RENT Live! (Catching Up)

RENT Live! aired on FOX on January 27.  I think we were out that night seeing our favorite local band, so I recorded it and told my sister we could get together and watch it later.  We finally did that this weekend, along with two other friends.  This review a little late to the game, but here we are.

As it turns out, Brennin Hunt, the guy playing Roger, broke his ankle during the dress rehearsal.  As a result, most of the RENT Live! was actually a pre-recorded version of the dress rehearsal.  That was unfortunate.  They did the final scene live, and they included the original Broadway cast members, so that was exciting.  Everyone looked and sounded great.  Poor Brennin.  During that last scene, he sat on the table with his foot in a huge cast and propped on a chair, but he still sang the heck out of Your Eyes.  Way to persevere!

Overall, I thought the casting of Brennin as Roger and Vanessa Hudgens as Maureen was perfect.  The other cast members were good too, but these two stood out for me.  Both of them did so well in their roles.  Brennin is quite easy on the eyes and his voice was great.  (Incidentally, I just looked him up on IMDb, and he was a contestant on The Voice.)

There was some pitchy-ness in some of the songs, and some of the supporting cast members were off in pivotal songs like Will I? and Seasons of Love.  I had to keep in mind that this was a dress rehearsal and perhaps if they had really done it live, they would have been pitch perfect.

I noticed early on that some lyrics were changed, mostly due to cursing, so I figured that they'd probably change a lot in La Vie Boheme, and I wondered if they'd do the sex song (Contact).  In La Vie Boheme, Maureen did not moon the businessmen and they changed "dildos," but left in everything else including, "mucho masturbation," "to sodomy," "to marijuana!" and, "to S&M!" --that surprised me!  And they did do Contact, but it was condensed and didn't have all of the sexually suggestive choreography that the stage show has.

I've lost count of how many times we've seen RENT (maybe 20?!), but I'll add this one to the list.  Overall, I thought it was enjoyable.  I was glad to hear the music again, and I've been listening to the original soundtrack all week.  As we were watching the show, I told my friends that I was having a hard time controlling myself and not singing all the songs to them.  Now I sing away!