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1* Why did Roger begin the song "Light My Candle" with the words "What did you forget?" You can see it [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urfB-_iX-gE here]] as the movie version, but it also happens in the original Broadway recording. Clearly, in the movie, he can't have mistaken Mimi for Mark, who had just left, and as Mimi has to tell Roger her name at the end of the song she can't actually have left anything there. Seems small, but I mulled that over the rest of the entire movie.
2** Eh? Roger, upon opening the door, thought she was Mark coming back for something he forgot. Not sure how you missed that!
3*** Correct. The fact that Mark has just left is EXACTLY why Roger would have thought it was him coming back. Have you never stepped into the driveway, then realized you didn't pick up your wallet or you left your jacket or something? What you do is immediately turn around and go get it. Since a key had just been thrown down to Collins, it also makes sense that there may have been a knock... if Collins didn't have his own key, that's 2 for the three of them to share... someone has to do without. Unless there was only the one key, in which case it makes even MORE sense.
4** Remember also that Roger is essentially a shut-in at the start of the play. Collins makes a point of saying that he doesn't even answer the phone. There's no reason for him to believe that anyone other than Mark (who he knows doesn't have a key - Collins has that) would be at the door.
5
6* Has anyone noticed that, in the stage play, Mark leaves the apartment right before One Song Glory, saying "Maureen calls"—i. e., "I'm gonna go fix Maureen's equipment". Later on, Mark is right back in the apartment with Roger, Collins and, later, Angel and Benny, with no indication that he even went over to the site of Maureen's protest. Then, directly after that scene, Mark arrives at Maureen's performance space, hence his meeting with Joanne and the well-liked "Tango: Maureen". I wonder why that scene wasn't just placed between "Light My Candle" and "Voice Mail #2". Pretty serious gap in continuity.
7** This is explained on the Fridge Logic page. When he walks back in with Collins he says something like "Look who I found" implying that he went to the street, bumped into Collins and Angel and then walked with them to the apartment to have a little hangout (probably persuaded by the goodies Collins brought) and then leaves after "Today 4 U" to attend to Maureen.
8** Equivalent place in the film - Angel had treated Collins...
9
10* Why didn't Roger use "One Song Glory" as his, well... "one song glory"?
11** If we pretend that by "Roger" you mean "Jon Larson," well ... he pretty much DID, didn't he? It caught on a heckuva lot more than the crap song he did for Mimi. Arguably, it's one of the most famous and catchy songs of the entire show.
12** Considering this is a musical, it's not really a song in-universe. It's just him giving us a bit of exposition, while angsting and rehashing the big events in his life in-universe.
13** This is almost FridgeBrilliance - because the song Roger finally writes is so much more amateurish than the ones in the musical, it's clearly set apart from the rest of the songs and libretto.
14
15* What exactly is going on during "contact"?
16** Hate-fucking (for those in bad relationships) or [[spoiler: don't-give-a-fuck fucking (for those dying of AIDS)]]
17*** Or mucho masturbation for Mark. And has anyone ever noticed that it's his voice that says "Where'd it go?" That's just weird.
18*** When watching the 2008 Broadway DVD version, you can clearly see Mark come out of the sheet and immediately get out of the way while everyone else is saying "It was bad for me, was it bad for you?".
19
20* How did Roger [[spoiler: get enough money for gas to and from Santa Fe, considering the fact that he had to sell an electric guitar just to afford the car]]?
21** It was the early 90s. Wasn't as expensive to get back then. [[spoiler: And maybe he sold some other stuff, too?]]
22** Also, cars in movies, TV, and theater tend to get ''great'' mileage, [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief for some reason]].
23
24* How in the ''world'' did ThePowerOfRock [[spoiler:somehow make Mimi's '''fever break''']]? (other than [[EmotionalAppeal the obvious]] [[ArtisticLicenseBiology Her AIDS-infected body would not be strong enough to fight off]] whatever it was [[spoiler: killing her (almost), be it a cold, starvation, anorexia, overdose, or whatever it was that was killing her. (It's implied to be a disease that she can't fight off, but I don't remember it ever being made abundantly clear outside of implication.]]
25** It's pretty obvious: ThePowerOfRock combined with [[spoiler: DivineIntervention (in the form of a literal Angel).]]
26*** Plus as everyone who ever watched Damn Yankee's music video "High Enough" knows, the power of rock can do anything if you rock hard enough. Even deflect bullets! Ted Nugent proved that!
27** In reply to the ArtisticLicenseBiology note, [[spoiler: is it clear that Mimi has full-blown AIDS? The show indicates she is HIV positive, but the progression to full-blown AIDS is the part that destroys the immune system. It could be just her body fighting off the infection, something that is possible if the body has progressed to full-blown AIDS]]
28*** We know [[spoiler: Roger has AIDS ("his girlfriend April left a note saying "we've got AIDS...") as do Angel and Collins ("this body provides a comfortable home for the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome"). The distinction between HIV and AIDS was much less well-understood around the time the musical is set (1988-1990), and that was part of the reason the treatments available (like AZT) had limited efficacy. It's probably safe to assume Mimi had AIDS also, or that her HIV becomes AIDS during the play, which would account for her declining health.]]
29** On that note, [[spoiler: what exactly was it that almost killed Mimi?]]
30*** It's never made clear, is it? Though for some reason I always assumed [[spoiler: hypothermia]]. I'm probably very wrong.
31*** [[spoiler: Hypothermia would actually make sense if it wasn't for the fever. Possibly tuberculosis or similar respiratory condition - maybe a link back to ''Theatre/LaBoheme''?]]
32*** Opportunistic infection? [[spoiler: Mimi had just either been to or dropped out of rehab, which would be a physically grueling process on the body of someone simultaneously dealing with AIDS.]]
33** Christopher Columbus, director of TheMovie, stated in the commentary (I think?) that he believes Mimi [[spoiler: died]] soon after the musical ended, anyway. Then again, [[AdaptationDecay what he did]] could possibly negate any kind of opinion he has, YMMV.
34*** Something like that sounds right. I know Anthony Rapp said something about how someone can get better and die within a week or something, so maybe his word means something more even to the fans that don't like the movie.
35*** Agreed. IIRC, Adam Pascal commented that maybe jumping on the table and starting CPR would detract from the "operatic" sense of the sequence. Personally, I always found it difficult seeing that sequence and counting 58 seconds into the Golden Hour with sod-all happening...
36*** Collins DID call 911. He was put on hold.
37*** AZT was of limited use for treating AIDS around the time the play is set (1988-1990ish). Typically a patient would take it, would experience a rapid recovery for a few months, and then deteriorate again very quickly. We find Mimi apparently fairly healthy at Christmas but by Halloween Mark notes she's [[spoiler: running out of time.]] It's not difficult to believe she was [[spoiler: definitely going to die.]]
38** Given that this is a musical, we can perhaps simply make some ArtisticLicense allowances for the healing powers of music and love.
39
40* Is Angel a transvestite or transgender?
41** I would call Angel a cross-dresser. Generally, transgender people feel uncomfortable appearing or being referred to as their born gender, which is not the case, seeing as we see Angel dressed as a man at least twice, and referring to herself as such in La Vie Boheme. The 'To Sodomy, it's between God and me' choreography also struck me as very un-transgender-like. The term that Mark uses, 'drag queen', doesn't fit either, because a drag queen is specifically a man who dresses as a woman for the purpose of entertainment. Cross-dresser or gender non-conformist seem to fit Angel the best.
