Producers Jeffrey Seller, Kevin McCollum and Allan S. Gordon have announced that the landmark musical RENT will open in a new, off-Broadway production on Thursday, August 11 at New World Stages. Previews begin Thursday, July 14.

This new production will be directed by Michael Greif who directed the show’s original off-Broadway and Broadway productions. The creative team will include choreographer Larry Keigwin; music supervisor Tim Weil; set designer Mark Wendland; costume designer Angela Wendt; lighting designer Kevin Adams; and sound designer Brian Ronan.

Casting for this production begins immediately with open calls in New York on Friday, March 18, at New World Stages, and in Los Angeles on Wednesday, March 30, at the Hollywood United Methodist Church.

With book, music and lyrics by Jonathan Larson, RENT first opened February 13, 1996 at New York Theatre Workshop where it was hailed as a landmark in the history of the American musical.  It transferred to Broadway’s Nederlander Theatre on April 29, 1996.  The musical went on to win every major best musical award, including the Tony Award, New York Drama Critics Circle Award, Drama Desk Award, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. Additionally, RENT is one of only eight musicals to win the Pulitzer Prize for drama.  In all RENT won four Tony Awards, six Drama Desk Awards, two Theatre World Awards, and Obie Awards for its creator, director, and entire cast. RENT closed at the Nederlander Theatre on Sunday, September 7, 2008, after playing 5,124 performances and 16 previews.

RENT is based on Giacomo Puccini´s opera `La bohème´. It tells the story of a group of impoverished young artists and musicians struggling to survive and create in New York´s Lower East Side in the thriving days of Bohemian Alphabet City, under the shadow of HIV/AIDS.