Before Rent, there was tick, tick ... boom!. This autobiographical musical by Jonathan Larson, the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award–winning composer of Rent, is the story of an aspiring composer who questions his life choices on the eve of his thirtieth birthday. His girlfriend wants to get married and move out of the city, his best friend is making big bucks on Madison Avenue, and yet Jon is still waiting on tables and trying to write the great American musical.