42** This is rather arguable, but she seems to be transgender, based on her behavior. That is, she's a girl in mind and a male in body. She's not a transvestite, because a transvestite would have a male inner identity and a female outer identity, and thus act less, well, feminine... She's not transsexual because she has not (and obviously will never) undergone the necessary operations.
43*** Also, during the Broadway version of [[spoiler: the funeral scene, Angel's walking around the back of the stage draped in a white bed sheet during the eulogies. During Mark's, when he refers to her as "he", she looks at him like, wtf. When Mark corrects himself and says "she", she looks and smiles like, "Thaaats better ^^"]]
44** I've always worked under the assumption that she considers herself genderqueer or a genderfuck.
45** He self-identifies as male most of the time, but it varies. I figure it's clinched when Collins calls him "he". ("I can't believe he's gone...") Transvestite.
46** S/he self-identifies as female plenty. Collins has probably dated men for a long time, and is not used to the idea of a genderqueer or trans partner, and reverts to the default he by accident, or it could be the fact that the people like Maureen, Joanne, and Mimi, who saw her/im first dressed like a normal (if rather eccentric) woman engaged in conversation fully enveloped in the female persona refer to Angel as 'she' while Collins who saw Angel first in a male persona refers to her/im as a he. Mark and Roger, who saw Angel first in a pretty obvious costume with overdone makeup, vary from he to her. It may be that Angel is genderqueer, and doesn't mind which one is used, so s/he lets her friends call her/him what they want. There are more than three options, and if s/he were a transvestite, s/he would identify as male, and probably have a problem with her/his friends using female pronouns instead of encouraging it. Look up Eddie Izzard's "Transvestite" routine.
47** Since s/he seems comfortable with both feminine and masculine terms ("Brothers!"), genderqueer is the most likely candidate for a label. That said, I don't think Angel and neat labels go terribly well together. Angel is Angel.
48*** Yeah, Angel is all of the above, all at once.
49*** "More of a man than you'll ever be and more of a woman than you'll ever get."
50** It's possible that s/he is genderfluid, and thus identifies differently at different times.
51*** More cynically, Angel could be seen as a clumsy attempt to roll all gender identity minorities into a single character, possibly by a writer who isn't particularly acquainted with them.
52** Note that Angel says he has identified both ways since he was a child ("I was a Boy Scout... and a Brownie til some brat got scared"). His gender is ill-defined and it may be that he simply doesn't care, but his feelings are clearly long-term.
53** We may have to chalk some of this up to Social Attitudes March On. Even among the well-meaning progressive left in the early-1990s, general trans/gender issues of this nature weren't really understood or paid much attention to outside of the communities that were affected by them, and certainly weren't to the degree that they are today. Angel is basically a kind of general mushing together of the parts of the acronym that come after "LGB".
54** I’m transgender and I think Angel is somewhere under the trans umbrella, but the terminology was so different at the time that “drag queen” could have even implied trans woman.
55** It's clear that the character is viewed very ''differently'' twenty years later, but that doesn't make the twenty-years-later labels inherently ''better'' than the labels people would have used for themselves at the time. A lot of the viewpoints of "oh, people just didn't understand gender issues in the 90s" seem to come from people who weren't old enough to be in the queer scene in the 90s, and can't comprehend people playing with gender outside of the categories that they have ''now'' learned to be the "inclusive" ones. Angel's playful mix of presentations and pronouns for different contexts without a clear label is absolutely a thing that happened, and friends showed acceptance by rolling with it, something that is sadly being lost in the modern era. Who Angel would be ''now'' if the character grew up in the modern context is... a totally different character.
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57* Mimi seems to be appallingly apathetic to the possibility of spreading her disease. As far as we know, she neither knows nor cares whether Roger has the disease or not, and makes no attempt to inform him before trying to have sex with him.
58** Not really. The extent of her interactions with Roger prior to the two finding out about each other's AIDS was playfully flirting with him and imploring him to take her out. The fact that she keeps her AZT and beeper on her at all times would probably mean she intended to bring up the fact that she had AIDS before anything sexual occurred.
59*** That's only if you take the words of "Take me out" literally. Don't do that. She's talking about a lot more than just going out to a club and dancing. Heroin is involved, and the number of needles is questionable. Also, getting on all fours for a stranger and shouting "I'll let ya make me out tonight!" (with "out" sounding more like an animal noise than a word) goes waaay past playful flirtation.
60** She makes bad decisions, pure and simple. She's a 19-year-old kid who's in way over her head but can't really admit it to herself.
61** See below, FridgeBrilliance - to sum up in '89-90, the ways you could contract HIV and AIDS were not mainstream knowledge and there were a lot of myths and not a whole lot of factual information. The dates are also below.
62** On Broadway at least it is abundantly clear she has heroin with her when she goes to see Roger. Carrying AZT with her doesn't really mean anything - a lot of AIDS patients were taking up to 15 doses a day at this point in time.
63** Mimi's kind of a hedonist/nihilist in terms of her relationship with her condition. Her recklessness is simply part of her character and her attempt to cope with her lot in life.
64
65* Exactly how long has April been dead? 'Cause the way they did it in the production I saw made it seem like she'd ''just'' committed suicide. How heartless is Roger for "falling in love" with a drug addict stripper within what seemed like a week of his girlfriend's suicide?
66** IIRC, Roger went through the whole withdrawal period after April died, which means it was definitely more than a week.
67*** Rodger hasn't left the house since he started suffering from withdrawal symptoms, and he didn't stop taking drugs until after April committed suicide. When Collins first arrives at Mark and Rodger's apartment, he says something about Rodger not going out/talking to anyone on the phone in the past seven months, so it's safe to say that it's been quite a while since April died (though he's still bitterly depressed over the whole thing, which is reasonable).
68*** Collins saying Roger hasn't left the apartment in seven months is the key. Act one takes place in December. Going back seven months, and accounting for the fact that in the immediate aftermath Roger would have been out (at least for her funeral and other associated aspects of that, such as seeing a doctor to confirm his own diagnosis and get medication) makes the timeframe of her death pretty obvious. April died in... April. A bit on the nose, but also poetic. (It's also alluded to by Maureen's line about April being the cruelest month in act 2.)
69** In the first Tune-Up Mark says "(Roger is) just coming back from half a year of withdrawal."
70*** Mark says that Roger is "tuning his Fender Guitar that he hasn't played for a year." Considering that he was playing at least at the beginning of his time with April -that is how he met her, at least according to One Song, Glory - this implies that she can't have been dead for more than a year.
71*** This is the best interpretation. He found out he had AIDS when April died, he hasn't played guitar in a year, and he's "just coming back from half a year of withdrawal", so it's reasonable to assume it's been about a year since he was diagnosed but he only got clean a few months later.
72*** Thinking about it, I think it's been a few years. "Reason says I should have died three years ago" (no, not just sung by Gordon, also by Roger). Perhaps Roger started his drug addiction to go numb to his grief?
73*** April introduced Roger to heroin, so no. (In fact, that's how they both caught it in the first place). He also implies that he quit after April died in his conversation with Mimi in Light My Candle.
74*** The Roger/April heroin flashback only happens in the film. That's a specific artistic choice, but it's not canon to the play.
