in the heights

DIRECTOR Jon M. Chu STARRING Anthony Ramos, Stephanie Beatriz, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Corey Hawkins ETA 7 August 2020 TBC

Before Hamilton, there was In The Heights, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s 2008 Broadway musical that was nominated for 13 Tony Awards and won four, including Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Choreography.

Set over three days in a Hispanic neighbourhood in New York’s Washington Heights, it’s the story of Usnavi (played in the stageshow by Miranda, and in the movie by Anthony Ramos), a bodega owner with big dreams who inherits a large sum of money from his grandmother, and considers retiring to the Dominican Republic. Originally optioned by Universal in 2008, the film version was then set to be distributed by The Weinstein Company until charges of sexual abuse were directed at Harvey Weinstein. Warner Bros won the ensuing bidding war.

With the pandemic causing its June release date in the US to be postponed (its August release in the UK also postponed), Miranda said, “There’s a lot that remains to be done. We were finishing the score and the mixing and just getting the music exactly right.” Director Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians, Step Up 2: The Streets), meanwhile, is adamant that this buoyant tale, with its theme of immigration, is just what we need right now: “I believe that this movie... can change a lot of minds.”

GO BIG SCREEN Miranda’s spot on, saying it’s something “we need to watch in the theatres, together.”