Post number five on [title of show].

I’m sorry. But I can’t get it out of my head. And I’ll explain why.

And then I have an anecdote. But first the explanation.

It’s not like this a flawless, OMFG-amazing this-is-the-best-thing-you’ll-ever-see show. It’s not tightly plotted, and it can be too insider-y, and some of the writing could be more polished, and the second half has problems, and the whole thing has minimal production values.

But there are so many wonderful stretches, and hilarious moments, and brilliant lyrics, and catchy or moving melodies, and the sum of its parts is terrific. And that whole experience on Saturday night — being in that wild, fan-filled audience, going to the stagedoor afterward — the whole thing somehow reconnected me with my much-younger, long-forgotten self.

I haven’t felt this way since I experienced Rent.

My Rent experience started way before I actually saw the show. In the mid-90s, I wasn’t too plugged into the Broadway scene, because I was away from home, at school in Virginia. Rent opened on Broadway in the spring of 1996 (after a long journey), but it wasn’t on my radar. It wasn’t until the end of ’96 that I was home in New Jersey, on break from my first year of law school, that someone mentioned the cast album of the show and how good it was. A few months later I decided to buy the album, knowing nothing about the show and never having heard the music before. I think I bought it over spring break — again while home in New Jersey. I listened to it in my car on the long ride back to Virginia, and it blew me away. For months thereafter, I listened to it endlessly. It was practically the only thing I listened to in my car. To this day I probably know every note of that album.

Then I read online about how this whole subculture had built up around the Rent line. Rent used to have a policy where the first two rows of seats were reserved for the first few dozen people on line outside the theater. Young Rent fanatics would wait outside the Nederlander Theater overnight for tickets, and over time, they developed friendships. Theyd wait all day, then tickets would be distributed at 6 p.m., and you could go grab a bit or whatever until the show at 8.

I read about these people and I was so envious. They seemed like they had so much fun. I wanted to be part of them. I wanted to be in their group.

I suppose it came from my not rebelling enough as a kid, from being too careful and studious — from feeling that while other kids were always allowed to play and break the rules, I, for some reason unknown to my kid self, never was allowed. I carried a Unique Burden. I had a Responsibility. I liked the neatness of my world — do well in school, and in return receive praise and protection from parents and teachers. I preferred my own world, where I knew what the rules were and knew how to follow them and thereby succeed.

Anyway, now I was 23 and I read about the RENT-heads and I wanted to be with them.

That summer, I was home working in New Jersey, and I finally decided to wait on The Line and see the show. There were numerous times I thought about it, and finally one day in the middle of July I decided to skip work and do it. I didn’t want to wait all night long, though, so I decided I’d get up really early and get to the theater by 7 in the morning. If the spots were all filled, then at least I’d tried.

I got there and I was in luck: there were still spots remaining. I hung out in front of the Nederlander with these other people all day. I talked with a few of them, but I didn’t particularly bond with any of them, and I never saw any of them again.

The big downer was that, as I learned sometime during the day, both Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal were going to be out that night. I’d fallen in love with Anthony Rapp through listening to the cast album, and I was devastated that I wasn’t going to be able to see him perform. And on top of that, Roger was out, too? Both male leads were out? (Turned out Rent experienced a rash of understudies that summer.)

It wound up not mattering. I got a second row ticket and I had a magical experience that night. I was moved to tears more than once, overwhelmed by finally being able to see this show that I’d come to know so well in my own way and to commune with the performers who stood just a few feet in front me.

Anyway. Back to [title of show].

Experiencing it among the fanatics the other night was a much different experience from seeing it at the three-quarters-filled Vineyard Theater a couple of years ago. The combination of the show itself, its inspirational message, the appeal of the four leads, and being among all these fanatics — it all added up to something hard to define.

Afterwards, Matt and I decided to hang out by the stage door for a while. We did this more out of curiosity than out of… what? Well, when I was younger, I might have wanted desperately to commune with the actors, get their autographs, talk to them, and hope that they’d see something great inside me and want to be my friend and that, by some form of osmosis, they might transfer their coolness to me.

But on Saturday night I was 34 years old and I knew that that’s not what happens, and anyway, there were tons of people waiting by the stage door, including a 16-year-old girl who was waiting to give the actors a stuffed toy monkey in a Playbill t-shirt (this relates to the show), and I heard some guy mention how he’d seen Wicked with the original cast, back when he was in second grade. I felt way too old to be there, not cool enough to stand out from the crowd enough for Hunter and Jeff to notice me, and on top of that, I knew that the sort of magic I used to yearn for doesn’t happen. Other people can’t make you different from who you are. There’s no transitive property of coolness.

And we were tired of waiting. So we went home.

So here’s my anecdote.

One weeknight a couple of years ago, I was coming out of the West 4th Street subway station on the way home from somewhere. By the time I got off the last car of the train and walked all the way down the platform to the front end where my stairway was, there was nobody else around.

And then I saw two people coming down those stairs. They were Jeff Bowen and Hunter Bell, the stars and creators of [title of show].

There was nobody else around but me and them.

I was starstruck. But I didn’t say anything, because I was a New Yorker, and we see recognizable people all the time, and you’re not supposed to disturb them, and maybe they were in a hurry to get somewhere, and besides, what would I have said to them?

But I wish I’d said something anyway.

Deep down — sometimes not so deep — I still want to be one of the cool people. The ones who sing and dance and act stupid and hug each other and say funny things to each other and know that they’ll always have each other.

I really want to. Desperately.