by Ian Mulder
Edmonton Weekly
November 5, 2000

The difference between the opinions of so-called "professional" critics and those of audiences is clearest when it comes to a run-of-the-mill Hollywood film or a typical Broadway musical. A film like this summer's Scary Movie will be panned by the critics but will break box office records. Similarly, Broadway musicals like Cats or Beauty and the Beast tend to get a rather flat critical reception, and then promptly go on to be warmly embraced by the public. And often, it's the saccharine-sweet "inauthenticity" of those musicals-the very factor that makes critics disdain them-that's the chief reason for their popular success. The masses like to feel good.

But somehow, the Broadway musical Rent has managed to appeal to everyone. Rent was the brainchild of Jonathan Larson, a sometime New York City waiter, who achieved a certain degree of success as a dramatist and songwriter: he wrote music for children's book cassettes (including Steven Spielberg's An American Tail), created songs for Sesame Street as well as several straight plays and stage musicals. Rent was by far his most ambitious achievement, and part of the show's mystique is due to the fact that, hours after the final dress rehearsal for its off-Broadway debut, Larson died of an aortic aneurysm, 10 days before he was to turn 36. As with musicians like Jeff Buckley and Nick Drake, Larson never achieved widespread fame until after he died. In 1996, Rent won the Pulitzer Prize for drama. Its Broadway production swept the Tony Awards and the Drama Desk Awards, while touring productions have taken Larson's creation around the world.

Christian soldiers onward

Christian Mena, who Edmonton audiences still fondly remember from his days with acclaimed local band Maracujah!, stars in the production that's about to hit town. He describes Larson as "really defining what Rent is all about. [Larson] had only quit working at the Life Café a month and a half before he died. He had done lots of shows, but never achieved financial success."

Rent is based on La Boheme, Puccini's classic opera about life and tragic romance among the bohemian subculture of Paris. Larson updated the story, transferring it into the world of struggling young artists living in New York's East Village. Mena plays Roger, an HIV-positive rock musician. "It is the story of a group of artists," he says, "living and loving in the time of AIDS."

As with any story based on real life tragedies, Rent runs the risk of romanticizing its setting and whitewashing the facts. It's a risk the cast is acutely aware of. "The story is told quite realistically through the eyes of an artist," says Mena, who says the circumstances of Larson's life give the show an unusual level of authenticity. After all, he says, "Rent only became successful after he died."

Few are called,
Mena is chosen

The Chilean-born and Edmonton-raised Mena landed the role of Roger in 1996. He moved to L.A. to join the show and worked on the production until the end of its first tour around this time last year. He then tried his hand at film and television with moderate success, snaring occasional roles in productions for Showtime and VH1, among others. He rejoined the tour after his replacement, Adam Pascal, began having "health problems." That's a showbiz phrase which might mean anything; Mena, on the other hand, makes it crystal-clear why he signed back up for another Rent tour. "I joined the tour again," he says, "because I saw that we would be coming to Edmonton."