75*** That line is (according to the DVD features) a reference to the fact that at the time people diagnosed with AIDS were informed that they had five years to live - Gordon is thus implied to have contracted the disease eight years ago.
76
77* If Mimi was unaware that Roger was HIV-positive until after the "La Vie Boheme" sequence, why did she attempt to seduce him after "Out Tonight" and knowingly infect a possibly clean person with AIDS?
78** She had her stash with her, so I assumed she was asking Roger to shoot up with her so they could go on a bender together.
79*** It doesn't help that in the staged version, you can't really see that she has that stash unless you're in the first couple of rows. In the movie, it's easier to see.
80*** [[FridgeBrilliance Aha!]]
81** ...You guys ''do'' know that HIV is also spread through dirty needles, right? Seeing that they're both heroin users, it's probably how they both got the disease in the first place.
82*** It certainly *is* how Roger and April got it. Mimi could have also got it through her addiction, but equally easily through unsafe sex.
83** She might have smartened up and brought separate needles that time. Or she might have planned to have Roger use it first.
84*** Might have. Or, she may have just been being thoughtless. She doesn't really give one the impression that she is careful about anything.
85*** This is actually FridgeBrilliance. The movie is set in 1989 when HIV and AIDS really blew up and people were just learning how it was contracted. AIDS had only been clinically documented in America in 1981 - 8 years before the movie takes place. The fact that a virus precluded AIDS wasn't discovered until 1983. HIV was only used as a clinical term for what people thought were two different viruses in 1986. That's 3 years to know if you get HIV, it becomes AIDS, much less how to prevent it. It's a lot easier to discover how you ''got'' something that knowing all the ways to ''not'' contract something. And Mimi is a 19-year-old S and M dancer. The dates I'm using are academic study dates, not when the information became widespread and public. That's kind of the point of the play. There's a break in La Vie Boheme - '''"Actual reality, act up, fight AIDS"''' A lot of them didn't ''have'' the information to prevent contracting the virus.
86*** Bingo. The connection with ACT UP is important because ACT UP was most active during the period before antiretrovirals became available, and splintered later before combination therapy proved to be effective in the mid-90s. At this point, they are still operating on pretty bad science. AZT at this point alone was wildly variable in how useful it was from patient to patient, but it was put into mass circulation very quickly because it was cheap and the only viable option available at the time. AZT used alone fell out of favour not long after the period this play is ostensibly set.
87** It's also simply part of Mimi's character. She's reckless and doesn't really give much thought to (or actively avoids thinking about) the consequences of her actions.
88
89* Is anybody else bugged that the entire first act takes place within a couple of hours. Somehow it makes some of the songs ("I'll Cover You" comes to mind) somewhat less meaningful. It also gives me a headache trying to come up with an exact timeline for everything...
90** The movie is much worse for this. The movie starts and it's December 24th, 9 pm. The sun comes up, goes down, comes up again and it's Christmas Day. What day was in between?
91*** Timeline in the film was :- Christmas Eve 2100 - Rent, (Collins get rescued by Angel, cleaned up, offscreen Life Support meeting), OSG, Candle; Christmas Day - (am) Collins comes in with supplies, Angel's entrance, Today for You, Life Support, (pm) Out Tonight (1st verse following Mimi on-shift before following her back to her flat and onwards to Roger's); Dec 26 (Boxing Day to us Brits) - they're on the tube doing Santa Fe, Mark does Maureen's soundcheck... Consider the lyric change in "Out Tonight" - "We won't come out till New Year's Day" as opposed to the stage play's "... Christmas Day".
92
93* Just what exactly is Roger so upset about in Another Day?. I understand that he's still carrying a torch for April and that Mimi probably came on a little strong, along with whatever she was actually suggesting they do but he seems to have overreacted for no real reason.
94** He's so sure he's going to die any day now. He doesn't want to let himself get close to anyone.
95** Also considering that in the Broadway version the entire first act takes place in one day, it's entirely possible that he felt she was being too pushy. I mean come on, how would you react if some chick wanted you to shoot up/make out/go out with her possibly only an hour or so after you just met her?
96** I felt he reacted reasonably, he probably held back a bit in fact. Although it's true that Mimi had no way of knowing this, look at the situation from Roger's point of view only. Although the fact that he had lost his girlfriend months before and that he was dying from the disease she gave him was certainly a factor in his anger, the big problem was the fact that Mimi brought along Heroin.
97*** This is made clearer in the film version, where he's, actually, sort of into it (he smiles at her when she climbs through his window) BEFORE she pulls out the heroin and brandishes it at him. He's just gone through a painful withdrawal and taking Mimi up on her offer would negate those months of suffering he spent trying to get clean.
98*** Not to mention his last girlfriend killed herself (and or died, in the movie version, it's ambiguous) after passing him the virus. If you listen closely, he hasn't even left the apartment for at least seven months. Then in walks this girl he likes with BUT with the thing that is killing him (he contracted the virus sharing drugs and/or through sex, but most likely drugs) not to mention he's a ''recovering addict'', he's got HIV and he's worried about passing it to someone else. (I should tell you./I should tell you./ NO!) His last relationship ended brutally and hypothetically his only contact has been with Mark. Mimi may have been the first person he talked to other than Mark for as much as seven months. (Collins was at MIT for at least that long, Maureen had broken up with Mark. He'd literally just saw Collins and Angel earlier that day after meeting Mimi.). I would have thrown her out for one of those reasons, much less ''all'' of them. The only reason his friends seem to take Mimi's side in things is that he's shutting everyone out. They don't know she brought drugs with her. His only fault is in not explaining any of this because he's afraid. (Again, I should tell you/I should tell you.) That's why everyone is so happy when he shows up at the Life Support meeting - because he left the damn house.
99** I figured he was really, truly interested and wanted to take her up on her offer, but from his point of view, he had AIDS, and she did not. He didn't want to spread it to her. His anger spill was a quick, poorly, improvised idea to get her away. He thought about telling her the truth ("I should tell you, I should tell you..."), but was too afraid. Poor decision making on his part, but understandable.
100*** I think this is it. Roger is dealing with a lot emotionally around his illness because of the death of his girlfriend, who died because they shared drugs - he might feel a degree of responsibility there. He's also definitely attracted to Mimi (this is clear in "Light My Candle") and from the lyrics to the song, he knows something would happen ("our temperatures would climb, there'd be a long embrace..."). It's a breakthrough moment for Roger because not knowing what to do about Mimi is part of what gets him out of the house finally, but he responds aggressively probably because he's as angry at himself as he is at her. It's also justifiable he would be angry that she brought heroin into the apartment at all since he is only a recently recovered addict.
101** I see it as consistent with his (justifiable) emotional issues. He snaps when Collins and Mark try to get him out of the house and to a support meeting - Angel is not offended and calms them all down, saying he's just tired. He's hostile when Mark tries to get him to go out to dinner or reminds him to take his medication. He's withdrawn and moody after dealing with his impending death, his girlfriend's suicide, and his withdrawal for the last however many months, then Mimi comes in and he's overwhelmed because he does like her and that's emotionally dangerous to him.
102** Not to mention that it's obvious Mark and Roger don't have a lot of money, even with the bits of flow Collins gives them. That means Mark couldn't pay for Roger's rehab. They had to go through withdrawal /alone/ and /without professional help/. Roger most likely got physical at points, or at least very verbally hostile when he was having a bad, bad moment—and since Mark is his best friend, that kind of guilt lingers. He has many a reason to shut himself away and to be very moody and bitter and unhappy. And then in waltzes this girl with a bag of the stuff he's /just managed to get off of/. Yeah, he's gonna be pissed. Regardless, she doesn't know, and couldn't know, but hell, he's gonna be mad, anyways, just because of the memories that smack would bring up.
