Starving artists struggling.

I can relate.

After a not-so-blockbuster silver screen debut, someone had the bright idea to film Jonathan Larson’s award-winning musical “Rent” live on Broadway. Populated with a cast of relatively unknowns, the story about East Village bohemians struggling to live through the AIDS epidemic, drug addiction, and class warfare—all while trying to pay their rent—came alive with a spirit and zest unlike the big screen production. 

I’m a sucker for live theater. This production made me feel like I was sitting in the audience, infected by the power of performance art and its artistic nuances, watching the now familiar story unfold against a stark backdrop of table tops, twisted metal, raised platforms, and holiday lights. When Maureen performed her cow jumping over the moon number and asked the audience to join in, I almost wanted to moo back.

Okay, I did moo back. I also clapped when Roger brought a shivering Mimi back from the dead. No one around to hear but the guinea pig. What’s the harm?

Last year around this time, my beautiful fifty-year old sister-in-law passed away after a two-year battle with breast cancer. The loss was so devastating our family is still trying to come to terms with the gaping holes in our hearts. Immersing myself in this end of the millennium musical fraught with love and pain, struggle and surrender, and life and death brought all of those emotions flooding back. 

Maybe I am just a tad too emotional, but there is something very beautiful and simultaneously terrifying about the fragility of life. This live action update of La Boheme touched my soul at its naked core. Here today, gone tomorrow. Nothing is guaranteed.

The movie even comes with an intermission. Ten whole minutes. Just enough to locate a box of tissues and settle in for the emotional roller coaster.