So if you’re averse to a show-tune, crack open a beer and watch the big game instead Larson’s score has a dozen songs and they’re all better than you could hope for. Perhaps Tick…Tick…Boom! isn’t the kind of musical that garners universal praise it doubles down on the Broadway feel and delves into a familiar niche of artistic angst and self-pity that has been the graveyard of many talents. The kitchen sink is full of dishes, Larson isn’t getting any younger, his savvy agent is too savvy to return his calls and he still hasn’t come up with a climactic song for his latest musical venture, which has a looming workshop in front of an audience of invited glitterati, possible including Stephen Sondheim. His relationship with Susan (Alexandra Shipp) is fizzling, his friends are quitting the arts and getting well-paid jobs, and HIV/AIDS has taken away many of those he cared about. As the title suggests, there’s a countdown going on, and as the numbers get smaller, Larson (Garfield) has a rising sense of his own mortality. Much like his former teen idol star here, Andrew Garfield, Miranda was beginning to look like the product of media hype, a genuine talent, sure, but maybe a theatrical one who would never quite click cinematically beyond a supporting role in Mary Poppins.Īnd then pops up Tick…Tick…BOOM!, an adaptation of Jonathan Larson’s musical about his own life, living the Boho lifestyle in New York before his huge success with Rent. After the blast of interest in Lin-Manuel Miranda post-Hamilton, the ‘film’ version turned out to be a recorded stage-event, while the movie of his much vaunted musical In The Heights strangely didn’t connect with an audience. I was feeling quite apathetic about viewing whatever Netflix had lined up this weekend last week’s Red Notice tested my belief that the streamer was capable of making anything of cultural significance.

Rent tick tick boom