Rent review – Jonathan Larson’s New York bohos move into the West End and unpack their passions

A nebbish bearing witness … Gaten Matarazzo (centre) and the cast of Rent. Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The GuardianView image in fullscreenA nebbish bearing witness … Gaten Matarazzo (centre) and the cast of Rent. Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The GuardianReviewRent review – Jonathan Larson’s New York bohos move into the West End and unpack their passionsTom Stoppard theatre, LondonStranger Things’ Gaten Matarazzo leads the grief-stricken 90s musical about friends living under the threat of Aids

Is Rent one of the musical greats? It’s a forever fan favourite – this new production extended its run even before the official opening – and its origin story holds a special place in theatre-kid hearts. Jonathan Larson, Rent’s creator, died just before the off-Broadway premiere in 1996, aged 35 – a poignant echo of its raggle-taggle bohemians in New York, living fast and fearing death will come before their time.

This production is developed by director Luke Sheppard (Paddington: The Musical) from his version at Manchester’s Hope Mill theatre. With onstage seating circling the space, Sheppard cradles the piece in community, knitting together the story’s hopeful vagabonds. Actors watch between scenes, harmonising and dancing in their chairs. The cast even form something close to a prayer circle for the imperishable Seasons of Love.

We’re in a grungy New York – even Howard Hudson’s light design looks grey and gritty. Everyone layers up against winter in thrift store coats, boots and berets, while the choreography (Tom Jackson Greaves) catches the hard-knock city in rucking elbows and weaving hips. Candles wink in jam jars, tiny lights against the harsh, dark chill.

View image in fullscreenFractious situationships … Travis Ross and Lazy Violet. Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The GuardianIt’s the story of La Bohème, kinda – taking a friendship circle of artists and wannabes from meet-cute in a power cut to last-act misery, riffing off Puccini’s sob-stringed melodies. Romances flare and falter, ambitions compromise, Aids is an ever-present anxiety.

Gaten Matarazzo (Stranger Things) plays narrator Mark, a nebbish bearing witness to his pals’ shenanigans with a Super 8 camera (footage plays around the stage). He observes fractious situationships between his bestie Roger (a snarling Travis Ross) and lost Mimi (Alexa Lopez); between his heedless ex Maureen (Lazy Violet) and Joanne (Danielle Fiamanya, preppy, goofy).

View image in fullscreenLives lost too soon … Jeevan Braich in Rent. Photograph: Tristram Kenton/The GuardianLoss steals into these young lives too soon. Part of the wrench of Seasons of Love is that kids shouldn’t have to keep toll of time (“Five hundred, twenty five thousand, six hundred minutes”) – they should see the moments stretch ahead of them. Instead, when Jeevan Braich’s shining drag queen dies, her lover falls into elegy – Billy Nevers’ lost, husky growl fills the air with grief.

Read moreThis show gives good value to Larson the composer – the band gunning through the score up on a gantry, the cast unleashing some rib-shaking vocals. Larson the lyricist emerges less well, engulfed by a wall of sound. The revival is produced with devotion but, nudging three hours, also needs dramaturgical tough love. Some lachrymose ballads don’t earn their stage time, while Maureen’s dairy-based activism (“Moo for me!”) has lost its bite. Keeping eight principal characters in play is tricky – Mark too often fades from his own story.

The glory of the show is its songs – the bolshie ensembles and scared solos. Larson threw everything into Rent, from wrenching anthems and witty tango to strutting pop. He must have hoped to have more musicals ahead of him, but wrote like he was running out of time – that desperate sense to write the songs, love the love and live the life is the urgent heart of the show.

At Tom Stoppard theatre, London, until 29 May