Every year, if we’re lucky, something magical comes along to light up the holiday sky in a way that reminds us to take stock and count our blessings, rather than focus on the hustle and bustle of gift buying, party invites and turkey hangovers. I feel pretty sure that this year’s gift is of the type for which any attempt at hyperbole is an understatement — and get ready for this, it’s going to keep on giving. That’s right: The wrapping gets ripped off Rent, the long-awaited film version of the legendary Broadway musical, on Nov. 23, just in time to remember what to be thankful for the next night at dinner.

I’m certain that I already sound like a typical New York “Rent-head” (those who have seen the play so many times that the person with the lowest number in a crowd has been known to cause fights), a distinction for which I am in no way qualified. However, I should confess that I’ve seen the show on Broadway repeatedly, and every time I do it brings me to tears; if memorization of the musical soundtrack is a crime, then find me guilty and sentence me to a theater near you.

Why do so many have such a personal connection? Because there are few places, in either theater or film, that offer such a loving treatment of those of us who society would so willingly toss out with yesterday’s garbage. Sure, Rent is a musical about life and love and human folly like so many others. But the difference is that anyone who has ever felt outcast, misunderstood, too sick, too queer, too colored or too poor to matter can find a piece of themselves in this story, and experience that piece embraced by love.

I was once among the fans (and there are legions of them) who were skeptical about the idea of retrofitting the musical for cinema — that is, until I caught the fever. It’s the kind of burning sensation that finds you putting your vacation on pause at the airport to take a call from Broadway diva Idina Menzel and moon over your overpriced beer nuts. Menzel won the Tony Award last year for her fiery turn in Wicked as the Wicked Witch of the West and she also starred in Aida, Hair and The Vagina Monologues onstage. Kissing Jessica Stein and The Tollbooth are among her film credits.

Menzel originated the role of bisexual performance artist Maureen in the original 1996 production of the Pulitzer Prize-winning hit Rent. The show also won four Tony Awards, three Drama Desk awards, the Obie (off-Broadway, where it began) Award and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award. Menzel isn’t the only original cast member appearing in the film version. In a virtually unprecedented move, nearly all of the original Broadway cast members — now 10 years older and with a wealth of fame and experience under their belts — reprise their roles in the film, with two exceptions. The newcomers are Rosario Dawson and Tracie Thoms, who plays Joanne, a lesbian legal aid lawyer whose relationship with Maureen is one of the central turning points in the play.

One of the reasons Rent-heads are skeptical about the film is that it’s directed by Chris Columbus, who is better known for helming the first two Harry Potter films. However, having seen clips of the film — it’s under tight wraps for fear of prerelease piracy — and spoken to the two lovely ladies who portray Maureen and Joanne, the longest lasting couple in the show, I am feeling a bit more confident with every iPod replay of the signature song “Seasons of Love.”

“All of us were very protective of it,” Menzel confides. “But we were also so grateful that we were even being asked to do it, and that Chris Columbus had the foresight to think that using the original cast was the right thing to do. Once we got in there and realized that Chris was really open to our ideas, it was easy. He really dedicated himself to keeping the integrity of the show and [writer-composer] Jonathan Larson’s original vision.”

It was important to have a director who understood the responsibility that comes with recasting live-audience mythology into celluloid reality. This is because Larson, who conceived of and wrote Rent, which has become the eighth-longest running show on Broadway, never lived to see his creation come to light, nor to accept a single award. Larson centered the show, a rock opera loosely based on Puccini’s opera La Bohème, around a cast of characters — half of them HIV positive — whose next day was never promised. After years of working in relative obscurity, Larson died of an aortic aneurysm at the age of 35, just hours before the Broadway opening of his breakthrough hit. But the new life that Larson created was only just beginning.

“I saw Rent in 1997 and became an instant fan,” says Thoms. “I auditioned for it eight times, but I was always too young for it. It was thrilling that my first film job was Rent.” In truth, Thoms has been acting for some time. She studied at Howard University before going to Julliard and picking up small parts in off-beat films, including black, queer favorite Brother to Brother.

“I don’t believe for a second [that] I am the best person to play Joanne in the world,” says the newcomer in a nod to some fans who originally questioned her being cast as an unknown. “So many people have done it beautifully. I’m so grateful for the experience.”

One of the major differences in Joanne’s on-screen character is that she has a slightly less butch persona than how she is usually played onstage. Her new style is most evident during the musical number “Tango Maureen,” which Thoms performs with Anthony Rapp. Rapp’s character, Mark, was recently dumped by Maureen for Joanne. In the dance scene, Joanne is costumed in a highly stylized tie and suspenders paired with stiletto heels.

