“Tick, Tick,..BOOM!”

[rating=5]BoHo Theatre Company is back! After living thru the pandemic with hopes and desire to resume bringing wonderful musicals to Chicago, they are back. They are not only back, but are back with an amazing production of “Tick,Tick,..BOOM!’, the Jonathan Larson musical that tells his story. Yes, the creator of “Rent” who passed away before that classic opened on Broadway, had another musical to share. Shared after his death, Jane and I first saw this show at The Jane Street Theatre in New York- an off-Broadway theater. Since then we have seen several renditions of this sparkling small musical and then during the pandemic the made for streaming version that made it a full scale musical instead of a “chamber piece”.

Bo-Ho Theatre’s production is one that will knock your sox off. In order to prepare you for the review you are about to read. let me quote Boho’s press notes” Larson’s beloved musical with BoHo Theatre and their phenomenal cast of trans and gender non-conforming performers is inspired by grunge rock concerts as well as the queer and trans counterculture of downtown 1990’s New York City, with the hundreds of anti-trans bills being introduced across the country, it is now even more important than ever to normalize TGNC representation on stage and amplify trans joy.”  Okay- here we go!

The production of “Tick,Tick,…Boom!” now on stage at the Edge Theater on Broadway is as intense as one can get in a 90 minute musical. It is , in many ways, Jonathan Larson telling his story. Here he is, played by Alec Phan ( a solid performer that never leaves the stage and is able to play the keyboard as well as guitar and sings up a storm). Phan’s Jonathan is an aspiring playwright who wants to write his first musical before he turns 30, which is right around the corner. That is what the title represents… the ticking of the clock and the BOOM, the explosion of him never reaching his goal!

The other members of the cast are Luke Halpern as Susan and Crystal Claros as Michael. Now you may think this to be a typo. Shouldn’t Michael be Luke and vice-versa? No. Director Bo Frazier has opted to cast the show based on the ideals of the theater company as expressed in the first paragraph. Guess what? It worked!

NOTE The best way to share the above with you is to give you wording as per the BoHo Team:

“The other members of the cast are Luke Halpern as Susan and Crystal Claros asMichael- characters who in Frazier’s vision are in a non-binary or genderqueer way. If you just sit back and watch the story unfold and let these dynamite actors do their thing,very soon, it doesn’t matter what their gender presentation is at all. We accept both Luke and Crystal as the characters they are bringing to life on stage”.

If you just sit back and watch the story unfold and let these dynamite actors do their thing, very soon, it doesn’t matter which gender is which. We accept both Luke and Crystal as the characters they are bringing to life on the stage. They are both right on target and make these characters quite believable. In fact, I have seen 7 productions of this play and this one held me closer than the others by a long shot.

Halpern has a voice that is wide in range and powerful. Claros is a great comic and brings a certain flair to Michael that I have never seen before.

The music is very Jonathan Larson as you will hear several places where you can sense that “Rent” is in the air. “Come To Your Senses” is a powerful song and there is no question that Larson’s hero, Steven Sondheim is paid homage to in the song “On A Sunday Breakfast” ( think about “Sunday In The Park With George” and you will see what I am talking about).

In this story, we hear about a musical written by Larson called “Superbia” ( Orwell’s “1984” as a musical). Orwell’s family said no, so back to the drawing boards. “Tick,Tick,..Boom” did play ealrier, but never won the accolades of “Rent” and since this was the only other play that the world has from this brilliant writer, it is fair to say, theater companies should keep it alive in the manner that Boho is. This is a story about life and change and the world changing around us. It is very real and Boho has made it even more so.

This is 90 minutes of quality theater with some wonderful music and a most talented cast. In many productions, Jonathan and his keyboard are the only music. The addition of a small band of musicians worked well and at places where Jonathan was supposed to be at the keyboards,  Phan was ( and he is quite good). At other times, musical director Harper Caruso handled the chore beautifully. Her musicians were Keith Burman on guitar, Willow Bloom on bass and Maddi Vogel on drums.

While there is not a lot of choreography in the show, what there is, (Jamal Howard) is well done. This is a show where sound (Eric Backus) and lighting (Piper Kirchhofer) are of great importance and they worked. I never needed my hearing aids at all. I took them off during the opening number. The set is simple, but the props are quite important to telling this story , so hats off to Noah Elman) for a job well done!

If you love “Rent”, I know that you will find this production a perfect combo- “Tick,Tick,..Boom!” will continue at The Edge Theater located at 5451 N. Broadway thru February 5th ( I am pretty sure they will extend) with performances as follows:

Thursdays  7:30 p.m.

Fridays  7:30 p.m.

Saturdays  3 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.

Sundays  3 p.m.

Industry Night MONDAY, January 30th  7 p.m.

Open Caption  1/21 and 1/28 at 3 p.m.

Tickets are $35 for general admission, $20 for seniors, military , first responders.  , $12 for transgender and gender non-conforming audience members, students and education professionals.

visit www.bohotheatre.com to order yours

Parking at the Edge is on the street, some metered, some not so please pay attention to the signs on Broadway.

To see what others are saying, visit www.theatreinchicago.com, go to Review Round-Up and click at “Tick,Tick,..Boom!”.