Jef Flores topbills autobiographical musical Tick, Tick...BOOM!

The passage of time and urgency to get things done lies at the heart of the first Philippine production of Jonathan Larson's first musical, Tick, Tick... BOOM!

Jonathan Larson is the creative mind behind the Tony- and Pulitzer-awarded Rent.

9 Works Theatrical brings together three actors for this pseudo-rock monologue and it promises to be a timely piece in an age where the young place so much value on doing everything as if it's their last night on earth.

When Larson wrote this in 1990, the story of Jon, an aspiring musical composer about to turn 30, was something the audience could relate to. Jon was struggling with the choice to compromise for a more stable life or persevere and pursue one's art.

Complications come in to Jon's life because of pressures from his girlfriend Susan who wants to settle down and his best friend Michael, who made the choice to pursue a corporate career over passion.

Actor Jef Flores, who plays Jon says this push and pull is something the millenial generation can learn from.

He clarifies "I think we should also just drop the word millenial. When you hear a millennial say 'I am having a huge life crisis, I am about to turn 30,' all the titos in the room can turn to that person and tell them to shut up."

He says that the titos and titas can rightly say "I'm older than you and it's not a big deal, there are bigger problems than this."

This is the main message he says of Tick, Tick... BOOM! as the show opens with Jon who is turning 30 and freaking out.

Jef shares that it is really a problem of his generation, the freaking out over turning 30 because "I personally have lots of friends who actually go through this. My best friend was having a panic attack on his 30th birthday. He couldn't figure out what to wear to his birthday party so he started crying and I talked to him, we had to comfort him, chill out, you look great."

He recalls how his friend whined "I look stupid and my birthday is going to suck" but then "he turned 30, and he was fine!"

The thespian believes this core message of not stressing too much about ageing is something "that young kids have a lot to learn about this show, because it is going to reflect what they're probably going to do when they panic attack."

Jef played roles in the local productions of Camp Rock (Repertory Philippines), Cinderella (Resorts World Manila), Pinocchio (Repertory Philippines), and Priscilla Queen of the Desert (Resorts World Manila) before landing his first lead in 4,000 Miles (Repertory Philippines). In 4,000 Miles, he got his first Gawad Buhay nomination for Best Actor.

He's also played the Prince in Snow White (Repertory Philippines), Bazooka Man in Paano Ako Naging Leading Lady (Dalanghita Productions), Winston in 3 Stars and a Sun (PETA), Jesus in Godspell (MusicArtes), and Dennis in This Is Our Youth (Red Turnip Theater). His Dennis role landed him the Gawad Buhay Best Actor for 2015.

Jef admits "the hardest question for a theater performer or any artist, passion kind of person, is what would you do if you couldn't do the thing you love to do."

While he is not the 'aging artist' Jon is portrayed as in Tick, Tick... BOOM!, Jef says that the anxiety of pursuing passion and ageing weighs on him. "I am turning 30 which is the end of youth, which I am coming to with realizations personally that I am not the person I used to be. My body doesn't work the same way, I have crickety joints, it's getting older. The blessing of theater is you get to play different roles and your age becomes this malleable thing."

The ticking clock is what he deals with, like Jon "it's that thing I need to fight against, the anxiety of getting older, which is the problem of Jon."

Personally, he nearly gave up, relating how he grew up in the United States and back then "I thought I was never going to be an artist, I had studied music and I thought I wasn't cut out for it and I would never win the big contest that is being good at music. But when I came to the Philippines, I saw that music was a different thing here, that everyone had it and you could go into a street corner and watch the best band you've ever seen..."

It is this journey of nearly giving up that brought him to where he is now "that's why I'm here, it revitalized things for me, me being here is the result of almost giving up. So I am the ending of Tick, Tick... BOOM!, no spoilers!"

Jef also confesses that his first encounter with Jonathan Larson was with RENT, the movie and not the musical.

"It sounds really, really shameful like you don't wanna be the person who watched the movie first. But I was a huge fan and it was one of the things that got me into musical theater, because I had done it in high school when I was just studying music and when I saw RENT, I was like ooh, I like this. I love rock so I'm really excited to be working on this."

Playing Jon is going to challenge Jef as well style-wise because he shares "I've never been in a musical with this few people, I'm not sure how much smaller musicals can get than this."

He continues "I don't know what it is gonna be like, but it's a trust process, I don't know what it's gonna feel like being on-stage without an army of people backing you up. So these two people are the whole army," pointing to co-stars Tanya Manalang and Ariel Reonal.

"It's going to be fun and incredibly scary," Jef promises with a mysterious grin.

Tick, Tick... BOOM! will open on October 1 and with shows on October 8-9, October 15-16, October 21-23, 2016.

Tickets are available through Ticketworld at 891-9999 or info@9workstheatrical.com, 586-7105 or 0917-554-5560.