I ask Thoms why Joanne’s costuming and overall vibe were so femmed out. “We just wanted to make it as multifaceted as possible,” says Thoms. “There’s actually more of an edge to her. I was interested in creating a whole person from the ground up. It’s important to not just put out one thing. There is her vulnerability and the softer side as well.”

Menzel, who is married to Rent co-star Taye Diggs — the two met while starring in the original production and married in 2003 — doesn’t subscribe to the idea that playing a lesbian or bisexual woman is any different than playing a heterosexual one.

“When I’m kissing a woman,” Menzel explains, “it comes from the same place for me. To me, Maureen has a love of life; she loves all types of people. She’s a sexual being. She loves women and she loves men and they love her. Her relationship with Joanne is actually the healthiest relationship out of the three couples. Tracie and I are really proud of it.”

“I met Idina and we had a little e-date,” says Thoms. “I was really nervous — it felt like a real first date! We went out to eat, and talked about ourselves and each other and decided we were going to make this relationship on-screen as honest and loving as possible.”

The story turns on the love triangle between Joanne, Maureen and the scorned Mark, but also pits conservative Joanne’s expectations against free-spirited Maureen’s love of, well, everyone.

“The movie doesn’t shy away from that physical attraction,” Thoms assures me. But that’s not all there is to this complicated relationship. “When [Joanne and Maureen] are not fighting, it was important that we have a working relationship. We had to figure out where does the love lie, what was our common ground. When they break up there’s actually a sense of loss, and it costs them both something so that when they get back together there’s something for them to gain.”

There will remain a few who prefer their musicals more candy-coated, and others who like their drama a bit less musical. However, after canvassing dozens of people across the country I’ve found that the response to Rent generally falls into two categories: those who love it with a cult-like fervor, and those who haven’t seen it. With the passionate performances of the original cast, and the addition of cinematography that both feels like an oil painting come to vibrant life and keeps true to the gritty, graphic look of the original, both camps can prepare for a new love affair with the film treatment.

So what’s coming up next for these two sirens of stage and screen? Menzel is taking time to focus on her musical career. Having recently released her latest solo CD, Here, on her own Zel Records, Menzel confesses that she’s taking a moment to absorb and appreciate the present. After a tough couple of years during which Menzel injured herself falling through a trap door in the theater and survived widely publicized racist death threats after her marriage to Diggs, this multitalented entertainer is taking time to focus on balancing her priorities.

“I really try to live in the moment,” says Menzel. “That’s really what Rent is about for all of us. Even though we keep singing those words, ‘no day but today,’ when we were younger it was harder for us because everyone wanted to know what we were going to do next. To have it come back again — nobody gets that experience — is such a gift.”

Thoms is busy leaving her newcomer status in the dust. This fall she begins shooting a film based on the best-selling novel The Devil Wears Prada, in which she stars with Meryl Streep.

“Right now I’m up at Dartmouth workshopping a new play with [Six Feet Under creator] Alan Ball,” Thoms says. “That’s where Rent was first workshopped five years ago; everything started right here on this campus, and now I’m here. It feels so right. I’m involved with the same theater that produced Rent. My agent is a big fan; my publicist is a big fan. All the stars lined up to make this happen, and here I am. I am loving life.”

I decide to take a leap and ask Thoms which song from the musical is her favorite. “That changes so often,” she replies. I figure that is all I’ll get out of her. I certainly can’t pick a favorite from the repertoire of moving pieces which carry the story, and the audience, through the full range of emotions, floating from flat to sharp through pop, rock, and even reggae and gospel riffs. But she acquiesces a bit. “My most recent favorite song is ‘Another Day’ because of what it says.” “Another Day” might be considered Rent’s second signature song, with the musical’s motto as its hook: “There’s only us, there’s only this; forget regret or life is yours to miss,” sings Dawson’s character, Mimi, an erotic dancer struggling with HIV and drug addiction while trying to negotiate falling in love. “No other road; no other way; no day but today.”

It’s easy to understand the fervor of the Rent-heads. Every character, every story in Rent is richly drawn between layers of innocent vulnerability and world-weary stone. The film affords those who have missed it onstage the opportunity to take up the mantel New Yorkers have carried for nearly a decade; it might even inspire others to give musical theater a chance.

“You want people to come together,” Thoms says. “It’s tragic and it’s beautiful but it is something you can live by. No day but today.”

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