About the work
tick, tick... BOOM! is an autobiographical musical by Jonathan Larson, who wrote its music, lyrics and book. Larson developed the material from 1990 as a solo “rock monologue”, first titled Boho Days in a workshop at Second Stage in New York, and performed it himself at the Village Gate in 1991 and at New York Theatre Workshop in 1992/93. After Larson’s death in 1996, playwright David Auburn restructured the monologue into a musical for three performers. This version opened Off-Broadway at the Jane Street Theatre on 13 June 2001, directed by Scott Schwartz, with Raúl Esparza as Jon.
Plot
New York, 1990: the composer Jon lives in SoHo, works as a waiter, is about to turn 30 and is preparing the workshop of his musical Superbia. His best friend Michael has given up acting for a well-paid marketing job, and his girlfriend Susan, a ballet teacher, wants to leave the city. Torn between money worries, the feeling that time is running out and the question of whether sacrificing everything for art is worth it, Jon has to decide what he wants to hold on to.
Cultural significance
The piece is closely tied to Larson’s breakthrough Rent: producer Jeffrey Seller noticed him through early performances of the monologue and later championed Rent on Broadway. The Off-Broadway production won the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical and received seven Drama Desk nominations; in 2021 Lin-Manuel Miranda turned the musical into a film starring Andrew Garfield as Jon.