The Latina seamstresses at a dressmaking workshop in East L.A. express their credo at the top of the new musical “Real Women Have Curves.” With the pulsating song “Make It Work” these women sing about how — despite their burdens and obstacles — this community of hardworking immigrant women manage to create a vibrant life.
The same can be said for the artistic team behind this appealing, tuneful and politically potent show based on Josefina López’s 1990 play and the 2002 film which she co-wrote with George LaVoo, and which starred America Ferrera.
The modestly scaled musical, which had a run at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass. in 2023, has been significantly refashioned for its Broadway engagement with some major cuts and new material for the show, plus the addition of Nell Benjamin (Broadway’s “Mean Girls,” “Legally Blonde”) as co-writer with Lisa Loomer (the film “Girl, Interrupted”).
The show still centers on Ana (Tatiana Córdoba, making a career-launching Broadway debut), an 18-year-old Mexican-American who yearns to leave her tight-knit family and become a journalist. Though Ana is self-confident, she’s fearful of how her family-first mother Carmen (Justina Machado) will react when she learns of Ana’s full-scholarship acceptance at Columbia University — because Carmen already has other plans for her daughter.
Ana is needed at the family’s small dressmaking operation that her sister Estela (Florencia Cuenca, excellent) runs in Boyle Heights with a team of undocumented women. When a demanding dress broker (Claudia Mulet) offers Estela a make-it-or-break-it deal to produce 200 dresses on a seemingly impossible deadline, the need for Ana to support the family business becomes critical.
But this is not simply “Kinky Dresses,” with likable workers banding together to save a manufacturing business (though that happens here). Nor is it a kind of “In the Boyle Heights,” with a neighborhood filled with loving and prideful immigrants (though there’s that, too).
There are familiar musical echoes and tropes but serious undercurrents, too, making the femme-centric musical much more than a celebration of culture, community and body positivity.
Ana is a U.S. citizen and that status is vital for the business because other members of her family were not born here — and her sister, because of a minor arrest, is precluded from her own path towards citizenship. The workers in the factory also live in constant fear of governmental raids and deportation, a threat that becomes all too real for seamstress Itzel (Aline Mayagoitia), a Guatemalan refugee.
While the show’s tone is more bright and upbeat than its original sources, the scope of the musical has also been widened to reveal dark complexities in the world of the undocumented.
Set in 1987 during the Reagan-era amnesty program for longtime undocumented immigrants — yes, there once was a bipartisan pathway to citizenship — the musical feels chillingly relevant today. For the musical’s likely tour, a stop in D.C. could prove timely (though the Kennedy Center might not be so inviting now).
But politics comes most alive through the personal, and the heart of the musical lies in its characters’ dreams: those that conflict with others, those that are deferred and, most poignantly, those that are never realized. The show astutely depicts the mixed emotions of grappling with obligations and expectations of one’s self, family and culture. Ana’s guilt creates a need to iron out differences with her mother and receive her blessing — but that’s not likely. “What if I have bigger dreams?” Ana asks. “Sleep less,” is her mother’s cold response.
Loomer and Benjamin’s book drapes the storyline and imperfect characters with rich details, dialogue, humor and backstories, some fully realized, while others come across as fleeting but enticing sketches, deserving of their own plays.
Threading through the score, by Joy Huerta and Benjamin Velez, are Latin rhythms and melodies, with songs ranging from pop to mariachi to rap. Songs about body positivity, menopause and awkward sex might seem like a digression from the main narrative but they also offer a break from the heavier moments of family strife and immigration tensions.
Sergio Trujillo’s staging and choreography in these classic musical comedy numbers keep the show aloft, none so stunning as when the seamstresses, suffering from the stifling heat, decide to strip to their undergarments for their own comfort. It’s a joyous scene of empowerment, with the women taking prideful ownership of their bodies, their lives and the stage.
The performances by this colorful ensemble of women are all splendid. The male characters are largely on the sidelines, including Mauricio Mendoza as Ana’s father Raul and an especially delightful Mason Reeves as Ana’s nerdy new boyfriend. But the musical makes the character of Carmen more sympathetic than the play or film, and Machado graces the multi-layered character with dignity, humor and humanity.
Several numbers have a been-there feel, such as when Itzel sings metaphorically about longing for the freedom of a bird. That is preceded by Ana’s ‘I-want’ song about flying away, which may be one too many airborne numbers.
Though sure to please many audiences, the show’s ending also feels unearned and underwritten. Perhaps if only Carmen could fully realize that Ana’s future writing will create something special that honors not only her but all the women like Carmen who, with fortitude, resilience and passion, will always be there making it work.
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