STRUGGLE FOR YOUR ART (tick! tick! BOOM!)

Sometimes you've got to be honest with your readers when you are reviewing movies.

So, here we go.

I'm not the biggest fan of contemporary musicals.

If I'm ever in New York or London and have some time to go to the theatre, they're not my first pick for entertainment on Broadway or the West End.

I'd rather hunt out a good play before a musical.

That's not to say I hate musicals.

'Singin' In The Rain,' 'On The Town,' 'Top Hat,' 'High Society,' 'West Side Story' are a treat onstage or onscreen.

I was a big fan of 'La La Land' when it came out in cinemas and I still am.

I also loved Woody Allen's 'Everybody Says I Love You.'

There's a type of musical, however, that I struggle with.

It's the type of contemporary musical like 'Dear Evan Hansen' where every song is earnest and sounds like it has been written for the cast of 'Glee'.

"Jazz hands" musicals irritate the hell out of me.

And don't get me started on 'The Greatest Showman.'

I have a lot of innate prejudice to decommission when reviewing a film like Lin Manuel Miranda's 'tick, tick, BOOM!' and I accept it may not be the kind of movie aimed at me.

However great musicals, as I've argued before, are great because of their ability to appeal beyond their core constituency.

They also have one or two belters of a song that you always associate with them.

Aficionados of musical theatre adore Lin Manuel Miranda - not least because of his revolutionary approach to the Founding Fathers in the rap musical 'Hamilton'.

This year, Miranda also had his New York musical 'In the Heights' brought to the big screen by John M Chu and while it was a vibrant tale of Latinos earning a living and dreaming big, it laboured to earn its $50 million budget back as audiences tried to adjust to the COVID cinemagoing experience.

This may in part explain the way Netflix has handled the release of 'tick, tick, BOOM!'.

It had a limited theatrical release before being made available to Netflix's subscribers.

But there is no doubt, once again, that had it been made 10 years ago, 'tick, tick, BOOM!' would have thrived on the big screen under the old theatrical release patterns.

Instead it will be viewed on smartphones, smartpads, smart TVs and a minority will be lucky enough to use home cinema systems.

'tick, tick, BOOM!' tells the story of Jonathan Larson, creator of the hugely popular and innovative Broadway musical hit 'Rent'.

Adapted by 'Dear Evan Hansen' creator Steven Levenson from Larson's off-off Broadway 1990 show of the same name, it stars Anglo American actor Andrew Garfield as Larson who died the night prior to 'Rent's' first Broadway performance.

If that wasn't enough, there's an added poignancy to Miranda's film because the Yoda to Larson's Skywalker in the film, the Broadway musical legend Stephen Sondheim passed away shortly after its release and even lends his voice to an answering machine message in the movie.

 

In the film, Larson is a struggling songwriter who, in true New York fashion, works in a diner to keep his head above water financially while he pursues his dream of having his musical, 'Superbia' performed on Broadway.

His soon to be ex-flatmate and friend from childhood, Robin de Jesus' Michael has long given up on his dream of being an actor and is carving out a lucrative career in an advertising agency that will land him a fancy apartment with reliable central heating and a nice car.

Jonathan's girlfriend, Alexandra Shipp's Susan, is a modern dance teacher whose promising professional career was cut short by an injury.

She is fielding an offer to teach in the Massachusetts community of Jacob's Pillow and is pressing Jonathan for an answer on whether he will join her - an answer he seems unwilling or unable to give.

Larson is also conscious that his 30th birthday is looming and is feeling the pressure of a musical that is being workshopped before a crucial performance in front of potential producers.

Working closely with Jonathan Marc Sherman's Ira Weitzman, the Head of Musical Theatre on the Playwrights Horizons Program, Larson's mind is constantly whirring as he draws from real life to conjure up songs for 'Superbia'.

He does so, though, in the knowledge that 'Superbia' may never ever get produced and that he may have wasted six years of his life on a dead parrot.

In the workshops, Weitzman subjects the musical to the scrutiny of mentors who include Bradley Whitford's Stephen Sondheim.

Sondheim is much more constructive and encouraging in his feedback than Richard Kind's pompous, blowhard, Walter Bloom.

Inevitably as Jonathan obsesses over his musical, his relationships with Susan, Michael and others suffer because of his inability to see the wood for the trees.

Are they are damaged to the point of no return?

And will Jonathan's dogged determination to find the right song and the perfect lyrics pay off?

Using a recreated performance of Larson's autobiographical 1990 show as a framing device to propel the narrative, it's natural that Miranda and Levenson also draw from their own lives as stalwarts of the Broadway musical in the telling of his story.

One of the film's strong points is not just how it conveys the precarious nature of trying to make art for a living while rent demands and utility bills pile up alongside the cost of groceries.

It's the way it depicts the songwriting process - the constant ticking of the mind as a creator desperately searches for inspiration.

In one of the most extraordinary examples of the songwriting process ever committed to the screen, Larson visits a swimming pool with his mind jumping between thoughts about Susan, about other people in the pool and about the pressure of writing a musical.

Suddenly as he dives under water, a line marking its depth becomes a timeline for his life and then the bars of a musical score as the notes and their tempo formulate in his head.

Periodically throughout the film, lyrics appear on the screen as Jonathan tries to draw inspiration from his life.

Indeed, there are moments where you feel Miranda and Levenson are apologising to loved ones for their own obsessive pursuit of the right tune and the right lyric when key events in their lives are unfolding.

As a director, Miranda is well up to the task of crafting a debut feature and confidently embraces the greater canvas that cinema gives for stage musicals.

With the help of cinematographer Alice Brooks and film editors, Myron Kerstein and Andrew Weisblum, he explores the ability of visual effects to enrich Larson's story.

And while the film occasionally succumbs to musical theatre luvviness, it is for the most part a pleasing watch, if not quite the classic it would like to be.

Garfield throws a lot of energy at the part of Larson and is a pretty good anchor for the story.

Don't be surprised if he picks up a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy next year.

Although it has to be said, there are few jazz hands moments in some of his performances of songs - most notably a song with Vanessa Hudgins' Karessa during a sequence recreating the 1990 show based on a row with Susan that veers into the really irritating.

Shipp, de Jesus, Hudgins, Sherman and Whitford provide decent supporting performances.

However Judith Light's performance as Jonathan's agent Rosa Stevens does fall into the realm of a Broadway caricature.

Musical theatre fans will no doubt revel in a diner song and dance sequence where the staff and diners turn out to a who's who of Broadway talent from Miranda to Bebe Neuwirth, Phylicia Rashad to Andre de Shields and Joel Grey to Bernadette Peters.

Levenson and other established Broadway musical composers and lyricists like Alex Lacamoire, Helen Park, Matthew Sklar, Eisa Davis,  Shaina Taub and Stephen Trask turn up in the workshop sections.

While these moments will undoubtedly keep the Miranda faithful sated, 'tick, tick, BOOM!' is an entertaining watch for those who are just not into musicals in the same way.

But is it as good as 'La La Land'?

I'm afraid not, as there is no 'City of Stars' or 'Someone In The Crowd' song to lodge in your head for years to come.

As a tribute to musical theatre and to Larson, it is pretty nice. 

However it just doesn't blow off your socks despite expecting it will.

('tick, tick, BOOM!' had a limited cinema release on November 12, 2021 before being made available for streaming on Netflix on November 19, 2021)