103** He might also be chafing a bit at Mimi having the nerve to lecture him on how he should live his life and cope with his feelings, given that her own house isn't exactly in order in this regard. After all, well-meant and on-point it may be, a nineteen-year-old heroin-addicted stripper with issues around recklessness (and, not that he at that point knows, also has HIV/AIDS as well) is perhaps not the best person to be acting as a life-coach offering unsolicited and unwanted advice on what people are doing wrong with their lives and how they should go about fixing them. Especially when that life-advice is essentially "Hey, you know what's gonna fix all your problems? Getting absolutely fucked up on heroin with me!" After all, Roger himself notes that if Mimi really had the answers that she claims she does, she probably wouldn't be on heroin in the first place ("if you're so wise then tell me, why do you need smack?").
104
105* Mimi has AIDS. Mimi and Benny were an item and may or may not have been again. So wouldn't Benny possibly have it too -- and Allison too?
106** Not if he uses a condom.
107** AIDS is less frequently spread in male-female sex (especially where the female is the one infected, since she is the one likely to experience any kind of skin-breakage). But Benny and Mimi have also been involved in the past, and it's unclear how long Mimi has been sick or whether she was infected at that time, which could also have bearing on Benny's willingness to get involved with her again.
108** About 5% of the population is at a genetic disposition to not get AIDS, despite exposure. Benny could be amongst this 5% and not even know it.
109*** Well, that's kinda reaching since there's no indication that Benny ''isn't'' HIV positive and just unaware of it. I think the point was the moral implications that Mimi may be not only chancing infecting a clean person but a ''married'' clean person - so she's risking his wife as well.
110*** Benny being immune or having unmentioned HIV are both kind of reaching. Benny probably just used condoms, why wouldn't he?
111*** Besides, 5-10% of the ''Caucasian'' population is immune to AIDS. In the original production, at least, Benny was black.
112*** If Benny didn't use a condom, there'd be the additional risk of getting Mimi pregnant, which would have been particularly troublesome after he got married to Allison. There's no reason to assume he didn't just wrap it up.
113** It's possible (perhaps even likely) he and his wife are infected, and that this is FridgeBrilliance. After all, it's fair to argue that people only really started to pay attention to and take serious action against HIV/AIDS when it began to spread into the 'normal' and 'respectable' (i.e. straight, middle-class, non-drug abusing etc.) community that Benny is used to representing, and it had to get there somehow.
114** And, of course, [[Film/TeamAmericaWorldPolice Everyone has AIDS]].
115
116* On rewatching the film, isn't there a bit of an incongruity around the lyrics Mimi is singing in Out Tonight when on-shift? "I wanna put on a tight skirt and flirt with a stranger"? Surely that would be a little overdressed for her, seeing that her work attire is G-string, bra, and boots? Not so much in the play - but in the film as shot...
117** I think that's a bit strange to say. Mimi can't get a little dressed up for Christmas?
118*** Hmm, I'm a little confused about what you are asking? Are you asking if its a bit overdressed for her job, or for her in general? I think she is talking about when her shift is up, she would like to get dressed up and go out to flirt with strangers...
119*** Out Tonight is all about reckless abandon and not giving two shits. She's talking about just simply getting dressed in a sexy manner and hitting up whoever she wants to.
120
121* The show takes place over the course of one year. This is a widely understood fact. Over the course of this single year, every main character except Mimi meets Angel for the first time on Christmas Eve. (I think, at least. Isn't it at least implied that Mimi knew Angel before "December 24th, 9:00 PM"?) Anyway, at [[spoiler: Angel's funeral]] on Halloween, Maureen says that "you'd find an old tablecloth on the street and make a dress and sure enough, they'd be mass-producing them at the GAP a year later." How would Maureen know "what would happen" a year later if she only knew Angel for ten months?
122** Hyperbole?
123** OP says, "Fair enough."
124** That happened a few years ago, and Angel told her about it later.
125
126* What really bugs me is that Benny brings his father-in-law/investor to the Life Cafe where all the others are hanging out. "Oh, gee, I have a conservative father-in-law who can make or break my business on a whim. I really need to impress him. I know! I'll take him to dinner at a vegetarian cafe well-known to be a hangout for all my flaky queer artist friends! That couldn't possibly go wrong!" It just seems beyond implausible that the kind of place where a guy like Benny would take a potential investor could also be the kind of place where Mark & company would hang out, and particularly the kind of place that would put up with them hanging around and not buy anything. (And, sure, the waiter tried to kick Mark & company out... but he didn't persist very much, and they were obviously repeat offenders.)
127** Benny brought him to the protest. The Life Cafe is stated to be right next to the protest site. It was probably the closest place to eat and discuss business. Benny probably didn't have enough time to drive/have them driven someplace nicer.
128** Maybe the father-in-law/investor just really loves vegetarian chili.
129** They're property developers. What better way to get an idea of how to develop the property than see it first hand in its current form? "See what I mean? Sure, it's a bit of a dump now and the food sucks, but tear up the floorboards and repaint the walls and this could be a pretty nice coffee shop."
130** Collins take issue with this, too ("what brings a mogul in his own mind to the Life Cafe").
131
132* "No day but today" seems to be the intended moral of the piece. It's also how Mimi and Roger got AIDS in the first place. "There is no future, there is no past..." Isn't that profoundly fucked up to anyone else?
133** Living for the day doesn't mean living without responsibility, it means not worrying about things that aren't happening yet/have already happened. Roger and Mimi are dying; they don't have time to worry about the future or dwell on the past.
134
135* Mimi seems to break every golden rule of exotic dancers. 1. She uses her real name. 2. She lives within walking distance of her club. 3. She walks home through dark alleyways completely alone and still wearing her sexy outfits. All of those things are practically laws to abide amongst dancers. Hell, lots of girls have to ask a bouncer to walk with her to her car in the parking lot to make sure she's safe, let alone WALKING THROUGH DARK SLEAZY SECTION OF NEW YORK CITY COMPLETELY UNPROTECTED.
136** She at least walks in the middle of the street, which women in cities are often advised to do late at night (when there's no traffic, obviously).
137** Who says her name was really Mimi? And even if it was, she never gave a last name. Mimi's not exactly a common name in the US, and it's very likely the clientele assumed it was a pseudonym. You really think any of them chatted her up afterwards and bothered to find out her real name?
138*** Mimi Marquez. Collins says it during "La Vie Boheme."
139*** Yes, but she also introduced herself to Roger with the line "They call me Mimi" that always made me assume that it was her stage name. And Marquez is a generic Spanish name, and you must admit that together they have a very nice ring. Perhaps Mimi goes by her stage name most of the time because she prefers it, she could have an embarrassing name, or one that's hard to pronounce for an Anglophone tongue.
140*** Except for in Voicemail 5 Mimi's mom calls her Mimi. And just because Marquez is a common name, does not mean it is a fictional name. Chang is pretty common amongst Chinese characters and is quite nonfictional too.
