“Here Lies Love” is a new Filipino musical that depicts the fine line between a good party and a power trip.
Most Broadway musicals open with hushed audiences awaiting drawn curtains, but not “Here Lies Love.” Instead, a dance floor replaces orchestra seating and is lined with disco balls and crew members in bright pink jumpsuits. Looking down from the mezzanine, a DJ rallies audience members for a show that’s both a retrospective celebration of Filipino joy and a poignant retelling of the nation’s complex history.
In a new immersive Broadway experience opening July 20th at the Broadway Theater, award-winning creators David Byrne and Fatboy Slim utilize disco-pop music to depict the dramatic rise and fall of former First Lady Imelda Marcos alongside her husband Ferdinand.
In just 90 minutes sans intermission, audiences are taken on a thirty-year-long journey beginning with a burgeoning love affair between the Marcoses that transforms into the couple’s deadly obsession with gaining global and domestic power.
Before she became First Lady, Imelda Marcos grew up in the Filipino province known as Leyte. Played by Arielle Jacobs, she wins a beauty contest in her hometown of Tacloban before moving to the nation’s capital where she meets rising Senator Ferdinand Marcos. The two quickly fall in love and begin the campaign for his winning presidency.
Meanwhile, Imelda’s ex-fling and opposing politician Ninoy Aquino, played by Conrad Ricamora, publicly condemns her excessive accumulation of wealth. The platforms of both politicians are told on stage through parallel “live” broadcasts that utilize the audience’s energy. The show is also supplemented by screenshots of actual newspaper headlines and video footage, serving as eerie reminders of how it was not so long ago that these events occurred. Ferdinand, portrayed by Jose Llana, weaves in and out of the crowd on the dance floor, hugging audience members as he sings promises into their eyes and the cameras. He inflates his status as a war hero and pledges to undertake new infrastructure projects that only benefit himself. Imelda walks up and down the moving center stage platform, shaking the hands of the eager public who are hypnotized by her flashy outfits and bright smile.
The absence of a gap between the audience and the characters extends beyond physical space. You are first seduced alongside Imelda, then by her. The pulsating disco music is a nod to the time period and Filipino karaoke culture but also reflects her fascination with beauty and days spent partying at Studio 54. You clap along and watch as she dances through the center of the floor, unknowingly becoming complicit in her narcissistic political agenda.
“And the audience realizes, we got tricked,” Byrne told Gina Aspolisto of The Washington Post, “So it’s the audience who has a change of mind. Not the characters”.
Even those seated in the rear mezzanine feed into the Marcoses power trap, as cast members twirling on podiums that overlook the theater encourage audience members to stand up and dance with Imelda and other world leaders.
No seat in the theater is intended to provide the same view. Over 900 orchestra seats were taken out of the theater as part of set designer David Korins and director Alex Timbers’ plan to transform the space into an authentic discotheque nightclub. A team of award-winning creatives is behind the show’s extensive lighting, sound, costume, and musical direction. Tony-winning costume designer Clint Ramos is also one of many notable Filipino producers, such as musician H.E.R and comedian Jo Koy. Test audiences were even brought into the theater before previews in order to perfect the show’s organized and seamless transitions.
Originating at the Public Theater in 2013 before making stops in London and Seattle shortly after, the Broadway Theater is the largest venue yet to host “Here Lies Love” with a capacity for over 1,700 attendees. It also makes history as the first Broadway production to feature an all-Filipino cast. Prior to hitting the stage, “Here Lies Love” was a concept album conceived by Byrne and Fatboy Slim featuring renowned artists such as Florence Welch, Cyndi Lauper, and Sia. Now, Filipinos are finally able to take on roles that tell their stories.
Before Imelda Marcos, Fil-Am Arielle Jacobs played Princess Jasmine in Aladdin, Nina Rosario in In the Heights, and Nessa in Wicked. Broadway veteran Lea Salonga features in “Here Lies Love” as Aurora Aquino, Ninoy’s mother, marking her first role playing a Filipina on Broadway.
