Broadway’s “Here Lies Love” is a dynamite showcase for actor and singer Arielle Jacobs, whose chilling, full-throttle performance has made the immersive musical a must-see. The show is also a raucous dance party and a historic first, featuring an all-Filipino cast.
Still, Jacobs understands why some audience members leave the theater feeling conflicted — a bit fearful, even — by much of what they’ve just witnessed onstage.
“I knew that the telling of this story was going to open wounds for a lot of people,” the California native told HuffPost after the musical opened at New York’s Broadway Theatre last month. “There’s a big weight in taking on a character like this, especially a real-life person who caused a lot of damage and trauma to her people and her country.”
She went on to note: “But this show is not one-note. We are telling a cautionary tale. My hope is that, in opening those wounds, we are making space for healing and conversation, and allowing families and friends to talk about things they didn’t want to address. So I think the experience of the show … isn’t something to avoid. It’s something to encourage.”
Featuring a disco-pop score by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim, “Here Lies Love” tells the real-life story of Imelda Marcos (played by Jacobs), who rose from obscurity to become the first lady of the Philippines on the arm of President Ferdinand Marcos (Jose Llana) in 1965.
Elias Williams for HuffPost
For a time, the Marcoses are fêted as their country’s answer to U.S. President John F. Kennedy and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy. One of their chief critics, however, is Philippine senator Ninoy Aquino (Conrad Ricamora), who had a brief romance with Imelda during their youth and routinely points out how she and her husband’s well-documented
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