141*** Mimi is the Italian diminutive of Maria, so I always assumed that her name was really Maria Marquez. Collins possibly knew her last name because of Angel, since it is heavily implied that Mimi and Angel were friends before joining up with Mark and Co. As for the walking home from the club, in the stage play, the entire Out Tonight sequence takes place in Mimi's apartment, so she's not walking home alone. Plus, the exact location of the Cat Scratch Club in relation to the apartment is (to my knowledge, feel free to correct me) never mentioned. Also, you have to remember that this is New York City. "Walking distance" is a little different for people who are used to walking everywhere, since most people don't own cars and taking a taxi everywhere can get pretty pricey. And it was the 90's. Lame excuse, but, honestly, the world seemed a lot safer to people back then, even if it wasn't. And it stands to reason that a girl like Mimi knows how to defend herself. Of course, this is just what I've come up with after seeing the movie, the Filmed Live version, a local production, and listening to the music. I could be wrong, but yeah. That's my opinion.
142*** I wasn't saying that it had to be, just that there was a good possibility, if you want to think up a quick name, your mind immediately jumps to common ones, in America, that's Smith or Jones. For Mimi, she might have well thought "I need a new name" and Marquez came to mind, and she liked the ring of it. And maybe Mimi was a pet name given to her by her mother, which she adopted as her fake name to have a connection. Or because, again, familiar things jump to the top of your mind faster.
143*** Here's the thing though. A stage name is used to help separate a dancer's job life and personal life. It doesn't exactly work as a stage name if everyone you know, including your family and loved ones refer to you as Mimi outside of work. If Mimi ''is'' just a nickname, then it's about as helpful to her privacy as her real name would be.
144*** Dancers can and often do use contractions of their real names as their stage names. Crossref Beatrice Ann Benson in the movie adaptation of A Chorus Line - her stage name was "Bebe Benson". It's perfectly possible that these were the lines Mimi was thinking down.
145*** That just means ''another'' play gets it wrong. Using a nickname everyone calls you as your stage name totally defeats the purpose of taking one in the first place.
146*** In the original La Bohème, Mimì sings the line "They call me Mimì, but my name is Lucia."
147*** I don't know the background of you guys, but I'll give you mine before I add to this. My mother was a bartender in strip clubs in her youth, I have roomed with, lived with, and partied with dancers in the last 3 years. I have dated dancers, bouncers, and DJs... Now as per my addition to this.. My best friend is a dancer and as well as her, most of the girls/men I have met through my social network do go by their stage name within their group of friends. Its funner, easier, and more well known for the people they are around. I cannot say this is true for all dancers but for the most I've met it has been. Also, a lot of the girls I know have been known to occasionally wear their work clothes home and even out to the bar or to parties depending on their plans for the night and the time they have.
148** You guys are all missing the point of Mimi. She is a character that does not care about any future consequences. She flirts with strangers and has sex indiscriminately despite being positive. She's addicted to heroin and brushes off her addiction as liking to "feel good." She's nineteen years old and she's dying and she doesn't care about anything anymore. There is no future, there is no past. Mimi is the last character you should expect to be acting with a concern for her or anyone else's safety.
149*** She's also 19. She doesn't have it all worked out, even when she claims otherwise ("if you're so wise then tell me, why do you need smack?"). She refers to herself as "old for her age" and "born to be bad", both very 19-year-old things to say. "No day but today", "Today 4 U" and the other maxims of the play are interpreted differently by different characters in the play - Mimi uses the same logic to try to lure Roger out to do heroin with her that the Life Support meeting does to support people who know they're going to die. Those different interpretations are part of the characterisation.
150** Mimi's mother in Voicemail 5 refers to her as 'Mimi' simply because that's the name she's been referred to throughout the whole story, and referring to her as such instead of, say, 'Alejandra', means the audience knows who is being addressed. The dramatic effect of the song and the play would be punctured if the audience had to spend even a couple of seconds confusedly wondering "Wait, who is this 'Alejandra' that woman is referring to? Has there been a character called 'Alejandra'? I'm puzzled." If Mimi ''did'' change her name, then it's a slight artistic fudge in order to ensure a broader clarity. And if she didn't change her name... well, she's reckless and doesn't care about the future to begin with. Just go with 'Mimi' being her mother's pet name for her if you must.
151
152* Why is ''Joanne'' so ticked off in "Tango: Maureen?" I mean, sure, she told Maureen not to call Mark, but she even says in the song, "... And to top it all off, I'm with ''you''." I would think Mark has the right to be more hacked off since he's the one who got dumped.
153** Considering Maureen's promiscuous nature it's probably jealousy and suspicion of an ex.
154** She can't work the equipment, she's cold and tired, she hired someone who bailed on her, her girlfriend thinks she's incompetent ''and'' stuck her with the wonderful awkward option of hanging with her girlfriend's ex (a relationship Joanne may have broken up) without showing up herself to be a buffer and Maureen called the one person she said she wouldn't - Mark - who of course, fixes the problem in a flash. Not to mention, of the entire cast, she has a real job and is doing this as a ''favor'' for her girl. Joanne's had a long day. The fact that Mark so quickly sympathizes with her (even with the possible cheating) implies that this isn't the first time something like this has happened with Maureen.
155** I read one fanfic with an alternate explanation: Maureen told Joanne that she had broken up with Mark for some reason other than "I was cheating on him with you," possibly by telling her ''Mark'' had cheated on ''her'' [[WoundedGazelleGambit to gain sympathy]]. Thus, Joanne was feeling vengeful against an ex who (to her knowledge) had not only cheated on her Honey Bear but was also a big enough influence that Maureen would go crawling to the scumbag for him to fix her sound system. Hence the reason why she hired an engineer herself, and why she yells, "She cheated!" as in, "Maureen said ''you'' cheated!", which fits with the whole "Maureen lies" theme of the song.
156*** Otherwise could be called the Wickham (Pride and Prejudice)/Cleaver (Bridget Jones' Diary) gambit.
157** I'd be surprised if ANYONE wasn't ticked off in that situation. Her girlfriend won't commit, continually cheats on her with any human being that hollers her way (and later cheats on her in front of her face), and forces her to do something that incredibly out of her area of expertise, only for Maureen to call her ex-boyfriend who she happened to cheat on (with Joanne). Yes, Mark has every right to be angry--but it's implied he was placed in a similar position so instead of lashing out at her, he allows Joanne to air her grievances and share his similar experiences with her which later help them to become very close friends by New Years Eve (to Maureen's chagrin).
158** Joanne is a lawyer. She starts dating Maureen and suddenly she's being asked to lug audio/visual equipment around in the cold and "stage manage". Mark is artsy and a filmmaker - maybe this is a role he was happy to play in his relationship with Maureen - but Joanne isn't, and Maureen's assumption seems to be that Joanne will fill the gap anyway despite Joanne's protestations ("Maureen, I'm not a theatre person! I'll never be a theatre person!"). Also, she already knows Maureen has cheated, so Maureen so quickly running back to her ex for help with the show would make her understandably uncomfortable.
159** Joanne probably isn't mad at Mark himself so much, she's mad at the situation and taking it out on Mark because, well, he's there and she has to take it out on ''someone''.
160
161* Does Joanne have any proof that Maureen cheats on her? I don't recall how explicit it is in the stage play, but in the movie, all we have to go on is Joanne's say-so and Maureen complimenting two women's necklaces.
