Two years later, as the pop-rock retelling of Puccini's La boheme arrives at Dallas' Majestic Theatre, the more grandiose hopes of Rent prophets have been deflated: Its songs did not rocket up the pop charts; Broadway isn't bursting with youth-oriented shows.

Nevertheless, Rent is a watershed for American musical theater. The Great White Way is again awash in new American musicals - 14 have opened in the last 11 months, including the current megahits The Lion King and Ragtime. On the whole, these new shows are leaner than the gargantuan European imports of the early 1990's, politically more engaged and racially more diverse.

Rent's influence probably hasn't peaked yet because Broadway has an even longer lead time to get product to an audience than Hollywood does. Sometimes it takes five or six years for a show to reach New York. So far, its influence is more in what scripts get backing for Broadway and how they are produced.

Rent director Michael Grief, though, says he expects Rent's example will eventually help more new composers like Jeffrey Stock (this season's Triumph of Love) finally get to Broadway.

"I see lots of talented people out there," he says. "One of the great things is that our success has opened the door a little."

Producers are more willing to roll the dice these days because of Rent's out-of-nowhere success. Writer-composer Jonathan Larson, who died of an aortic embolism at age 35 just before previews began, posthumously won the Pulitzer Prize for drama before Rent even opened on Broadway. The show also walked away with every major Broadway and off-Broadway award for musicals.

"I was surprised by the Pulitzer, but not at the huge reaction," Rent producer Kevin McCollum says. "I still see the show and get the same rush. We are part of the American culture now."

The Rent cast was even asked to entertain at the 1996 Democratic National Convention. It's a long way from "Happy Days Are Here Again" to a song celebrating the 525,600 minutes in a year of the life of a person with AIDS.

AN UNLIKELY SMASH

That's one reason Rent seemed an unlikely megahit. Its milieu - including drugs, sex in various permutations, and four leading characters who are HIV-positive - wasn't expected to attract the normally conservative audience for musicals. In contrast to the lavish spectacle that was the norm in 1996, Rent's mere 15 cast members occupy a stage decorated only with platforms and a large trash sculpture. Costume designer Angela Wendt picked up a lot of the wardrobe in thrift stores. And stars? Forget about it.

Casting unknowns made the show feel authentic. It also made it cheap. That helped Rent earn back its backers' investment even before it picked up its best-musical Tony Award. The contrast with the previous year's Tony winner, Sunset Boulevard, couldn't have been stronger. The Andrew Lloyd Webber show made money only during the relatively short time superstar Glenn Close stayed in the cast. Although it ran for nearly three years, it never turned a profit.

Rent, on the other hand, has been a consistent cash cow. For two years it has sold out every seat at New York's Nederlander Theatre, raking in an average of nearly $600,000 weekly. Contrary to some skeptics' expectations, who feared Rent's subject matter wouldn't play outside New York, its three - soon to be four - road companies have also made lots of money.

Although no song from Rent became a hit single, the two-CD original cast album has gone platinum, moving on and off the Billboard album chart as recently as January. It was among the top 200 albums for a total of 22 weeks and peaked at 19th place - a more-than-respectable showing for a musical, if not a breakthrough.

As for disappointing the pundits who hoped the score would bridge the gap between musicals and the singles charts, Mr. McCollum is philosophical.

"It's more of a commentary on how songs are selected for radio play than about Rent. Rent is a show, not a recording artist. It doesn't have a record contract, and Jonathan Larson doesn't either. Also, a lot of artists want to sing things they have a copyright interest in," he says.

The biggest spin-off from Rent, of course, would be a movie. From the time Rent hit Broadway, there have been reports that the producers have sold the rights for huge sums, but Mr. McCollum says that hasn't happened yet.

It's too early to tell whether Rent will have the staying power of a Phantom or Les Miz, but its impact on Broadway's spirit - you might even say its self-esteem - is already obvious.

During the first half of the '90s, the Great White Way was lucky to see three or four new musicals a year, few enough of them American. The nadir came in 1995, when only two new musicals opened, one a British import, the other a revue.

One measure of the energy Rent has infused Broadway with is a new confidence that brought in seven new musicals last spring. This season seven have already opened, including smaller shows such as Side Show and Triumph of Love alongside blockbusters such as The Lion King and Ragtime. And there are still three more months - and at least one more new show - left to go before the season officially ends April 30.

Rent's example has influenced these shows in several ways:

Scaled-back stagings: "Our influence has been that other shows that are differently visually spectacular are now given a chance. The style in which Rent is performed is less traditional, less typical. This has opened the way for other shows. I'm thinking of Side Show, even Chicago - full of beautiful images and original storytelling, but not your typical Broadway spectacular," Mr. Grief says.

Mix-and-match musical styles: Mr. Larson's score, while not pure rock 'n' roll, mines a lot of pop veins. It's a true fusion between pop and a Broadway idiom heavily influenced by Stephen Sondheim. This year's new scores have seen many more attempts to fuse styles than before: pop and authentic African music in the new songs for The Lion King, ragtime and Sondheim in Ragtime, soul and old-fashioned Broadway in Side Show, doo-wop and Latin music with Paul Simon-style pop in The Capeman.

A social conscience: Rent and 1996's other breakthrough musical hit, Bring in 'Da Noise, Bring in 'Da Funk, reclaimed the interest in social issues that a major part of musicals' heritage between the 1950s and '70s. Ragtime retells America's racial history in music (like Noise/Funk, but from a wider variety of perspectives). Side Show echoes a grand string of musicals from South Pacific through A Chorus Line to Rent in forcing the audience to identify with outsiders. The Capeman may be the most boldly political musical ever, asking the audience to examine its conscience over the treatment of an underprivileged and abused boy who confesses to a heinous murder.

Racial opportunity: Rent and Noise/Funk were musicals with largely minority casts that had huge appeal to mainstream audiences. This year The Lion King's cast is mostly African-American. The Capeman's cast is virtually all Hispanic. This year's potentially charming revue Street Corner Symphony, unfortunately robbed of a lot of its punch by cuts before it opened, has six African-Americans and one Filipino in its eight-person cast. Ragtime spends equal energies on three families - one WASP, one Jewish and one African-American. But the real stars of the show are the two black leads.

IGNORING RACE

Mr. McCollum, however, says he feels Rent's real contribution to the racial issue is the way the show ignores it.

"African-American artists don't often get to do a show that's not about being an African-American. Very often when you have multiracial shows, that's the whole point. Here race is not an issue. It's a reflection of the reality that we have to live together," he says.

"Hair did that. It didn't have an agenda about race. In Rent, you don't think about race, you think about community."

It's that sense of community, Mr. McCollum says, that he believes will be Rent's real legacy to the American theater.