The Broadway Theatre Review: Broadway’s Buena Vista Social Club

By Ross

The stage fills up quickly, with musicians and characters feeling the music and the beat of the Buena Vista Social Club. The bodies flow like waves coming in from the Gulf of Mexico (and no other), and it feels like the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre is overflowing with nostalgic love and an intoxicating energy that can’t be denied. It sounds good, and it looks good too, as the exceptional cast and crew take us through a journey across time and the Gulf, giving space and rhythm for every Cuban song to tell the story that lives, breathes, and moves inside it, and it’s almost too powerful to take in, even in those first few moments.

It’s a grand, fantastic musical party from the first strum on that guitar. And it’s one you should do everything in your power to get to, as Broadway‘s Buena Vista Social Club is an on-fire musical experience, overflowing with emotionality and musical expertise shining on us all as gorgeously as the sunset off the coast of Cuba. The completely unstoppable music is rich, invigorating, and profoundly performed by a stellar band, led by music supervisor Dean Sharenow (Broadway’s Girl From the North Country) and music director/conductor (on the piano) Marco Paguia (Broadway’s Gutenberg! The Musical), that keeps giving and giving with a love and rhythm that is impossible to not be swept away and enlivened by.

Directed with a keen ear to its musicality by Saheem Ali (Broadway’s Fat Ham), Buena Vista Social Club is essentially a jukebox musical, but done on a whole elevated level and dimension, taking inspiration from the musicians and stars of the Grammy Award-winning band of the same name, credited with the music energy that never gives up, with the talented David Yazbek (The Band’s Visit) also credited as the show’s Creative Consultant. This force of nature shines as bright as the creative team behind it, placing the iconic performance space solidly and organically inside Broadway’s Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, after an off-Broadway run at Atlantic Theater Company. It feels completely made for the space, enlivening the theatre with an infectious energy that would make my music-worthing dad tear up like I did, thinking about how much he would have loved to have been there to witness this wonder, nad thanks to the spectacular upgraded work by set designer Arnulfo Maldonado (Broadway’s A Strange Loop), costume designer Dede Ayite (Public’s Hell’s Kitchen), hair, wig, & makeup by J. Jared Janas (Broadway’s Purlie Victorious), lighting designer Tyler Micoleau (Broadway’s Into the Woods), and sound designer Jonathan Deans (Broadway’s Ain’t No Mo’ ), Buena Vista Social Club expands the stage with a soul and spirit that undeniable. 

The colorful piece radiates an energy that floats in smoothly and emotionally on the fiery notes that radiate out from all those well-played instruments, filling the theatre with a variety of sounds and songs that completely register. It’s as infectious as can be, creating an energy that moves through you, from your nodding head to your tapping toes, and the crowd leans in, knowing what is invested in this piece of theatre, and loving it. The scenes of interaction are transported out to us, unpacking the emotional entanglements that surrounded the making of Wim Wenders’ 1999 documentary over a landscape of four decades in about two hours of fictionalized backstory. It’s solid stuff, this unpacking, tightly altered from its first incarnation at the ATC, focusing on a crew of characters; musicians and singers, that are working hard to create a cultural music legacy while attempting to survive a country working hard in revolution. The struggle is real and impossible to fully comprehend, but their passion for the music and the ownership of their sound rings true tonally and emotionally, especially when the music takes over the space and our soul.

First, we are introduced to the hardened but respected older singer, Omara, played with a strong sense of self by Natalie Venetia Belcon (Broadway’s Avenue Q), a profoundly gifted singer who is being lured, with surprising success, by a young upstart music producer Juan De Marcos, played solidly by Justin Cunningham (Broadway’s King Lear) determined to rediscover and record the traditional Cuban sound for consumption outside of Cuba. It’s a carefully crafted moment, their tango, that sends us all flying back to a moment when Omara was young, sweet, and innocent, portrayed gently by the very engaging and vocally powerful Isa Antonetti (NYCC’s Evita), and performing nightly as one half of a sister act. Her sister, Haydee, played powerfully by Ashley De La Rosa (Ars Nova’s Travels), is focused, guiding the duo with careful, clear-sighted deliberation, creating success by singing in traditional tourist destinations where they, while performing Cuban classics, are deemed prettier when they smile. Capital Records might be interested, she reminds the young Omara. And we can completely understand why.

