Rent (Help!)

Hi guys. Well, I've got an informative speech due for my Basic Oral Communication class, and I think it's a bit obvious what the topic is.

Anyhoo- I need testimonials of other fans, mainly your favorite experience (or time seeing it or w/e). PM, please!

Also- when did Jesse and Taye leave the B'way cast, and I also need to know how both runs of Jai Rodriguez lasted (if available)?

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Rent! Help! My exact feeling towards my first viewing of the show. Actually, my ONLY viewing of the show, but I have since fallen in love with the music. Messy show, very badly designed, but I look forward to seeing new directors approach it in the years to come.

Ok, I'll try to help you out, maybe others will follow.

I saw the show for the first time with my sister-in-law, Melissa, in Fort Lauderdale a few months ago, and I was blown away. So much so, that I convinced five of my cousins in New Jersey, who have never even thought about seeing a broadway show, to meet me in New York in April and see it with me.

I was too cheap to buy the soundtrack at the theater, so instead I spent the next few days searching everywhere for it. For all of my effort, I saved a whopping $4.00, what a moron, right?
But in the end it was well worth it, those 2 cds have yet to leave my car's cd player.

Melissa and I felt a little left out at the theater because we felt like the only 2 people there who hadn't already seen it. It's the first show I've been to where I could here the audience singing along like they were at a concert, it was actually kind of moving.

I'm not sure if this is the kind of stuff you're looking for, but feel free to PM me if you need anymore or if you want to ask me specific questions. In fact, maybe you should post some questions and people will feel more comfortable answering.

For the dates that the cast members left, I would try google or their websites, if they have a website, it should have their bio.

Good Luck,
Gina

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hmm...well i saw rent for the first time almost five years ago when i had just finished high school. It was my friend's graduation present and he took me to see it. We had done a VERY bad arrangement of rent songs for my concert choir, so i kind of knew the music...(well i thought i did, little did i know it was the g-rated version). It was the second broadway show I had ever seen, and it has left such an imprint in my mind.

I actually started tearing up at the song "Rent" just because it was so overwhelming, and I had never experienced anything like that before. I had a good cast too, Trey Ellet as Mark, Norbert Leo Butz as Roger, and Karen Olivio was the understudy at the time, but she went on that night. I'm almost positive Jai Rodriguez was Angel. It was an unbelievable night, and as cliche as this sounds, it pretty much changed my life.

This past saturday I won the rent lottery, so i was literally front and center for the show...after 15+ times of seeing it, I was a little jaded with the show, but a friend convinced me that seeing it that close gives you a completely different perspective. She was right! Of couse, it helps to have the kick ass combination of Matt Caplan, Cary Shields and Karmine Alers...they were GREAT! Of course, this experience was completely different from my first time, now that i know all the music and practically the whole book by heart, but i still get such a great vibe from seeing it, and it is one of the few shows that after i leave, makes me want to get my stuff together to really pursue a career on broadway, or just music in general.

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Just PM'd you! :)

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The news of RENTS opening night performance reached me in Kutztown, Pennsylvania at the dinner theater I was working at, at the time. All the youngins' were screaming over the beauty of the two leading men, and although I agreed I needed something more. When I invited them over my house I started asking them about the story which they didn't know. But listening to the cast album all summer long, every day, everywhere we went...the small, dedicated and talented cast pulled together and learned from this wonderful show. My wish is people get past the beauty to see the realism, the struggle and power of the voice.

the best memory I have involving Rent:

After seeing La Boheme with my dad I found that There were a lot of similarities in the two shows. We spent the entire 3.5 hour drive home listening to the rent OBCR and talking about the two shows...it was great to be able to bridge the age gap between me and my father, and the artistic gap. See my dad sings Opera and I'm more of a contemerary broadway musical singer. It was something we were both able to relate with each other.

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