Review: RENT at Queen's Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre

5 Quarter & Preachrs Productions are presenting the 1994 award-winning rock musical, Rent, loosely based on Giacomo Puccini's much-loved 1896 opera, La Bohème. It was an innovative piece in its day because, breaking from the musical theatre tradition of songs linked by dialogue, it borrowed from opera, the songs being linked by recitative, dialogue sung to music. The first time that I saw this musical in Adelaide, it was still a new work.

The work has a book, music, and lyrics by Jonathan Larson, with musical arrangements by Steve Skinner, music supervision and additional arrangements by Tim Weil, and the original concept and additional lyrics were by Billy Aronson. This production is directed by Benjamin Maio Mackay, with Jesse Budel as the musical director, Nina Richards as choreographer, and Matt Ralph as the technical director. Larson, sadly, never saw his musical performed, dying from an undiagnosed aortic aneurysm the night before it was due to open.

It is set in New York's East Village where poor, struggling artists live in a rented building, run by Benjamin 'Benny' Coffin III (Benoît, the landlord). He was once the roommate of several of the other characters: Roger, Mark, Tom, and Maureen, but he married a Rich Woman and now owns the building.

The characters mostly have recognisably similar names to those in Puccini's opera. The central character, Mimi Marquez, a stripper at the Cat Scratch club, and a heroin addict, has HIV/AIDS, whereas Mimi, Puccini's seamstress, had tuberculosis. She becomes the girlfriend of rock songwriter, Roger Davis (Rodolfo, a poet), who is also HIV positive.

Roger shares his room with Mark Cohen (Marcello, a painter), a Jewish-American filmmaker, who is also the narrator, and who has recently been dumped by his girlfriend, Maureen Johnson (Musetta, a singer), a bisexual performance artist and now Joanne Jefferson's (Alcindoro, a state counsellor) girlfriend. Joanne is a lesbian lawyer.

Angel Dumott Schunard (Schaunard, a musician), a drag queen, and drummer, becomes the partner of Tom Collins (Colline, a philosopher), a gay teacher who is first seen being mugged on his way to see Roger and Mark. Both of them have AIDS, forming the initial basis for them bonding.

It all begins on Christmas Eve, in Manhattan's East Village, where Mark and Roger are trying to keep warm in their bitterly cold room. It ends on Christmas Eve a year later. We follow the ups and downs of the fortunes of the characters, and witness their changing relationships.

Benjamin Maio Mackay plays Roger, presenting an emotionally complex character, initially devastated by the suicide of his HIV-positive past girlfriend. His character's grief is clearly displayed and there are great moments in Roger's interactions with Mimi, and the awkwardness of his inability to make a commitment for fear of being hurt again. Mimi is played by Tate Simpson, who establishes a great rapport with Benjamin Maio Mackay, and furthers that interpersonal awkwardness as Mimi tries to win over Roger. She creates a richly nuanced character.

Lindsay Prodea plays Mark who, like Christopher Isherwood, attempts to be detached, looking on and recording the events around him. Isherwood was the author of The Berlin Stories, beginning with the line "I am a camera", taken as the title of the play by John Van Druton, which then became the musical, Cabaret. Like Isherwood, however, Mark becomes involved with all around him, including Maureen, whom he wants back. Prodea gives a convincing performance as the lost soul of the piece.

Maureen is played by Cassandra Haines, who finds the playfulness and humour in her character. She brings out the flirtatiousness of Maureen, getting plenty of reactions from Mark and Joanne, among others.

The understudy for Joanne, Vaishnavi Rajaramanan, played the role at this performance. Her powerhouse voice, and her confidence and accuracy on her stratospheric high notes, stopped the show every time she sang. Keep an eye open for her in the future. She's going to go far.

Raul-Xavier Garcia plays Angel with great sensitivity and gentleness, quiet at first, then growing in stature as Angel switches into drag. Tom is played by Sampson Wilkop, in yet one more well-developed characterisation, working closely with Garcia to display a convincing relationship.

Nicholas Munday plays Benny, giving us a clear picture of a man seeking the almighty dollar, but eventually realising that people are what is important.

There is a very strong ensemble, with Wirra Benveniste, Clara Fahy, Chloe Fusco, Natasha Green, Liam Phillips, Jack Raft, and Shalee Madelaine Vicencio, and with Patty Glaviex as Mr. Grey

Various people leave messages on the answering machine, and it is very interesting to see who provides the disembodied voices, with some well-known names from the worlds of cabaret, musical theatre, and opera. The voices are provided by: Michelle Nightingale, Mark Oates, Nina Richards, Reuben Kaye, Tash York, and Chloe Fusco.

The Queen's Theatre is an appropriate choice of venue. Built in 1841, only five years after the colony was established, and the oldest theatre in Australia, it is now just a hollow shell with three of the original outer walls and the façade that was added in 1850. It suits the production, set in a crumbling district in New York. Over the years, this theatre fell into disrepair, was gutted, and then used for numerous other purposes. It is now used occasionally as a performance venue again. Within this distressed venue, Matt Ralph's set has been made from industrial scaffolding, creating stairs, rooms, streets, and other locations. He also designed the lighting, which ideally complements the set.

Musically and thematically, Rent is a product of its time, and it hasn't aged particularly well, but a sold-out opening night, and a very mixed audience, show that people of all ages still want to see it performed.

Although the programme told us that there were five members of Jesse Budel's band, three of them could only be heard from time to time, drowned by a muddy, booming bass, so loud that it occasionally suffered feedback, the continual piercing thud of the snare drum, and regularly crashing cymbals. These two also obscured many of the lyrics. The sound mix needs some serious work. Quiet passages, though, allowed us to hear the fine melodic and harmonic work being done by the guitars and keyboards, as well as every word being sung. This, hopefully, will be remedied. Interestingly, Jennifer Trijo, on keyboards and guitar, played Mimi in the 2016 production staged by Marie Clark Musical Theatre.

Opening night was sold out, so don't delay, book your tickets today.