Lin-Manuel Miranda’s translation of the late Jonathan Larson’s semi-autobiographical musical, a cult hit off-Broadway in the early 1990s, asks a lot of even the most indulgent audience.
Like the same composer’s Rent, Tick, Tick... Boom! deals in a blend of show tune and adult-oriented rock that too often suggests concept albums of the 1970s. (The fictionalised version of Larson does, indeed, have Jethro Tull LPs in his collection.)
As with the later show, the very act of living in downtown New York City during the 1980s is celebrated as an achievement of note. One doesn’t quite find oneself, in echo of John Betjeman on Slough, wishing for friendly gentrification to fall on Saint Mark’s Place, but it is a close-run thing.
Most aggravating at all is a treatment of Stephen Sondheim that would shame North Korean media reporting the activities of Kim Jong-un. Offering an absurdly over-worked, head-tilted performance that suggests an elderly dog listening for a cat in another garden, Bradley Whitford’s version descends briefly from heaven to make all right in an unforgiving word. See Tick, Tick... Boom! on St Stephen’s Day.
So, yes, Miranda’s first film as director requires certain leaps of faith. Those do not, however, prove all that hard to grant. There is so much zip and zest in Andrew Garfield’s central turn – not to mention decent singing – that it seems mean spirited not to let it wash ingenuously over you. Cutting between a performance of the stage show and the supposed real-world inspiration, Tick, Tick... Boom! follows Larson as, cash-strapped in Greenwich VillageLand, he struggles to prepare a science-fiction themed musical for a workshop presentation. He is neglecting his girlfriend Susan (Alexandra Shipp) and patronising his old pal Michael (Robin de Jesús). Meanwhile, Aids is working its horrific way through the artistic community.
The divided structure allows some songs to gain extra dimension. One number is fleshed out with a surprising touch of meta-musical trickery. It bristles that the best song is a pastiche of Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park With George, but, stuffing the screen with surprises, Miranda opens that number up in rousingly cinematic fashion.
The arc takes us towards the trite realisation, delivered by Larson’s agent, that you should “write about what you know”. That too takes a bit of swallowing. But, by that stage, most viewers will be sufficiently won over to manoeuvre even larger inconveniences past the epiglottis. The damn thing just works.
Opens in selected cinemas on November 12th. Streams on Netflix from November 19th
