Ending Of Rent...

I want to start out by saying that i am a big fan of jonathan larson and all of his work but whenever i leave rent i always felt something was wrong, and i realized that it is because the ending is so out of place
while i kno a musical isn't supposed to be realistic after the intense moments of angel dying and mimi coming close to death, mimi coming back to life and saying, blah blah blah, "i saw angel and she looked goooood" seems so stupid and out of place, i feel that if they stuck to the ending of the real boheme with mimi dying it would be much more powerful and moving, with roger possible making a speech about not wasting life to mourn
the ending kills any sense of realism and it was as if ms. lovett popped out of the oven at the end of sweeney and said, "sweeney, i saw signor parelli, and damn he looked good"
just wonderin if anyone agrees

oh hon, oldest discussion ever... haha... i have always wished that mimi would just die. i think this way it questions the whole point of the show.

Well, I'm sure she dies/they die soon after anyway.

In the RENT book that I own, people asked Jonathan why she didn't die, and he said he didn't have her die, because RENT was supposed to be about life, not about death. The whole seeing Angel thing I think is supposed to be that's what she saw when she was at first dying, but then doesn't. I definetely think the whole life/death message was a big reason why Mimi doesn't die. I guess that was just his preference.

Mabye he's trying to let the audience know that Angel's doing fine and that he's still "living on" in heaven and doing "good." And to keep his memory alive for the audience. Not just be like "oh yeah, he died earlier in ACT 2, but anyways.." Maybe? ha.

its in part because RENT is written in a brectian style, in which we are supposed to be removed from intence emotions. If Mimi dies we're enwrapped in sorrow.

Also, Jonathan needed Heroes in the AIDS crisis, by living Mimi and Roger are heroes/survivors....

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Besides the main reason that Jonathon didn't want RENT to be about death, but life. We've all heard that before.

Mimi not dying is the message of the show - no day but today. Roger went two to three months running away from his problems, not seeing Mimi and comes back to see her dying. And yeah, she prolly dies soon - but that moment when Mimi comes back to life is bitter sweet because they'll live what they have together. That's the message.

And Roger giving a speech is kinda lame. He could sing a sad song or whatnot, but that'd be so sad and everyone would leave the theatre thinking about death and it just wouldn't be a fun night.

pst, you two(Adamis... and jkfan) - JonathAn.

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Updated On: 7/18/05 at 09:36 PM