What is the Broadway-sized version like for you as actors as you recalibrate your performances? Here Lies Love has never been a small show, and you’ve done it in several different venues and spaces. The three of us are having a great time playing together. The amount of material she’s learned and the amount of strides and choices that she’s made, and then still at the end of the day, be kind and openhearted and cool…that’s Arielle Jacobs in a nutshell right there. No one’s ever accused me of being that way. Jose: Arielle is not just an extraordinary talent, but she’s just cool as a cucumber. It keeps me on my toes and thinking about what I’m actually saying and doing. Arielle is one of the most talented people I’ve ever worked with, and the choices that she’s making are so stunning and surprising that it keeps the show fresh for me. It feels like such a blessing because a lot of the times when you’ve done something so much, you can get comfortable and everything could become rote. So I’m sure you change in response to the actor you’re playing opposite.Ĭonrad: Very much so. Conrad Ricamora as Ninoy Aquino in David Byrne and Fatboy Slim’s Here Lies Love on BroadwayĪrielle Jacobs is your third or fourth Imelda, too. I have more tools to bring to the table than I did 10 years ago, and I feel like it’s not the same performance - hopefully it’s not - because you’re bringing your life experience to what you’re doing. Jose: And as you get older and as you work more, you just enrich yourself more as an actor. I just got married, and knowing that Cory was Ninoy’s soulmate, and knowing what Ninoy sacrificed and gave up to speak against the government makes the character a little more alive for me. Certain things also feel deeper, in terms of having lived 10 years of life. So for me, it’s fitting.Ĭonrad: Certain things feel harder 10 years later. He was elected president when he was a year older than I am now. My husband actually pointed out to me that I’m closer to the right age for Marcos than I was 10 years ago. I won’t speak for Conrad, but I feel it in my bones a little bit more this time, jumping up and down on these platforms. Jose: If you’re riding a bike that’s 10 years older. Has it lived in your body for this long? Was it like riding a bike again, even though you’re in the new space? And now we get the luxury of being more specific and detailed with everything that we’re doing, which is just such a gift. With a bigger audience now, and the fact that we’re telling the story in a much different world than we were 10 years ago, it’s even more relevant today.Ĭonrad Ricamora: Having something sit in your bones for 10 years and coming back to it, everything just feels deepened. We’ve all been collectively holding our breath since our last production seven and eight and 10 years ago. Jose Llana: I feel like we’re crossing the finish line, finally. How does it feel to be here on Broadway right now? (© Billy Bustamante/Matthew Murphy/Evan Zimmerman) Jose Llana as Ferdinand Marcos in David Byrne and Fatboy Slim’s Here Lies Love on Broadway This conversation, conducted prior to the SAG-AFTRA strike, has been condensed and edited for clarity. Now, with all that experience up their sleeves, they both get to dig deeper and go harder as they take over the Broadway Theatre. (Ricamora also journeyed with the show to Seattle Rep in 2017, while Llana toured as the King in The King and I.) Both actors took part in a 2012 workshop at Mass MoCA, before starring in the Alex Timbers-helmed production at the Public Theater (20). After more than a decade since originating the roles of Ferdinand Marcos and Ninoy Aquino in David Byrne and Fatboy Slim’s Here Lies Love, the pair are back at it in the much anticipated Broadway mounting. Not all actors have the luxury of returning to roles they originated, especially not after 10 years, but Jose Llana and Conrad Ricamora are experiencing that long-hoped-for sensation right now.
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