Editing Jonathan Larson (section)

==Works==
===''Superbia''===
{{main|Superbia (musical)}}
In 1983, Larson planned to write a musical adaptation of [[George Orwell]]'s book ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'', which he planned to get produced in the year 1984; however, the Orwell estate denied him permission. Larson then began the process of adapting his work on 1984 into a futuristic story of his own, titled ''[[Superbia (musical)|Superbia]]''.<ref name=heard>{{Cite news | url=https://www.playbill.com/article/5-jonathan-larson-songs-youve-probably-never-heard | title=5 Jonathan Larson Songs You've Probably Never Heard | first=JENNIFER ASHLEY | last=TEPPER | work=[[Playbill]] | date=October 9, 2018 | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401005117/https://www.playbill.com/article/5-jonathan-larson-songs-youve-probably-never-heard | url-status=live }}</ref>

''Superbia'' was modified many times. In the first drafts, the story, set in the year 2064, followed the character Josh Out, a member of OUTLAND, a society where emotions are erased from everyone at birth. Due to complications at birth, Josh maintained his emotions, and spent his life as an inventor, searching for something that could wake up the rest of his family and society. One day, Josh discovers a Music Box, which has the power to bring emotions to the other members of OUTLAND. He meets Elizabeth In, a girl his age from INCITY, who convinces him to spread the power of the music box. Josh travels to INCITY, where the INs live. The INs are the celebrities of this society who spend their days having their scripted lives filmed and transmitted to the OUTs as entertainment. In INCITY, Josh must face the temptations of fame in order to succeed on his mission. By the time Larson finished his final draft of the show, it was a much darker piece that took a deeper look into the power of emotions and mankind's attachment to technology. In this version, Josh was already married to Elizabeth at the beginning of the story and they are both OUTs. Like the other OUTs, Elizabeth is addicted to technology, and is unable to truly love. As the story begins, Josh leaves Elizabeth in order to find a greater life. Elizabeth wakes up from her technological trance and pursues Josh.<ref>{{Cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K8akDwAAQBAJ | title=Boho Days: The Wider Works of Jonathan Larson | first=Jonathon | last=Collis | publisher=Outer Obscurity | date=July 17, 2018 | isbn=9783000591129 | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401164143/https://books.google.com/books?id=K8akDwAAQBAJ | url-status=live }}</ref>

''Superbia'' won the Richard Rodgers Production Award and the Richard Rodgers Development Grant.<ref name="melg">{{cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/26/nyregion/jonathan-larson-35-composer-of-rock-opera-and-musicals.html | title=Jonathan Larson, 35, Composer of Rock Opera and Musicals | last=Gussow | first=Mel | author-link=Mel Gussow | work=[[The New York Times]] | date=January 26, 1996 | url-access=limited | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=April 2, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220402170256/https://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/26/nyregion/jonathan-larson-35-composer-of-rock-opera-and-musicals.html | url-status=live }}</ref> However, despite performances at [[Playwrights Horizons]] and a rock concert version produced by Larson's close friend and producer Victoria Leacock at the [[Village Gate]] in September 1989, ''Superbia'' never received a full production.<ref name=heard/>

In the 2001 three-person musical version of Larson's monologue TICK, TICK... BOOM, the 11 o'clock number from the Musical Comedy version of Superbia, "Come to Your Senses" was included. Another song from ''Superbia'' ("LCD Readout") was included on the 2007 album "[[Jonathan Sings Larson]]". In 2019, the song "One of These Days", originally sung by Josh near the beginning of the early drafts of ''Superbia'', was included on the album "[[The Jonathan Larson Project]]".

On February 4, 2022, "Sextet Montage" was released on streaming platforms as a single.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/LISTEN-TICK-TICKBOOM-Releases-Sextet-Montage-From-SUPERBIA-20220204 | title=LISTEN: TICK, TICK...BOOM! Releases 'Sextet Montage' From SUPERBIA | work=[[BroadwayWorld]] | date=February 4, 2022 | access-date=February 5, 2022 | archive-date=February 4, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220204201755/https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/LISTEN-TICK-TICKBOOM-Releases-Sextet-Montage-From-SUPERBIA-20220204 | url-status=live }}</ref>

