This thesis document is a revisiting of the technical direction of Southern Illinois University's production of RENT. In it, in Chapter One, you will see background on the production itself with a ...table illustrating a breakdown of scenes from the script and technical challenges for each. Following this, Chapter Two begins discussion of the process I, as the technical director, went through, including preparation, the build itself, and the strike process. The final chapter of this document is a self-reflecting section where the issues I encountered during the process are addressed, and ways I can improve as a technical director are indicated.
In addition to receiving numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Rent, the two musicals dominated the 1996 Tony competition over several big-budget contenders, causing consternation among ...Broadway producers and speculation over the future of the American musical theatre. Larson writes of a world in which love transcends race, religion, sexual orientation, even death, creating a theatrical event that engages a new generation of theatregoers who can at last identify with the characters, stories, and music that they see and hear on Broadway.\n In the first, dancers Bingham, Glover, Hill, and Tate, perched about metal scaffolding, are joined by percussionists Crawford and King, using taps, chains, pipes, and levers to create intricate patterns of sound and movement.
THEATRE - Rent Shuttleworth, Ian
The Financial times (London ed.),
10/2007
Newspaper Article
Steve Anderson's musical arrangements flatten out Jonathan Larson's dynamics into the same bright piano, synthetic strings and remorselessly cheery drums that characterise so much of current ...assembly-line chart pop. Nor does he forget those vocal harmonies that are almost artificially perfect but manage to avoid delineating a tune. Ashley Wallen's choreography artfully suggests movement and energy without plotting anything complex or original. Like William Baker's direction, it all seems to take place line-abreast. This is pop-concert staging: get your stars moving across the front so the crowd can see them. When Baker tries to use the depth of the stage, he does so by layering flat two-dimensional compositions one behind another.
Rent control Nunns, Stephen
American Theatre,
11/1998, Volume:
15, Issue:
9
Trade Publication Article
"Rent" dramaturg Lynn Thomson has reached a settlement with the family of the late Jonathan Larson. It has been reported that Thomson will get dramaturgical credit on the title page of "Rent" ...programs.
The musical opened not long after that, with the technical glitches gone and a cast completely committed to the gritty story. Based loosely on Puccini's "La Boheme," it is about a group of scrappy ...artists in New York's East Village who are on the verge of being evicted from the cold, rundown warehouse they squat in and call home. Some are junkies fighting AIDS. Some are gay, also fighting AIDS. All are idealists, with a fierce sense of justice, and even fiercer passions. The musical "Rent," by Jonathan Larson, directed by Michael Greif and brought here by Broadway in Tucson, is 7:30 p.m. today, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, and 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday at the Tucson Music Hall, 260 S. Church Ave. in the Tucson Convention Center. Tickets are $24-$56. Prime orchestra seat rush tickets ($20) are available two hours before the performance on a first-come, first-served basis. Tickets at Ticketmaster, 321-1000, or in person at the TCC box office, 260 S. Church Ave. "Rent" cast members will perform from 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. Friday at Woody's, 3710 N. Oracle Road. The event is a benefit for the National Marfan Foundation and a celebration of cast member Aaron LaVigne's new EP. The 21-and-older event costs $10. 292-6702.
Another 'Rent' strike Nunns, Stephen
American Theatre,
07/1998, Volume:
15, Issue:
6
Trade Publication Article
The estate of "Rent" playwright Jonathan Larson is counter-suing Lynn Thomson seeking "a judicial declaration that they have the exclusive right to license and authorize third parties to exploit ...'Rent' in any and all mediums without the license, consent or participation of Thomson." Thomson recently lost a suit seeking co-authorship rights to the musical.
