"Why Dorothy and Toto Went Over The Rainbow, To Blow Off Auntie Em!"

Note to self--I really should keep track of anniversaries of when musicals went on Broadway (if they are ever fortunate enough to make it there).  The musical I'm talking about is Johnathan Larson's most famous script that is known as RENT.

Based off of Giacomo Puccini's opera La Bohème, the show follows the lives of eight friends over the course of a year starting and finishing on Christmas Eve from 1987 to 1988, while living in New York City.  Four out of the main characters--Roger, Mimi, Collins, Angel--have AIDs, while the other four--Mark, Benny, Maureen, Johanne--do not.  (I mention that because a theme for the show is not regretting anything and to make a great impact in the world somehow before inevitable death comes.)

For the 1996 Tony Awards, this musical was nominated in ten categories but won only four (Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, and Best Score [all three taken posthumously by Johnathan Larson--he died the morning of RENT 's first preview Off-Broadway on January 26, 1996] and Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical (Wilson Jermaine Heredia--Angel).

Personally, I would most likely choose the song "Santa Fe" because it's my top favorite song out of the whole show (I have four favorite songs in it, and two of them are from Mark's Mom, so they aren't really songs).

However, I do have a soft spot for "La Vie Boheme" but only if I include the entire Life Cafe scene it's in--it's the only scene from any show I can recite by heart.