Here Lies Love

A political musical set in a faraway land becomes a cautionary tale for us here in the USA with the long-delayed Broadway transfer of Here Lies Love.

This Evita-like musical retelling of the life of Filipino First Lady (and eventual co-dictator) Imelda Marcos benefits from dazzlingly imaginative staging by Alex Timbers in a drastically reconfigured Broadway Theatre.

To tell the story of Imelda’s rise and fall Timbers called for the removal of all seats from what used to be the orchestra section. The stage itself has been removed, so the audience (mostly standing, not sitting) can turn to view the action on multiple performing spaces that sometimes whirl and reconfigure to capture the pageantry, the ugly glamor and the eventual horror of the Marcos regime.

The unusual setting is appropriate to the political whirlwind of Imelda’s career, starting as a simple country girl who uses her beauty, style, intelligence and political acumen to work her way up the power structure in her nation starting in the 1960s.

Also fueling her ascent is a streak of revenge from a woman scorned. Arielle Jacobs grows fiercer and fiercer as Imelda, whose first love, Ninoy Aquino (the dashing Conrad Ricamora), who breaks her heart, but then builds a career as the democracy-loving primary antagonist to Imelda’s autocratic husband, Ferdinand Marcos (the commanding Jose Llana). The former sweethearts become bitter enemies, leading both of them to very different kinds of destruction.

As the title indicates, many kinds of love die in this show, which has music by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim, and lyrics by Byrne. It’s a pity, then, that the creators decided to cut the title song—incidentally the best song in the score—from a triumphant sing-along in the original productions, to a just a few bars early in the action.

The fast-moving events of Here Lies Love are wonderfully expressed by the masterful lighting design and projections by Peter Nigrini. One of the many literal highlights was the helicopter effect, as Imelda is swept up into her gilded-cage exile in Hawaii. Here, Nigrini is helped by M.L. Dogg’s and Cody Spencer’s sound design. However, elsewhere they seem to have had trouble making the lyrics understandable as the actors gyrate.

Here Lies Love had its New York premiere in 2006 as a concert version at Carnegie Hall, and got its first full-staged production at the Public Theatre in 2013. Though a decade has passed since then, the musical has only gained significance with recent events in the world and especially here in the USA as the country narrowly missed a coup d’etat on January 6, 2021.

And, as it turned out, the story of the Marcoses did not end with Imelda’s flight from her homeland. Who is the president of The Philippines today? Marcos’ son, Ferdinand R. “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.

It’s a sobering reminder that the events of Here Lies Love could indeed yet happen here.