162** In the stage-play, Joanne walks in during La Vie Boheme just in time to see Maureen making out with another girl. Also, it's kind of implied during Tango: Maureen that when she starts using the nickname "Pookie" on partners, it means she's cheating on them. Cue Joanne getting a phone-call at the end of the song and reacting badly to Maureen calling her "Pookie".
163** In the film, after Mark's Buzzline interview, Maureen retorts re her flirting with the receptionist and JUST before asking Joanne to marry her - she used the term "Pookie". And during the reception - "What, we were just talking!" "Right(!)" "Pookie, we were just talking" (1hr 34 mins, 55 seconds into the film).
164
165* How'd everyone afford AZT in the late 80s/early 90s. Aren't AIDS drugs kinda prohibitively expensive?
166** Ever heard of black markets?
167** They know the right people and places to find hard drugs. They can probably find people and places who have "good" drugs too.
168** Street vendors are selling AZT during the "Christmas Bells" sequence in the play.
169** The US government distributed quite a bit of AZT in effect to make up for the fact that it was poorly tested - basically to see what would happen.
170
171* If Roger, Mark, and Maureen are respectively based on Rudolfo, Marcello, and Musetta, why is it that Roger's the one obsessed with Musetta's waltz? Why not something that Mimì sings?
172** Because it's not an exact replica of the opera. And Mimi is a dancer, not a singer.
173** Possibly also because Musetta's Waltz is simply the most recognizable theme from ''Theatre/LaBoheme''.
174* Why is Benny dating Mimi? Doesn't he have a wife? How come no one in-show addresses this?
175** Near the end of the play, it is mentioned that "a little birdy" told Allison about Mimi. I always assumed no one really cared enough about Benny's wife to tell her or somehow Benny had isolated her from the group. He had corrected them more than once when they used her nickname, "Muffy", in conversation.
176** Collins implies that the "little birdy" was actually "an Angel".
177** The whole thing is kind of glossed over and quickly dealt-with (there's not even a terrible amount of angst regarding the Benny/Roger/Mimi triangle when you really get down to it). It's an odd aside, and really just doesn't get delved into.
178** Same reasons anyone cheats on their significant other, I suppose. Given the characters, I'd imagine that Benny likes the idea of sleeping with a hot stripper, Mimi just throws caution to the wind and sleeps with the rich guy, and the relationship is probably based mainly on great sex more than anything else.
179
180* How come Maureen and Mark don't have AIDS? Maureen is a DepravedBisexual and Mark her ex-boyfriend. With the play being set in the 90s, Maureen probably had lots of unprotected sex, how come her more monogamous friends caught it, but she didn't?
181** Some people are just BornLucky.
182** Many of the others were gay or heavy drug users -- both groups with the highest chance of catching AIDS. Maureen slept around, but maybe just stayed away from druggies. And yeah, just lucky -- huge groups of people in New York caught AIDS, but there's a higher percentage of the same groups who didn't.
183** Or, here's a weird idea, maybe Maureen simply preferred to not get pregnant and thus used condoms when sleeping around. Or alternatively, she preferred to not contract any other STD and thus also used protection when sleeping with other women. Maureen is a bit older than Mimi and, pardon me, a bit smarter too. And it's not like you automatically give no shit about your health because you are promiscuous.
184** We don't know if Maureen dated women before she dated Mark, and the reaction to the news about Joanne from Collins and Benny seems to suggest that she didn't (at least to their knowledge). Mark is also a bit of a square, so there's no proof he was into the same things his friends were into (i.e. drugs). There's also the shitty real life fact that Black and Hispanic communities were disproportionately affected by the epidemic. Mark is canonically Jewish.
185** Or a bit of WMG: '''Maureen and Mark have the Delta32 mutation which originated in the village of Eyam.''' Eyam was a tiny village that volunteered itself to catch the Plague and then quarantine themselves. The Plague ran its course over 14 months and out of a population of about 350 people, about 27 people survived and this was a good thing because the plague was known to wipe out villages in two days, tops. Later on during the HIV/AIDS epidemic, there were people who happened to not catch it or if they caught it, they'd get better. Genealogists later discovered that these people were relatives of those villagers from Eyam, who had the Delta32 mutation, which was something that made them immune to most sickness. If both parents had D32 in them, you never got it and if only one parent had it, you'd get but it wouldn't be harmful to you at all. Some scientists even believe D32 is what's keeping Magic Johnson alive after surviving with HIV after 23 years.
186** Or, well, they just practice safe sex. Not everyone's utterly reckless with their health. Even in the late eighties during the AIDS crisis, when the story is set, people were aware of and used condoms.
187** HIV transmission has a percentage of risk - various factors increase or decrease that risk. You could take every single precaution (aside from abstinence) and still contract it on your first time, or take no precautions and still not contract it. Several factors have already been mentioned that could have decreased Mark's risk. In addition to these suggested factors, as a Jewish male in the 90's U.S., he was probably circumcised.
188
189* This isn't a question so much as an "It Just Bugs Me", but the fact that most of the first Act takes place within a few hours tends to make some of the emotions the characters feel a bit contrived. For example, Angel singing "I'll Cover You" to Collins when they've only just met or the conversation between Benny and Mimi in "La Vie Boheme". "We're taking it slow"? No, not really. In the space of a couple hours, they gave an exposition of their lifestyles, had a dramatic fight, made up and went on a date where she met his closest friends. I'd say that's pretty quick if not completely normal.
190** The pacing in theatre can be odd that way (characters fall in love at the drop of a hat, and within a few scenes we see a full-blown couple), but it's especially notable since ''Rent'' puts a strict timeline down to represent all of this. Things happen so quickly that you can't help but wonder that the entire play works better if you assume weeks passed between the opening and the riot/"La Vie Boheme" portion.
191** I think maybe she's just fibbing to Benny because she wants him off her case. It's just her excuse for why they "don't act like they're together", because she figures it'd end the conversation faster than admitting they're on their first date and she literally didn't even know his name this morning, since Benny is doing this weird clingy thing she doesn't seem to like.
192** Some of this might also come down to behind-the-scenes issues; the playwright died just before the play actually opened, and many of these inconsistencies may have been caught and ironed out over the process of running the play before it reached Broadway.
193
194* In "Happy New Year B", when Benny asks Mark to film his granting them a key to the building, everybody gets all indignant and Roger says "Oh, I see, this is a photo opportunity." Did it occur to nobody that maybe Benny was trying to put on the record his permission to live in the building? I can see Maureen reacting like that, cause she doesn't think before she speaks, but Roger, Mark, Angel, and Collins all heard Benny offer to guarantee on paper their rent-free tenancy, and Joanne is a lawyer. One might expect them to realize that by putting the matter on film, Benny was making it so they could legally be residents and not just squatters. Benny is occasionally a jerk to his former roommates, but most of his actions are motivated by a desire to improve the neighborhood.
195** Benny just kicked Roger and Mark out, they feel betrayed by the eviction and with it realize that no part of Benny was the friend they knew. Mark gets a job and they decide to squat, then Benny comes along and graciously offers a no-rent agreement and suggesting it be filmed. Now, I know that Benny meant it and you know Benny meant it, but at this point, all the gang knows is that Benny pretty much doomed Roger and Mark to the streets and as soon as Mark has some possible pull, Benny's scrambling to get on his good side.
196*** Also, Roger is pissed because he's just found out Mimi has had some kind of contact with Benny since Benny claims (sleazily) it was Mimi who convinced him to let them back in the house.
