Annie Crummer has put her solo music career on hold for a season in a rock opera. LOUISA CLEAVE caught up with her in Sydney and heard about life in the theatre.
On a warm Sydney afternoon, Annie Crummer is the image of cool.
The self-proclaimed "chill girl" has put her long-term
music career on ice for a spell in musical theatre.
Not your run-of-the-mill musical, mind you. Crummer has joined the Australian cast of Rent, a fresh, raw rock opera for the 1990s.
It follows a group of friends living a bohemian life in a rundown apartment block in New York's East Village.
The show spans a year, from one Christmas Eve to the next, when the group struggles to come up with a year's rent to stop their landlord turning the block into a studio.
It deals with the issues of today - Aids, relationships both straight and gay, drug addiction and the general struggle with day-to-day life.
Crummer plays a range of roles - from an abusive bag lady to a Puerto Rican mother. Her time in the limelight comes as soloist in a moving number, Seasons of Love.
Rent is the contemporary answer to Puccini's La Boheme (the opera gets a nod in the first act finale, La Vie Boheme) and sends the message: live for today because you never know what's around the corner.
Those words turned out to be prophetic for Rent creator Jonathan Larson. He wrote the story, music and lyrics but never saw the audience reaction to them.
Larson died aged 35 of an aortic aneurysm in January 1996 - just days before Rent had its world premiere in New York. He received posthumously the 1996 Pulitzer prize for drama and four Tony awards, the theatre equivalent of the Oscars.
Whether because of the publicity about Larson's poignant personal story, or his lyrics, the show was a sellout when it opened at the New York Theatre Workshop in February 1996. It went on Broadway and broke records.
There was a special feeling about the New York production of Rent, and that lingers among its Australian and New Zealand cast.
And if Crummer was not moved when she first heard the music, and the story behind it, then she was after Larson's parents visited the cast, bringing home videos of their son.
The original director, Michael Greif, gave the cast this advice: "I know you have to come out here and feel every single bit of pain. You'll get used to that, as you do when you grieve. But I ask you to be in pain every night."
Crummer says Greif's words have stuck with her and she is still moved by the lyrics she belts out every night.
"It's not a fantasy-type story, it's the truth. It made me feel like, yep, that is something I would be proud to be involved in as a first musical theatre show."
Rent may not be the type of show you would take your grandparents to. In fact, a few of the older people in the audience were noticeably absent after the first act during a recent performance. But Crummer recommends it for parents.
"It's a great show for parents to come and see, especially if they find it difficult to talk about the birds and the bees.
"There are stories in this show which every single person will identify with. Most of us will know of someone who died of Aids, most of us go through relationships, most of us experience getting money and losing it again."
Crummer was chosen for the 21-member cast after 6000 hopefuls were reduced to a shortlist of 300.
"It was excruciating, because I've never had a job before. So to go through that was like having an interview for a job. It took months before they decided what they wanted."
Then it was Crummer's turn to decide whether she wanted to spend a year working in a new area of performance.
"It's a big thing to ask someone to leave their country and have their hands tied for a year ... every single day, everything you do is for the show that night. You have to weigh it up and think is it a good thing or is it a bad thing. For me it was a great thing to do."
Crummer has been too busy to think of her own music career since Rent opened last month.
She has poured all her energy into the show, which she says has been more demanding than her music career.
"I'm learning so much. I've learned to be disciplined and I'm having fun dabbling in the acting side. It's something that only maturity and experience can help you with."
But she plans to hook up with friend and songwriting partner Barbara Griffin soon. The pair co-wrote Crummer's last album, Seventh Wave, and will collaborate on her third solo album.
Crummer says she feels transformed by her theatre experience and expects it will shine through in her music.
"It has made me hungry for something fresh. That's the real way to move into your next project, not forcing it, letting it happen when it feels like it.
"[This show] has made me think. I've wasted a lot of time doing things I think other people expected me to do ... yet inside I'm quite a chill girl and not as ambitious as they think I should be.
"I think everybody's been blessed with something, everyone has a gift, and I nurture mine and respect it. I try not to abuse it."
Crummer is still very much a home girl, referring to New Zealand as "a good friend," but she is relishing the chance to live in another country for a while.
"New Zealand and I are good friends and we have known each other for a long time. You're always going to get new friends, and if they're true the old friends will stay. That's how I feel about New Zealand.
"But I'm pleased to be out of there now to go and learn a few things about life."
Who: Annie Crummer
What: Rent
Where: Sydney
When: Now
Pictured: Annie Crummer
Annie Crummer has put her solo music career on hold for a season in a rock opera. LOUISA CLEAVE caught up with her in Sydney and heard about life in the theatre.
On a warm Sydney afternoon, Annie Crummer is the image of cool.
The self-proclaimed "chill girl" has put her long-term
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