How to go
What: “Rent”
Where: Victoria Theatre, 138 N. Main St., Dayton
When: Sept. 5-6; 8 p.m. Friday and 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday
Cost: $27-$52
Tickets: Call Ticket Center Stage (937) 228-3630 or visit www.ticketcenterstage.com
More info: www.daretodefyllc.com
Jonathan Larson’s groundbreaking 1996 Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning rock opera “Rent,” a contemporary adaptation of Puccini’s “La Boheme,” will be presented Friday and Saturday at the Victoria Theatre courtesy of the emerging Dare to Defy Productions.
Larson’s blunt, compelling, humorous, romantic and touching masterwork chronicles a group of starving artists struggling to make ends meet on New York’s Lower East Side in the mid-1990s. Through the course of one year they fight to overcome economic disparity, discrimination, disillusionment, drug addiction, heartbreak, HIV and more while holding onto their dreams and the inherent value of friendship. The significance of living for today and measuring life in love emotionally resounds.
“We’re giving the show a fresh look while paying homage to the original,” said director JJ Parkey, a Wright State University theater graduate who staged an outstanding production of “Spring Awakening” for Encore Theater Company in 2012. “I’ve always felt that ‘Rent’ is truly about people connecting to each other for the first time. There is a lyric in ‘What You Own’ that mentions ‘connection in an isolating age.’ The characters ultimately lose their connection because of fear. Fear of someone else hurting them and fear of their own potential. My whole concept is centered on connection, which makes ‘Rent’ relevant. Some may feel ‘Rent’ is dated, and it can be if you look at it from an epidemic or pandemic perspective involving the AIDS crisis. But when you look at it through connection, which I believe to be its true theme, it becomes timeless.”
Parkey, superb last season as Dr. Frank N. Furter in Zoot Theatre Company’s “The Rocky Horror (Puppet) Show,” felt motivated to approach the material by emphasizing its language as if staging Shakespeare. He acknowledges the strengths of the score, but found the text to be a source of fascinating possibilities upon thorough investigation.
“Our take, as a company, on these characters has been to look at the script and notice every word, every punctuation mark,” he explained. “Jonathan Larson left us many clues that are all too often glossed over in other productions. So many people have the original Broadway cast stuck in the their minds, and what that was can certainly be considered a beautiful thing, but if we keep recreating that it can make ‘Rent’ stale or unable to survive. Larson’s art is gorgeous and his music beautiful, but the thing I love about him the most is his language, his poetry.”
In addition to the aforementioned “What You Own,” fantastic numbers include “Seasons of Love,” “One Song Glory,” “Light My Candle,” “Out Tonight,” “I’ll Cover You,” “La Vie Boheme,” “Take Me or Leave Me” and the title tune.
“We must not forget ‘Rent’ is an opera,” Parkey said. “All too often people turn up the speakers really loud and scream their way through the songs, but since ‘Rent’ is an opera, the show is focused on dance, poetry, drama and music equally. It plays on all of these human passions, which is what the appeal of ‘Rent’ is.”
The cast, encompassing actors who have notably appeared in productions at the Human Race Theatre Company and Wright State University, includes Mark Beyer as Roger Davis, Paige Dobkins as Maureen Johnson, Michael Embree as Angel Dumott-Schunard, Lisa Glover as Mimi Marquez, Mathys Herbert as Benjamin “Benny” Coffin II, Bobby Mitchum as Mark Cohen, Shawn Storms as Joanne Jefferson, Isaac I. Tobler as Tom Collins, and ensemble members Marcus Bedinger, Jamal Cann, Haylee Dobkins, Zach King, Danielle Kubasky, T.C. Schreier and Mackensie Vonderbrink.
“I want to challenge our audience to look at the way they live and view their lives,” Parkey said. “Material things are not important. What is important is the person in front of me and my relationship to them. What is important is the person holding my hand.”
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