197
198* Why is Mark deciding to work for ''Buzzline'' presented as "selling out"? I can understand his perspective; he's a serious documentary filmmaker and doesn't want to work for a tabloid, but Alexi Darling seemed genuinely interested in his documentary when he told her about it. She also offered him a well-paying job on an escalating scale just because he happened to be in the right place and the right time, filming everything as usual. Yes, he's working for tabloid media, but he also now has the resources and an outlet to make his dream a reality. Are we supposed to agree with him?
199** Furthermore, this would give him a couple years' experience for him to move on to a more respectable media outlet in time.
200** His saying this represents an attitude in the "DIY" 90s, where success automatically meant you (or your work) sucked. A true artist would rather make art on his own terms and keep it locked up in his bedroom than make mainstream pulp that lots of people would see. It doesn't make sense, but people sometimes talked that way back then (even if they didn't feel that way). Usually, it was a way to cover up bitterness at not being successful, or to show off for one's friends, but not always.
201** I can't remember if it's mentioned in the movie or if it's just in the stage show, but there's a moment when the job offer from Buzzline is first brought up and Mark makes a comment about the show being sleazy, and then there's the "vampire welfare queens who are compulsive bowlers" headline bit. Mark's obviously got an image (justified or not) of Buzzline being on the lower rungs of quality entertainment, and it's probably that coupled with his desire to be making his own films - which if he continued with the Buzzline job would very likely have ended up being shelved due to no time/energy to do anything besides what is required from him at work - ''plus'' the fact that he's meant to be in his mid-to-late twenties and is therefore still in the "rebellious" age of life, all mixed together to convince him that he's selling out. As to whether you agree with him...well, it's like what they say: you know you've grown out of ''Rent'''s intended demographic once you stop siding with the Bohos and start siding with Benny.
202** Let's be brutally honest here; Mark's young, idealistic (or, less generously, stupid) and kind of pretentious. He buys into the classic idea of DoingItForTheArt as a puritan ideal and succumbing to MoneyDearBoy in any way as a betrayal of that. While Buzzline is admittedly kind of sketchy, Mark would probably resent ''any'' kind of commercial use of his skills as selling out his artistic ideals (at first, at least), regardless of whether doing so would help further his artistic ambitions in the long run. His whole thing screams that he is dedicated to living the ideal of The Struggling But Pure Artist without having fully considered the long-term practicals.
203** There's also the fact that Buzzline doesn't appear to be covering the issues that Mark cares about, particularly the AIDS crisis that is seriously affecting his friends. That's why so much importance is put on Mark making his own film - because he's doing it for his friends. You may argue that he should be able to do both, but as the death of Angel and the near-death of Mimi shows, all of Mark's friends could be gone in a few short years. He wants to make the most of the time he has left with them and tell their stories.
204
205* How much cash does Collins have? On one hand, he's mentioned to (probably) be living in a shantytown circa "Take Me or Leave Me" (Valentine's Day or so?), [[spoiler: needs Benny's help paying for Angel's funeral]], seems to get the cash for gifts from either Angel's gig or hacking ATMs, and has a far better relationship with the rest of the cast than the obviously-rich Benny. On the other hand, he was a professor at MIT and got sacked only just before the play started, which had to have gotten him a solid paycheck.
206** I understood it to mean that Collins was a TUTOR at MIT. That's far more likely for a twenty-something. Add in the complaints which have shown up a lot in recent media about sessional university staff in the US not making a living wage, and it isn't too surprising.
207
208* How is Roger paying for his meds?
209** A few alternate possibilities: Roger is a former addict and knows where to get drugs. AZT is one of the drugs the street dealers are selling. Collins had (until recently) a job, and could have been helping out. Some AZT was distributed by the government in what were essentially trials on the general population, and Roger could have gotten it this way.
210
211* Joanne graduated from Harvard Law School in an economy when that was still a pretty good shot at a pretty good job. Why is she hanging out with a bunch of underemployed quasi-artists in Alphabet City? Doesn't she have her own friends?
212** Maybe she does. But the show isn't about them.
213** She could also have problems finding friends amongst "her set" as a lesbian. In "La Vie Boheme" she's clearly singing along with the others, so she could also be a closet artist-type who went into law to please her parents, so not have much in common with her peers.
214** Empathy.
215** Joanne ''is'' a practicing lawyer and does have friends outside of the ''RENT'' cast: She's shown once discussing cases with other lawyers on the phone, and in the same song also trading gossip and stories about friends and coworkers, and her parents talk about her obligations to other people than Maureen. In fact, her parents talk ''down'' to her because of what she does with Maureen, pointing out that "those unwed teenage mothers in Harlem need [her] help, too" (Exact wording? I'm not sure) and acting confused/surprise when she says she's working on Maureen's production. It all implies that she's a crusading social justice lawyer, very active in that scene with lawyer co-workers and like friends, who has only ''just now'' started hanging out in the style of the show after getting involved with Maureen.
216** Joanne's parents are important (political figures?), but it's clear from their phone message for her that she has an artsy streak - "No Doc Martens this time. And wear a dress. And a bra-". She also has "friends at Legal Aid" - so it's reasonable to assume she genuinely feels part of this community. She's also gay, and in the late 80s politically that maybe makes her a better fit with queer artsy friends than with other lawyers - she had to meet Maureen somewhere.
217** In addition to that, [[RealityIsUnrealistic it's pretty common]] to hang out with your partner's friends regardless of whether or not you're tight with them specifically.
218
219* When Angel said "Boys like me" in ''You'll See'', did she mean that in the [[AttractiveBentGender Attractive Bent Gender]]/[[SweetOnPollyOliver Sweet on Polly Oliver]] sense ("boys are attracted to me") or, in reference to Collins saying "I like boys", "he likes boys like me"?
220** I suppose the answer to this really depends on how you interpret Angel's gender, which is clearly a hot topic anyway.
221* What exactly did Joanne do wrong in the relationship with her and Maureen? I don't really see much of anything. All that's said is when Maureen goes on the "That's it, Ms. Ivy League!" rant. "Ever since New Year's, I haven't said boo. I let you direct. I didn't pierce my nipples because it grossed you out. I didn't stay and dance at the Kink Club because YOU wanted to go home!" The whole thing about Maureen getting her nipples pierced may have stepped the line a little bit, but Maureen told Joanne she could direct. And Joanne wanted to go home because Maureen was flirting with other girls RIGHT IN FRONT OF HER, with NO regard to how she felt. Honestly, Maureen was the one far more in the wrong... and she doesn't own up to it, either.
222** I think this is probably just a character flaw in Maureen, but perhaps Joanne has an uptight/control freak streak we didn't get to see?
223** Question-asker here, and yeah, that seems about it. The line in the first part of "Goodbye Love", "Who said that you should stick your nose in other people's business?" could showcase that, but then that could also be an angry friend giving, like, bitter advice. I dunno.
224
225* What is "that night" that Mark and Roger are singing about in "What You Own?" Roger had a great night because he met Mimi and fell in love with her, but Mark watched a performance by Maureen went to a restaurant and had his meal paid for and told Benny to f- off in song. Not that it wasn't fun but it sounds like what he does every day.
226** Mark is an observer, living vicariously through his friends. "That night" (Christmas Eve) brought together what elsewhere in the play is referred to as a "family" - Roger and Mimi, but also Angel and Collins, and acquainted Mark and Joanne, and Angel and everyone else (and Angel is the heart and conscience of the play.) This "connection" is what sets everything that happens over the next 12 months in motion when what Mark might have done every other day was go to the protest with Collins and then go home to Roger.