Three decades ago her first Broadway role ever was on the same stage at the Broadway Theater, as Kim in “Miss Saigon.” She became known as the singing voice behind the Disney princesses Jasmine and Mulan in their respective animated films.
Just like other minority communities, Filipino actors have long been kept out of principal roles given to white actors. Those who find work are then often portraying other minorities, and never their own. In 2015, Salonga played Kei Kimura in Allegiance, a groundbreaking musical about Japanese internment camps which ran for less than a year. KPOP, another musical with a largely Asian cast, was also met with an early closure on Broadway.
“And so if we’re able to make a success of this, that opens the door for the next story, “Salonga said in a joint interview with Jacobs for Playbill earlier this month. “And the next and the next.”
For Llana, the role of Ferdinand Marcos is one that hits close to home. He attributes his opportunities in the United States to his family who fled the Marcos regime not even half a century ago.
With history this recent, the show has been met with some criticism from the Filipino community who believe the disco pop show goes too far to romanticize the Marcos regime. Before opening, the show and Byrne were also faced with disapproval for the lack of using live musicians. Now, the show utilizes twelve.
“Here Lies Love” may have failed to include every atrocity the Marcoses committed against their own people and key details in the thirty-year timeline, but the show does create a proper foundation for this transformative era. The show’s main QR codes of historical timelines are provided around the theater and inside the Playbill. Bryne’s chosen version of the story was to have the audience feel the extent of the regime’s poisonous power surge, amidst moments of solidarity and joy.
Looking both on and off stage, I was met with the faces of my titos, titas, and many, many pinsan. After having been taught to assimilate into Western culture for so long, “Here Lies Love” finally encourages Fil Ams to recognize important Filipino history while simultaneously celebrating the culture and the traditions behind it. Actors and even some showgoers are draped in classic Filipiniana barongs and dresses. On stage, line dancing and the use of colorful karaoke mics channel the joyful and resilient spirit Filipinos are known for.
Almost just as quickly as it began, the glitz and glamor give way to reveal the dark and bitter truth. Smoke and blackouts replace the sparkling disco lights as the bombings of Plaza Miranda reflect the growing unrest against Ferdinand. His affair with young American actress Dovie Beams devastates Imelda and she rises as the nation’s de facto leader. Bodies of the working class are found underneath new construction projects expedited by Imelda as Aquino and her childhood maid Estrella publicly speak out against her.
Order 1081 is a number that brings the theater to a standstill, as Ferdinand declares martial law. Giving himself unchecked political power and bringing democracy to a halt, the Marcoses ruled for over two decades. They are two crucial players in the world’s geopolitical landscape, with other rising fascists like Mao Zedong and Fidel Castro. Aquino is imprisoned and exiled to the United States by Imelda while Ferdinand’s own health begins to decline in the Philippines.
During the show’s last scene, the moving stage no longer parts the dance floor and instead brings the audience together to mimic the beginnings of the People Power Movement. We prepare for Aquino’s return to the United States and are rattled by his sudden assassination right on the airport tarmac. As Aurora, Lea Salonga leads her son’s funeral procession and at the climax of the show, holds up an “L” with her fingers as she moves towards the audience to say Laban, a call for her people to “fight.”
What happens next is the beginning of a whole other story, one led by and fairly won by Cory Aquino, the deceased Ninoy’s wife, and the nation’s first female president. She appears only momentarily in the show waving goodbye to her husband, dressed in her signature yellow coat.
Now, lights slowly come on again, not as harsh strobe lights but this time in warm hues of yellow and orange. It is clear that a new dawn of peace has come over the Philippines, and the cast sings the show’s closing number.
“And there’s so many people,” croons the DJ that opened the show, strumming an acoustic guitar. His eyes, formerly hidden by silver sunglasses, are now flooded with tears. His tears aren’t purely happy ones but marked heavy by an announcement that stirs boos, nods, and gasps from the audience.
The realization that Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is the current leader of the Philippines strikes a final melancholy, yet formidable chord with the audience. You realize that the show isn’t contained in those four walls but that optimism and change are possible too.
“God draws straight but with crooked lines,” the cast sings, looking out into the audience as if to make a final plea — there’s still hope in the People Power Movement.
