"BroadwayGirl, you said you haven't seen it often because you've had bad casts. But you had little if any hesistation to see Adam and Anthony. They were the only additions to the current cast (Tamyra Gray hadn't been announced yet). So if a new Roger and Mark is enough to convince you the cast is worth checking out, have you seen it since Christopher Hanke joined?
Personally, I think requiring Rent to be in ideal circumstances, with only critically-acclaimed cast members that love the show and understand it 100% before you'll deem it worthy of your presence makes you a fair-weather Rent fan, at best. I mean, I'd love Godspell if Adam were playing Jesus, Raul were playing Judas and probably see it once a week. But I definitely wouldn't claim to be a Godspell fan. For god's sake, at least admit you're seeing it only for Adam and Anthony."
I have never seen Hanke in anything before and have no idea whether or not he can handle the role, so I have no reason to spend money on seeing a show just because Matt Caplan is gone and some new guy I know nothing about is in there. Unless some actors that I know do good work are in there, it's hard for me to convince myself to spend money on the show knowing I very well may sit through the whole thing again listening to a bunch of teenagers wail their lungs out as a bunch of clueless actors schlump around the stage.
I don't require Rent to be in "ideal circumstances" more than I would any other show. If any of my other favorite shows had been fortunate enough to run as long as Rent is, and any of those shows started to have the same awful pattern of utter carelessness from all aspects that Rent has in the past few years, I would not see THOSE shows either unless someone who I trusted could bring a little dignity to it was in there. It has nothing to do with being "critically acclaimed." Heck, I don't think critics even touched Will Chase when I saw him in the show, but I went when he was in it, because I know he was a serious actor who could invest something in it.
I don't even know what you mean y "fair-weather fan." You act as if Rent is a sports team; it's not. I hate it when any work of art that I think could be important and meaningful is given lousy treatment, which is exactly what my experience has been with Rent when I've seen it in the past few years: a great show with lousy actors, that looks and sounds as if the director and musical director hadn't been there in years. It's not Rent; it was like amateurs trying to do Rent. I don't see why a fan would put up with that.
I would never see a show for Adam Pascal or Anthony Rapp. I've never seen either one in anything other than Rent; I would hardly call myself a fan of either one of them. If I see them perform in anything other than Rent in the future, I'm sure it'll be because I'm interested in the show much more than either one of them. I bought tickets when I heard they were coming back because I know that they are (or at least were at one point) very much capable of telling Rent's story.
"Lotto tickets are $20 and they've practically been giving them away lately. If someone wasn't able to scrape together an extra $20 once in recent years, how could they afford the advance tickets during Adam and Anthony's comeback?"
Because there are constantly other shows opening besides Rent that also offer $20 or $25 rush tickets, and I (and I'm sure others) hardly have enough money to see all of those. Is seeing other shows a bad thing?
Updated On: 5/6/07 at 10:11 PM