RENT: A Rock Musical

For my written analysis of art, I chose the musical RENT. RENT is a rock musical relatively based on Giacomo Puccini's opera La Bohème. It tells the story of a group of friends in the early 1990s who are struggling artists that are struggling to survive in a society that is surrounded by the harsh reality of the AIDS/HIV epidemic and the struggle with the societal belief on sexuality, gender, and power dynamics. In this musical, the main characters Mimi, Rodger, Mark, Maureen, Angel Dumott Schunard, Tom Collins, Joanne, and Benny each come from a different lifestyle but all embody the struggles of sexuality, gender and power dynamics in some way or form. Thus, documenting the fear that people in this era lived in.
This musical highlights

Thus, creating an illusion that they as females are subjected to the theory that women are owned rather than they are their own person. An example of this is when the characters Maureen and Joanne sing the song “Take me or Leave me”. The song “Take me or Leave Me” conveys an argument between Maureen and Joanne about the flirty nature of Maureen. The phrase sung by Maureen in this song “Every single day, I walk down the street, I hear people say baby so sweet, Ever since puberty, everybody stares at me, boys, girls, I can’t help baby” can be seen as a metaphor for the general idea of the sexual objectification of women. The character Maureen can be seen as very comfortable with her sexuality. It is my belief that this line shows that she perhaps was not originally comfortable with the stares and catcalls she received but had to grow accustomed to it overtime because it was so frequent and eventually begin to see it as normal. It is my belief that the sexual objectification Maureen has received should never be deemed normal and should not be something that you should grow accustomed to. Alternatively, the character of Joanne, who is the partner of Maureen, disagrees with Maureen’s flirty nature. Joanne is cautious and uncomfortable with the idea of being “flirty”. Joanne’s phrase “I look before I leap, I love margions and discipline, I make lists in my sleep, baby what’s my sin?” in Take Me