In The Heights

Lin-Manuel Miranda, the famed creator of Hamilton, pays more homage to his Latin American heritage in his first musical.  Opening successfully on Broadway in 2008, In the Heights is a streetscape of interlocking stories drawn from the largely Dominican neighbourhood in Washington Heights, Upper Manhattan.

Not only the composer and lyricist, Miranda also played the lead role of Usnavi, the shy, debt-ridden shop owner who dreams of escaping “home” to the Dominican Republic.  (Usnavi’s emigre parents named him after a ship they saw when arriving in America, called US Navy.) 

Fondly played here by Ryan Gonzalez, Usnavi pines for Vanessa from the nearby beauty salon (Olivia Vasquez in fine voice), takes loving care of the elderly Cuban woman (Lena Cruz) who raised him and of the teenage cousin he employs (a rascally Steve Costi). Meanwhile, Nina (Olivia Dacal) returns in shame after dropping out of Stanford, romance blooms with Benny (Barry Conrad), but he’s not Latin enough for her Dad (Alexander Palacio) who runs the nearby taxi business, along with his placating wife (Angela Rosero).

All these stories run together in an ongoing flood of great Latino Broadway physicality and musical twists.  Miranda’s score is such an exhilarating mix of rap, hip hop, jazz, salsa, and street dance and South American styles, that it works like opera advancing the story less in drama than in near continuous song and action.

And Miranda’s sharp lyrics are worth relishing, even if parts are hard to catch, and simple storylines and relationships are left confused.  Our emotional contact to some characters was also distanced by sound problems on opening night.

Quiara Alegria Hudes’ slender book becomes clearer in the more dramatized second half, when love blooms, and troubles are healed through song and the tight bonds and joys of   community, ultimately by end leaving everyone happy with where the show started.  

Instead of structured routines, Amy Campbell’s non-stop choreography celebrates a mix of individual personalities and styles, with some whirlwinds of energy like dancer Mario Acosta Cavellos, but all tuned to the same community. Along that busy street, Janet Dacal is also outstanding as the acerbic owner of the beauty salon.

Directed by Luke Joslin, the quick changes of focus are efficiently played out within Mason Browne’s modest semicircular streetscape of frontages backed by scaffolding.  Jasmine Rizk’s lighting aids these quick shifts of mood and situation; Keerthi Subramanyam’s streetwear is sassy if vague on period detail, while Victoria Falconer is music director and conductor of Miranda’s rousing score.  

While its clarity is yet to sharpen, In the Heights is a show with great heart and seductive musical energy.

Martin Portus

Photographer: Daniel Boud.