===''Tick, Tick... Boom!''===
{{main|Tick, Tick... Boom!}}
His next work, completed in 1991, was an autobiographical "rock monologue" entitled ''30/90'', which was later renamed ''Boho Days'' and finally titled ''[[Tick, Tick... Boom!]]'' This piece, written for only Larson with a piano and rock band, drew on his feelings of rejection caused by the disappointment of ''Superbia''. The show was performed off-Broadway at the Village Gate in [[Greenwich Village]], then at the [[Second Stage Theater]] on the [[Upper West Side]]. Both of these productions were produced by Victoria Leacock.{{cn|date=March 2025}} The producer [[Jeffrey Seller]] saw a reading of ''Boho Days'' and expressed interest in producing Larson's musicals. After Larson's death, Victoria Leacock and Robyn Goodman, with the permission of the Larson family, brought in playwright David Auburn to go through Larson’s five versions of the rock monologue, and expand it for three actors. Stephen Oremus was hired to orchestrate and be the musical director, as he had already been working on the tour of ''RENT''. The stage version premiered off-Broadway in 2001 and starred [[Raúl Esparza]] as Larson, a performance for which he earned an [[Obie Award]]. It has since been produced on a West End theatre. A [[Tick, Tick... Boom! (film)|film adaptation of ''tick, tick... BOOM!'']], directed by [[Lin-Manuel Miranda]] and starring [[Andrew Garfield]] (in an [[94th Academy Awards#Winners and nominees|Academy Award nominated]] performance) as Larson, with a rewritten script by [[Steven Levenson]] was released on [[Netflix]] on November 12, 2021.

In 1992, Larson collaborated with fellow composer/lyricists [[Rusty Magee]], Bob Golden, Paul Scott Goodman, and Jeremy Roberts on ''Sacred Cows,'' which was devised and pitched to television networks as a weekly anthology with each episode taking a different Biblical or mythological story and giving it a '90s celebrity twist. The project was shelved due to scheduling conflicts among the five composers but resurfaced over 20 years later in a six-page ''[[Playbill]]'' article. The demo for ''Sacred Cows'' was released on iTunes.<ref>{{cite news | title=How the Feverish Imaginations of Jonathan Larson, Rusty Magee and Friends Birthed the Musical 'Sacred Cows' | url=https://www.playbill.com/article/how-the-feverish-imaginations-of-jonathan-larson-rusty-magee-and-friends-birthed-the-musical-sacred-cows-com-203033 | last=Collis | first=Jonathon | work=[[Playbill]] | date=March 4, 2013 | access-date=April 2, 2022 | archive-date=April 2, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220402051848/https://www.playbill.com/article/how-the-feverish-imaginations-of-jonathan-larson-rusty-magee-and-friends-birthed-the-musical-sacred-cows-com-203033 | url-status=live }}</ref>

Larson's strongest musical theatre influence was [[Stephen Sondheim]], with whom he corresponded, and to whom he occasionally submitted his work for review. One ''tick, tick... BOOM!'' song, called "Sunday," is a homage to Sondheim, who supported Larson, staying close to the melody and lyrics of Sondheim's own song of the same title but turning it from a manifesto about art into a waiter's lament. Sondheim wrote several letters of recommendation for Larson to various producers. Larson later won the Stephen Sondheim Award.<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://www.sigtheatre.org/boheme/larson-and-sondheim/ | title=To Sontag, to Sondheim, to anything taboo! | work=[[Signature Theatre (Arlington, Virginia)|Signature Theatre]] | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=January 29, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220129012937/https://www.sigtheatre.org/boheme/larson-and-sondheim/ | url-status=live }}</ref>

In addition to his three larger theatrical pieces written before ''Rent'', Larson also wrote music for ''[[J.P. Morgan Saves the Nation]]'';<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/07/07/arts/last-chance.html | title=Last Chance | work=[[The New York Times]] | date=July 7, 1995 | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401035817/https://www.nytimes.com/1995/07/07/arts/last-chance.html | url-status=live }}</ref> numerous individual numbers; music for ''[[Sesame Street]]''; music for the children's book cassettes of ''An American Tail'' and ''The Land Before Time''; music for ''[[Rolling Stone]]'' magazine publisher [[Jann Wenner]]; a musical called ''[[Mowgli (musical)|Mowgli]]''; and four songs for the children's video ''[[Away We Go! (children's video)|Away We Go!]]'', which he also conceived with collaborator and composer Bob Golden and directed. He performed in [[John MacLachlan Gray]]'s musical ''[[Billy Bishop Goes to War]]'', which starred his close friend actor [[Roger Bart]]. For his early works, Larson won a grant and award from the [[American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers]] and the [[Gilman & Gonzalez-Falla Theatre Foundation]]'s Commendation Award.<ref name=Life>{{Cite news | last=Pacheco | first=Patrick | title=Life, Death and 'Rent' | url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-04-14-ca-58265-story.html | work=[[Los Angeles Times]] | date=April 14, 1996 | url-access=limited | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201022072045/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-04-14-ca-58265-story.html | archive-date=October 22, 2020 | url-status=live}}</ref>

