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Marc Anthony gives an amazing acting performance in the short film “In The Heights”. The scene lasts only two minutes but hints at major repercussions for an important character. Director John M Choo praised Anthony as “very reasonable” while playing the character. Visit the Insider homepage for more stories.
Warning: This post contains major spoilers for “In The Heights”.
When Marc Anthony arrived on set to shoot his movie “In The Heights,” director John M. Choo thought the singer would be more than a singer given his fame. But Cho was pleasantly surprised by how much Anthony put into his short two-minute scene – and believes Anthony should play more acting roles after his memorable performance.
Adapted from the Lin-Manuel Miranda and Quiara Alegría Hudes Broadway musical of the same name, “In The Heights” is a story about a community from Washington Heights in New York City. One of the people who lives and works in the neighborhood is teenage Sonny (played by Gregory Diaz IV) who works at his cousin Osnavi’s bodega (played by Anthony Ramos).
Anthony the Thinker plays Sonny’s alcoholic father.
Despite being on screen for just over two minutes and saying a few lines of dialogue, Anthony gives a moving performance in a conversation with Usnavi about Sonny’s future. Anthony’s last line in the film suggests that his teenage son, who was brought to New York City from the Dominican Republic as a young child, may be an illegal immigrant (this was confirmed several scenes later when Sonny collapsed at a rally of DREAMers).
While promoting In The Heights on Friday, Chu told Insider that Anthony “didn’t question” appearing in the movie even though it wasn’t the “biggest scene” in the musical.
Anthony in “In the Heights”. Warner Bros./HBO Max
“First of all, it’s just huge,” Cho said of the singer’s fame. “He went out on Washington Heights Boulevard and people were coming out from everywhere.”
The director praised the way in which Anthony presented the short show all he could.
“You think he’d be a singer movie star,” he added. “And he just stripped everything down and turned into this character.”
Cho continued, “He was that guy—just believable. I was like, ‘Why don’t you do more movies?'” You should be. “He was so good. He was so honest in that scene. I didn’t know he’d make it.”
Despite Anthony being a talented actor, “In The Heights” is the first feature film role for the Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter in fifteen years. His last film appearance was in 2006, in the biographical drama “El Cantante” opposite his then wife, Jennifer Lopez.
Chu said In The Heights is meant to be more “humane” than “political.”
The release of “In The Heights” differs from its source in how it deals with Sony’s story.
In productions of the Broadway and off-Broadway musical, Sonny was not undocumented. Hoods (who wrote the screenplay for the adapted film) added this to the film’s plot after writing a separate musical called “Miss You Like Hell” in 2018, which also talks about immigration.
Sony in music. Courtesy of Warner Bros . Pictures
In The Heights deals with themes of home, community, and a sense of belonging. Cho told Insider it’s hard to have those important conversations without showing someone like Sonny who knows where he is but is “told to leave” because he doesn’t have documents.
The “Crazy Rich Asians” director added that they shot a shot of the scene with Anthony that “is actually twice as long” and the filmmakers briefly considered including the longer clip in the film where Anthony’s character reveals Sony’s true immigration status at that point, rather than just hinting to him afterwards (as he does in the final version of the movie).
“Then, at the end, we were like, ‘Let’s not tell the audience yet,'” Cho told Insider about the scene with Ramos and Anthony. “We cut it out so you don’t quite know it. Some people will understand it, some don’t.”
“It just got more dramatic and interesting,” he added.
Diaz told Teen Vogue in a profile published Thursday that he wanted to play Sonny in a way that would “elevate his profile.” [undocumented people] in a positive sense.
“It was a conversation that we just wanted as not something he’s been up to,” Diaz told the newspaper. “But it’s there and it puts regulations on his life because in the end Sonny just wants to be able to grow and do big things.”
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