"In The Heights" at Contra Costa Civic Theatre

[I have no idea why Blogger isn't letting me put pictures in tonight. ]

In the wake of all the Hamilton popularity, a number of theaters are looking at some of Lin-Manuel Miranda's earlier work, notably his first hit musical, In The Heights, based on people and situations from Washington Heights, Manhattan, where he grew up. I admit that was my primary motivation, though I was really intrigued to see that although Miranda wrote the music and lyrics, the book for the show is by Quiara Allegria Hudes, who I only know through her dramatic works. Her Water By the Spoonful is a powerful piece, and its sequel, The Happiest Song Plays Last, is also quite good.

So that's a lot of artistic firepower behind a play, which should be a good thing.

And if that's not enough, Contra Costa Civic Theatre (CCCT) is kind of my old home stage. El Cerrito, where CCCT is located, is where I grew up, and I saw quite a few shows there as a kid. And then by high school, a number of my friends were in their productions and many local families were involved with the theater. I've been hearing that the company has made some real advances in the last several years, so I was looking forward to seeing for myself.

The Play

The show is largely an ensemble piece, though there are clearly a few key characters. The center is really Usnavi (Rajiv Vijayakumar) and his Abuela Claudia (Anita Viramontes). Claudia in many ways holds the neighborhood together. Usnavi has a crush on Vanessa (India Kawar). Meanwhile, Nina (Zinah Abraha) is trying to be the success story, going to college at Stanford on scholarship, though she's home for the summer and getting involved with Benny (Dave J. Abrams), who works for her parents' car service. It's complicated.

We have lots of slices of life at Usnavi's bodega, the car service, the salon that's closing, and of course, out in the street. Much music, lots of dance. And the Piragua Guy (Billy Raphael).

Oh yeah, it's the third of July, so we have to have fireworks and things.

The Production

With a community theater company, you never quite know what you're going to get, but I have to say the company here was quite competent, and much more even in their performances than I would have expected. The ensemble sang and danced very well, even though the street was pretty crowded at times, and the choreography by Allison Paraiso-Silicani was pretty intricate at times. The musicians were good, but not very balanced; the keyboard often drowned out the other instruments (and sometimes the voices, despite the microphones everyone was wearing). So the sound balance needed some work. And there were definitely issues with the lights. I couldn't tell whether those were deisgn problems or equipment problems, but it was bad enough to be distracting at some key moments, which is unfortunate.

But really, I was impressed with the performances of the actors as a whole. The solid ensemble work meshed well with the featured roles. Musically it worked pretty well, although at times Vijayakumar had a bit of difficulty enunciating his raps, particularly with the music overpowering him at times. But on the whole the acting was fine and the singing strong. I should call out Zinah Abraha for her strong, expressive singing, and Dave Abrams for the whole package: singing, dancing, acrobatics, and acting.

Bottom Line

Once again a community theater company has exceeded my expectations. Unfortunately, we were only able to get tickets to the closing performance, so I can't recommend that you run out and see it. On the plus side, I gather they sold out most of the run. Certainly it was had to get tickets the last few weeks. Good for them!

I'm impressed with the quality both of the play itself and of the production put on by CCCT. Director Ryan Mark Weible did a good job of pulling together a cast that was capable of doing justice to Miranda's and Hudes's work. This is not an easy show, but they did it well. I will be looking for excuses to check out more CCCT shows coming up. This was the last show of their current season, but they've announced some pretty ambitious shows for next year, including Cabaret and Ragtime.

Keep your eyes peeled.