===''Rent''===
{{main|Rent (musical)}}
[[File:Jonathan Larson .jpg|200px|right|thumb|Larson, year unknown]]
In 1988, playwright [[Billy Aronson]] wanted to create "a musical inspired by [[Giacomo Puccini]]'s ''[[La bohème]]'', in which the luscious splendor of Puccini's world would be replaced with the coarseness and noise of modern New York".<ref name=Led>{{cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/17/theater/theather-the-seven-year-odyssey-that-led-to-rent.html | last=Tommasini | first=Anthony | author-link=Anthony Tommasini | title=Theater; The Seven-Year Odyssey that Led to 'Rent' | work=[[The New York Times]] | date=March 17, 1996 | url-access=limited | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=March 28, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220328020600/https://www.nytimes.com/1996/03/17/theater/theather-the-seven-year-odyssey-that-led-to-rent.html | url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1989, Aronson called [[Ira Weitzman]], asking for ideas for collaborators, and Weitzman introduced Larson to Aronson to collaborate on the new project. Larson came up with the title and suggested moving the setting from the [[Upper West Side]] to [[Lower Manhattan]], where Larson and his roommates lived in a rundown apartment.

''Rent'' started as a staged reading in 1993 at the [[New York Theatre Workshop]], followed by a studio production that played a three-week run a year later. However, the version that is now known worldwide, the result of three years of collaboration and editing between Larson and the producers and director, was not publicly performed before Larson's death as Larson died the day before the first preview performance. The show premiered Off-Broadway on schedule. According to lead performer [[Anthony Rapp]], Larson's parents, who were flying in for the show anyway, gave their blessing to perform the show despite Larson's death a day earlier, and the cast agreed that they would premiere the show by simply singing it through, all the while sitting at three prop tables lined up on stage. But by the time the show got to its high energy "[[La Vie Boheme]]", the cast could no longer contain themselves and did the rest of the show as it was meant to be, minus costumes, to the crowd and the Larson family's approval. Once the show was over, there was a long applause followed by silence which was eventually broken when an audience member shouted out "Thank you, Jonathan Larson."<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g2CctOLvdaoC | title=Without You: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and the Musical Rent | last=Rapp | first=Anthony | authorlink=Anthony Rapp | publisher=[[Simon & Schuster]] | date=October 31, 2006 | page=136| isbn=9780743269773 }}</ref>

''Rent'' played through its planned engagement to sold-out crowds and was continually extended. The decision was finally made to move the show to a Broadway theatre, and it opened at the [[Nederlander Theatre]] on April 29, 1996.<ref>{{cite news | last=Winer | first=Laurie | title='Rent' Goes Up -- to Broadway | url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-04-30-ca-64130-story.html | work=[[The Los Angeles Times]] | date=April 30, 1996 | url-access=limited | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200803234358/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-04-30-ca-64130-story.html | archive-date=August 3, 2020 | url-status=live}}</ref> In addition to the [[New York Theatre Workshop]], ''Rent'' was produced by [[Jeffrey Seller]], who was introduced to Larson's work when attending an off-Broadway performance of ''Boho Days'', and two of his producer friends who also wished to support the work, [[Kevin McCollum]] and Allan S. Gordon.

For his work on ''Rent'', Larson was posthumously awarded the [[Pulitzer Prize for Drama]],<ref name=Life/> the [[Tony Award for Best Musical]], [[Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical]], and [[Tony Award for Best Original Score]];<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.playbill.com/article/rent-master-class-win-top-tonys-com-67959 | title=Rent, Master Class Win Top Tonys | work=[[Playbill]] | date=June 3, 1996 | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220401005122/https://www.playbill.com/article/rent-master-class-win-top-tonys-com-67959 | url-status=live }}</ref> the [[Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical]], [[Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music]], and the [[Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics]]; the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Musical; the [[Outer Critics Circle Award]] for Best Musical in the Off-Broadway category; and [[Obie Award]]s for Outstanding Book, Outstanding Lyrics, and Outstanding Music.

Larson's estate was scheduled to earn one-third of the amount earned by ''Rent''.<ref name=price>{{Cite news | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1996/12/14/just-what-is-the-price-of-fame-rent-authors-family-seeks-answer-in-suit/b4ea6837-ba1d-41fd-9821-88eda5968d6a/ | title=JUST WHAT IS THE PRICE OF FAME? 'RENT' AUTHOR'S FAMILY SEEKS ANSWER IN SUIT | first=Paula | last=Span | newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] | date=December 14, 1996 | access-date=April 1, 2022 | archive-date=August 28, 2017 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170828224004/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1996/12/14/just-what-is-the-price-of-fame-rent-authors-family-seeks-answer-in-suit/b4ea6837-ba1d-41fd-9821-88eda5968d6a/ | url-status=live }}</ref>