227*** I think Larson was going for the idea that Mark is living with low-key depression. One symptom is, he generally feels isolated from other people, no matter what he does, even if they're his best friends. He retreats into his head, into his art, behind his camera. But something about that one night broke through that isolation - and he can't tell you ''why'' any more than I can, but he remembers it as the one moment of "connection in an isolated age," and is trying to figure out what made it so.
228** I always thought "that night" was the second part of Goodbye Love when Mark and Roger fight before Roger leaves for Santa Fe. "For once, the shadows gave way to light/For once, I didn't disengage..." meaning that they both let loose with things they had kept bottled up for months or years.
229
230* If Benny and Roger used to be roommates, how did Roger not meet Mimi earlier?
231** We don't really know how long it has been since Benny moved out. Benny's relationship with Mimi (whatever it consisted of) reportedly happened "three months ago", which is well within the realm of Roger's "half a year of withdrawals". It's also not clear whether Benny even lived there at this point, or if he was already married, which would make the relationship an illicit affair anyway - there may be no reason for Benny to have ever brought Mimi into contact with any of the others (although we do know Roger does recognise Mimi, apparently from the Cat Scratch Club, but possibly also because he's seen her elsewhere.)
232
233* Did the playwright think through the fact that Collins is a guy who teaches at MIT and NYU? He seems pretty poor and not that proud of his career for someone who teaches at two of the most prestigious schools in the country?
234** He was fired, and it's not established he was a lecturer or professor, just some kind of teacher - tutors, especially grad students, don't necessarily make much money. In terms of how he feels about his work, we know he lost faith in MIT because they were ignoring "actual reality". Being gainfully employed doesn't seem to get much love in this community anyway - see also Mark and Buzzline.
235** In addition to the low-paid nature of a surprising amount of academic work, in this (academically-employed) troper's experience, a lot of academics also tend to be rather inclined towards the counter-culture and bohemian lifestyles as well (particularly those in the philosophy[=/=]humanities areas, as Collins is IIRC).
236
237* Why did Roger go to Santa Fe? Wasn't that Collins' dream?
238** Roger isn't really trying to "go" anywhere - he's just trying to get out. That's what Mimi calls him out for - always being "run away, hit the road, don't commit". He can't deal with what is happening so he wants to bail. Collins puts the idea of Santa Fe in his head, and it probably seems as good an option as any, considering what Roger is really trying to do is escape himself.
239
240* Kind of obvious but what specifically is the justification for not paying rent?
241** This is one of the elements that hasn't aged well in the play. Interestingly, when the Original Broadway Cast reunited for the film, ten years on, they acknowledged that their read of the play as adults was different - that there is a petulance to the Bohemian characters and their behavior. But also, Manhattan - and specifically Alphabet City - was financially destitute at this point in time, historically. Artsy types were drawn there purely for the vibes even when they came from better backgrounds (Mark, for example, is firmly middle class and still in contact with his parents, as is Joanne, whose parents seem to be political figures of some kind), but plenty of people were also living that way out of necessity. The block where the apartment is located is described as a "tent city" and is full of homeless and addicts and people dying from a poorly understood, worse-treated disease. Mark and Roger (per the title song) feel like they're witnessing the worst of humanity - their former Bohemian friend Benny trying to run out the homeless and the destitute that he used to live with - and their response is that paying rent is paying "The Man", and the man isn't doing anything for them, so why should they?
242** Except that The Man (here personified by Benny) ''is'' doing something for them, by allowing them to live in a building rent-free (a luxury that many people on impossibly low income would die for). He later goes back on his eviction notice despite the protest going ahead, which suggests that it may have been an empty threat all along. He also ends up paying for both Angel's funeral and Mimi's rehab. This whole issue continues to be a point of contention between the show's fans and its detractors: some of the characters often go out of their way to ''avoid'' earning money honestly out of supposed principle or dedication to their art, but are still happy to let rich friends and family pay their way for them, or even re-wire ATM machines to steal from banks. The play even points out that both Mark and Maureen's championing of the homeless is also self-serving, and arguably not actually helping the homeless that much. Whether you sympathize with the main characters or not mostly ends up being a matter of personal perspective.
243*** One important point is that Benny isn't asking them to START PAYING rent, he is after "last year's rent" - so charging retrospectively a large sum most wouldn't have up front - and had supposedly said they could live there without paying when he bought the place, having previously been their roommate.
244
245* Why would anyone think that someone drumming non-stop would be a great strategy to kill a dog?
246** These ''are'' pretentious boho arty types we're dealing with here.
247
248* Why is Mr. Grey appalled enough to make note of Maureen slapping Joanne's ass (or in the film, Joanne groping Maureen's) when he didn't have an issue with Maureen slapping her own ass (in the movie, Joanne slapping Maureen's) previously?
249** I don't know, maybe homophobia?
250
251* If Mark can't pay his rent and doesn't have a job, then how on earth does he afford film for his camera? Especially filming the way he does, with no set script or idea as to what he's even making, just recording endlessly? A 100-foot roll of 16mm film goes for anywhere between $25-40 dollars and that amounts to just under three minutes of screentime.
252** I assume simple poor money management. Mark is an '''''ART'''IST'', and no doubt considers it more important and worthwhile to spend what little money he manages to scrape together on things which will further his artistic vision (namely, film for his camera) over things that will enable him to keep a roof over his head. It is, after all, something of a stereotype (not entirely unfounded in reality) that artistic types tend to be a bit flighty and poor at making practical decisions.
253** It's also implied that he has wealthy parents who are willing to send him a bit of cash every so often. As for why he doesn't choose to use some of that money to pay his rent, see the point above.
254
255* This feels pretty nitpicky in light of all the other character-motivated questions above but...why does the film version open with "Seasons of Love"? Isn't the "five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes" line meant to reflect that a year has passed between Acts One and Two? Is it solely because it's the most recognizable song in the play?
256** Probably because it's recognisable, yeah. It was probably just the only real place to put it without breaking the pacing even further in movie... And also to give Joanne her only solo of the film.
257** Besides, it's not that a year has passed between the end of Act One and the beginning of Act Two--only about a week does. The second act takes place over the course of a year--"Seasons of Love" is about the year ahead. With that in mind, it's not that much of a difference if the film version opens with it--it's still about the year that the entire show/movie takes place over.
258
259* At the end of the stage play, Mark and Roger are talking about how Allison pulled Benny out of the east village location after discovering his affair with Mimi. Mark wonders who told Allison about Mimi, and Roger replies "maybe a little bird told her", at which point Collins walks in and says "or an Angel". I don't think that was meant to mean that Angel's ghost literally told Allison, but why would Angel have ever revealed the affair anyway? She and Mimi were close, and Angel would have probably realised that Mimi's health was reliant on Benny paying for her rehab. So what gives?
260
261* During "Christmas Bells" when Angel and Collins are buying a new coat, the vendor tries to sell Collins his own coat that was stolen when he was mugged. Collins says "she's a thief", to which Angel replies "but she brought us together". Huh? Were the guys who mugged Collins working for the coat lady?
262** Angel probably wasn't being literal, more along the lines of "it sucks but we wouldn't have met each other if it didn't happen."

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