The 2008 Stage Version Of Rent Shows Why This Gut-Wrenching Musical Has Endured For So Long

It's interesting to me how a large amount of art can be dubbed both timely to the specific period it premiered in and timeless in the types of emotions and characters it grapples with. Rent, a Broadway musical penned by Jonathan Larson, is very much one such production, with its story chronicling the experiences of eight adults in their early twenties grappling with financial insecurity and the AIDS crisis being very much something that resonated powerfully with audiences in the mid-1990's. For decades at that point, the AIDS crisis had ravaged the LGBTQA community and instead of creating more empathy for members of this community, individuals like former President Ronald Reagan only made those suffering from AIDS and the LGBTQA community itself even more of a pariah in American society than it already was. 

The Toxic Avenger Musical Has Energy To Spare But Doesn't Utilize That Energy Properly

The Toxic Avenger is a musical currently being performed by the Uptown Plays at the Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas, Texas from August 27, 2016 through September 11, 2016. This review covers the opening night performance given on August 27, 2016.

Many of Broadway's biggest musicals have been based on motion pictures, most notably adaptations of animated Hairspray and Beauty And The Beast. Following in the tradition of said movies is The Toxic Avenger, a musical adaptation of a well-known 1980's B-movie (a film I have not seen, for full disclosure) that debuted in New Brunswick, New Jersey in 2008. And in terms of Broadway musical adaptations of notable Hollywood movies, it's overall quality is closer to Bullets Over Broadway than The Lion King.