For Variety‘s Writers on Writers, David Henry Hwang pays tribute to “Tick, Tick … Boom!” (screenplay by Steven Levenson; based on the musical by Jonathan Larson).
Movies about writers are notoriously difficult, since the central action of the protagonist is largely cerebral. Here, that protagonist is composer-dramatist Jonathan Larson, whose musical “Rent” defined a generation.
However, this story is not about the making of “Rent,” which would build to a victorious if bittersweet ending (Larson tragically passed away before the show’s first performance). Instead, “Tick, Tick … Boom!” concerns an earlier show, “Superbia,” abandoned by its author after a disappointing developmental workshop.