Rent Opens Today, 12 May
Date: 12 May 1998
The multi award-winning hit Broadway musical Rent opens today at the West End's Shaftesbury Theatre, following previews from 21 April.
Four key members from the original Broadway cast have come over specially to reprise their roles. They include Wilson Jermaine Heredia as 'Angel', Jesse L. Martin as 'Tom Collins', Adam Pascal as 'Roger' and Anthony Rapp as 'Mark'.
Inspired by Puccini's opera La Boheme, Rent celebrates a community of young East Villagers as they struggle with the soaring hopes and tough realities of modern day New York.
Rent originally opened at the New York Theatre Workshop on 13 February 1996 before moving to Broadway's Nederlander Theatre on 29 April that year. The show received rave reviews and immediately became a sell-out hit, with audiences waiting months for tickets. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Rent subsequently made a clean sweep of the 1996 New York theatre awards - winning four Tonys including Best Musical, Best Score and Best Book; the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Musical; six Drama Desk Awards including Best Musical, Best Music, Best Lyrics and Best Book; the Outer Critics' Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Musical; the Drama League Award for Best Musical; three Obie Awards including Outstanding Book, Music & Lyrice and Outstanding Direction; and two Theatre World Awards.
Rent was created and composed by Jonathan Larson who died on the night of the first off-Broadway performance. It is directed by Michael Grief with musical supervision by Tim Weil and choreography by Marlies Yearby. It is produced in London by Jeffrey Seller, Kevin McCollum, Allan S. Gordon and New York Theatre Workshop, in association with Duncan C. Weldon.
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