Yes, well, the Lovely Carla and I saw the movie (we never saw the play), and the theme resounded in our ears, loud and clear. We occupy a space, and then we move on, we pay "the Rent," we are all "renters," we own nothing, everything is temporary. How do you measure a year? In Seasons of Love?
We went to see Jonathan Larson's rock-based musical, "Rent," last night (I especially wanted to see it - doing research on my own Rock Opera don't you know?!), and the story of a group of marginal artists in a rough neighborhood in NYC really resonated with us. It's such a great, death-haunted piece with the back story that Larson died right before previews of the original theatrical run, and with AIDS front and center in the lives of the main characters. So you have young beautiful people (who can sing and dance too) singing life-affirming songs about mutual masturbation, and T-cells, and cross-dressing, and all the wonders of modern urban civilisation in America circa 1990.
I think it was life-affirming. As long as you can get your head around the "truth," that anyone of us can disappear at any moment. That all we have is now, that all we have is love, that none of it lasts beyond this moment. And how do you live with that knowledge, (experience the yawning canyon of sadness), I mean really know it, feel it in every fibre of your being? "Viva la boheme!"