But within seconds of a quick pre-show rehearsal with some new fill-in musicians; the young Compay, handsomely portrayed by the exceptional Da’Von T. Moody (La Jolla’s The Outsiders) on guitar, and the young Rubén, portrayed strongly by Leonardo Reyna (“El Gran Impaciente“) on piano, a spark is lit inside the younger sister, one based on the music of her island, and not on placating foreign tourists at fancy island resorts like the “Tropicana”. At first, it feels like it might be blossoming because of love, as Compay first exclaims when seeing the very pretty Omara walk in, but, as the energy pulls Omara to the wrong side of town and into the warmth and energy of the Buena Vista Social Club, things alter, naturally and with a strong authentic heart. This is where the young Omara meets the charismatic and gifted young singer, Ibrahim, beautifully portrayed by Wesley Wray (“Moonlight”), and something far more organic and powerful comes to life. There is no turning back for the singer. Even as politics, colorism, and class differences come clamoring into their musical heaven, beginning with the Cuban revolution of the 1950s.

With a light and nicely improved book by Marco Ramirez (LCT’s The Royale), this rendering parallels the older and harder present with the more optimistic and idealized past, for most of those who play a role in this narrative. It’s a standardized delivery, but here, in this exceptionally emotional entanglement, the heart pumps strong with a musical rhythm that can’t be ignored. Tears come to my eyes, time and time again, especially when the older Omara, who has stepped away from her sound and career, becomes more engulfed in the music and herself more and more with each note sung. That moment when her body starts to move in delight, particularly after the flute comes in unexpectedly, is overwhelming and gorgeous, as we take it all in and feel our own body moving with that same rhythm.

Somewhere in the historical air that this passionate music producer ignites inside her, blowing in from the sea, a window of regret, love, connection, and loss is opened inside Omara’s protective soul. Her sister reenters her heart, flooding her with the memories of a time she has tried to lock out. It overwhelms and drives her, with equal force. But the music and the history that live inside these singers and musicians are too strong to not be played and sung, and Omara dives in, singing live with all these fabulous musicians, until a memory steps forward, driving her back into the painful memories of love, separation, and estrangements.

The music and the song list are powerful and exceptionally well performed. The young producer who is determined to record this band and this sound for mass consumption far beyond the shores of Cuba, brings forth the older Compay, dynamically embodied by Julio Monge (Broadway’s On Your Feet!), to help secure the reluctant and strongly opinioned Omara. It’s an electric reunion, stitched with intimacy and connection. The older Compay, who engages with Omara on a whole other spiritual and historical level, is filled with light and love (and a bit of booze and sexual energy). He brings forth memories and remembrances with a sly wink, systematically tracking down a worn-down Ibrahim, played tenderly by Mel Semé, and an almost silent Rubén, played compassionately by Jainardo Batista Sterling, filling out the look-back framework as gently as Ibrahim’s beautiful singing for pesos on a sunset boardwalk. 

The historic energy evades the space, packing in layers upon layers of political history and personal dynamics with heart and expert clarity. It all feels completely electric, engaging, and encompassing, telling tales and unpacking emotional history to the same beat that swings the hips of that talented ensemble, choreographed spectacularly by Patricia Delgado and Justin Peck (Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story“). They move and embellish every moment, and when that band floats forward, delivering that mesmerizing music and energy into our laps, we can not resist. Especially when we are truly gifted with the captivating guitar playing of Renesito Avich, which is pure emotion and fire, all rolled up into a sound that will not soon leave you. Even though I never saw the documentary film, nor have I ever listened to the CD, the music and this show should not be missed. It needs to be gulped down like a good strong rum and coke on a hot Cuban night, gazing out on the sunset and dreaming of the past when all seemed important and powerfully present.