‘In the Heights’ is more than a movie to its cast. It’s a celebration of Latinas throughout history.
By Candice Frederick
There’s a beating heart within every frame of “In the Heights,” the film adaptation of Quiara Alegría Hudes and Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony-winning musical directed by Jon M. Chu.
It comes from the joy of young romance in Washington Heights — between bodega owner Usnavi (Anthony Ramos) and aspiring stylist Vanessa (Melissa Barrera), as well as dispatch worker Benny (Corey Hawkins) and Stanford student Nina (Leslie Grace). It’s seen in the spirited song and dance sequences that leap from the doors of a chatty hair salon and spill out into a July-hot alleyway and off the screen. The root of this passion is a rich tapestry of Latin history, and what it means to remember, celebrate and pass it down to younger members of the community who have their own dreams.
“How do we reckon our particular challenges and dreams with those of a different generation?” Hudes asks on Zoom. “How do we understand what each other have faced and struggled?”
That question could best be answered by the barrio’s fierce matriarchs, Abuela Claudia (Olga Merediz), who emigrated with her mother from Cuba in the 1940s, and Daniela (Daphne Rubin-Vega), the gregarious coiffeuse whose salon has been the epicenter for conversation and social activity for years. “Abuela is the matriarch and I call Daniela the priestess,” Rubin-Vega says proudly.
The Panama-born, two-time Tony-nominated actress, who originated the role of Mimi in “Rent,” is now in the role of an elder on the block — one of the women who keeps the residents honest about their cultural strength while empowering them to explore their own identity. “[They] give permission for our histories to evolve, to incorporate new customs and yet remain grounded in the legacy that we have brought from wherever we’ve come.”
When Nina is torn between staying on the block where she’s thrived with people she knows and loves, or return to college where she feels culturally isolated, it is Abuela Claudia who reminds her that she can take pieces of herself wherever she goes, as Claudia has with her own mom’s embroidered napkins. She describes them as “little details that tell the world we are not invisible.”
Similarly, Daniela admonishes her millennial patrons as well as her colleagues (played by Dascha Polanco and Stephanie Beatriz) for mourning the fact that their favorite salon has been priced out of the neighborhood and will move less conveniently to the Bronx. “Our people survived slave ships, Taíno genocide, conquistadores,” she sings. Certainly, they “can survive the D train to the Grand Concourse.”
“The thing that I love about Daniela is she has such a wild and positive sense of humor that she actually can address somewhat painful episodes in history with levity,” Hudes says about the character, who is inspired by an amalgam of cousins, her Puerto Rican mother and other female spiritual leaders she saw growing up in Philadelphia. “I love her ability to call people out and call them in just with a joke.
While it sometimes shares critical messages with a wink and a smile, “In the Heights” — in theaters and on HBO Max on June 11 — is no less urgent in the truth that Latin people have a storied heritage, one that should embolden them even in places they may feel unseen and unheard, including in their own gentrifying neighborhood. And it is up to women like Abuela Claudia and Daniela, who have no biological children of their own but watch out for people in their community as if they do, to show them the path that’s already been paved.
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