Tag: musical theatre

525,600 minutes in a year.

That’s 1440 minutes every day that each person has to make the myriad of choices, big and small, that we all face daily.

Ultimately though, the one choice that will really make a meaningful difference in this world, both for individuals and for humanity as a whole, as trite as it may sound, is LOVE.

If we can tap into that emotion every day, especially the dark days, and more importantly show it in our actions, the haters can’t win.

I was lucky enough to see Rent onstage in Vancouver twenty years ago, two years after its debut. Rent is a rock musical written by Jonathan Larson, who died suddenly at 36, the morning of its off-Broadway debut in 1996. Talk about no day but today. RIP Jonathan.

I listened to the soundtrack on my road trip last month because the Victoria Operatic Society is performing the musical this fall. My nine year old will be disappointed there are no suitable roles for her. ☺️

Rent is loosely based on the opera “La Bohème” by Puccini, which concerns starving artists in Paris in the 1840s, facing the tuberculosis epidemic. Rent places the struggling artists in New York City in the 1990s, facing the AIDS epidemic.

In 2018, the messages of both these great works are more important than ever as the world faces the trumpidemic that threatens to tear apart the United States. Is that melodramatic? Maybe. I hope so.

As a white, cisgender woman growing up and living in a middle class neighbourhood in Canada, I have been spared the horrific abuse I see hurled at the marginalized, though even as a young girl it hurt my heart to realize humans could treat each other so badly.

Now being a member of another marginalized group, the disabled, I have an inkling (the teeniest for sure) of the challenges so many people face in being accepted and valued in our society.

Diversity, tolerance, love, friendship, hope, despair, addiction, disease, discrimination, the class divide and the death of art – timeless themes that we human beings should have a better handle on by now.

Instead, a Muppet-like wannabe dictator (sorry Jim Henson) a misguided, heartless president is sowing the seeds of hatred, intolerance and bigotry through his ridiculous Twitterganda and isolationism.

The strongest weapon against his particular brand of nastiness, is LOVE. Seasons of love, people, that’s what we need.

No day but today.

Have you seen Rent? If not, I highly recommend! The actual musical is way better but they did a great job with the movie which includes most of the original Broadway cast. It’s on Netflix. 😊

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I propose we start a new hashtag movement. It seems the haters and the trolls are the ones who spend time and energy spewing hatred online. Rather than wasting our (precious spoonie) energy by engaging in a useless attempt at intelligent debate, let’s drown them with a tsunami of #fightthetrumpidemic and #chooselove hashtags every time they comment.

In order to stem the tide of ignorance and hate, we have to overcome the apathy, stop talking amongst ourselves and start fighting back. Who’s with me?