‘In the Heights’ stars: ‘There was a lot of silly fabulosity on set’
Dascha Polanco and Daphne Rubin-Vega hadn’t seen each other in more than a year — after spending months at the hip filming “In the Heights,” the movie adaptation of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony Award-winning musical, now in theaters. So, they were a bit giddy when they reunited last week to pose for photos at the East Village salon Treehouse Social Club.
“I gave her a lot of piggyback rides,” Polanco told The Post of their time shooting on location in Manhattan two years ago. (The movie was supposed to come out last summer, but was delayed a year due to the pandemic.) The petite Rubin-Vega confirmed their antics. “There was a lot of silly fabulosity on set,” she added with a laugh.
“In the Heights” centers around a tight-knit Latino community in Washington Heights, and Polanco and Rubin-Vega — along with “Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s” Stephanie Beatriz — play its scene-stealing salon ladies. These fabulously turned-out women, in their skin-tight pants and knotted turbans and gloriously long nails, know everything about everyone on their block and have opinions about them all, too. They are the neighborhood’s gossipy, meddlesome tias, as well as its glue and conscience. Rubin-Vega is Daniela, the dynamo salon-owner; Polanco, Cuca, one of her employees and BFFs.
Polanco, 38, and Rubin-Vega, 51, immediately grasped the importance of the salon ladies in the film — as well as in Latin culture. Both women immigrated to the US from Latin America when they were children, and both have powerful memories related to their textured manes.
Polanco massaged her Dominican mother’s hair with oil in their home in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. Her mom was a licensed cosmetologist, and though she never practiced professionally, she imparted her knowledge and expertise to her daughter.
“She taught me so much as far as the respect that you should have for your hair,” Polanco said. “Hair for her meant strength, meant identity, meant bonding, meant power.”
“It’s close to your head, which is close to God,” the Panamanian-born Rubin-Vega said, recalling how she used to wrap her locks in Bustelo coffee cans to smooth them out. “It really is the container of sacred things,” added the actress, who grew up in Greenwich Village with her Afro-Latina mother and Jewish stepfather.
Polanco and Rubin-Vega had never met before being asked to improvise together during a callback audition for “In the Heights” in 2019. Polanco, who had just finished filming the final season of “Orange Is the New Black,” hadn’t been in a musical before, while Rubin-Vega is a Tony Award winner for her role as the original Mimi in “Rent.” But the connection was instant.
“We had such a good time,” said Polanco. The two further bonded during the months of vocal and choreography “bootcamp,” and when they started filming on the streets of Washington Heights, they were kindred spirits.
“Shooting in the summer in the Heights was very fun,” said Polanco. She, Rubin-Vega and Beatriz raided the neighborhood’s beauty supply stores and snapped up $10 dresses at the boutiques lining the sidewalks. “People opened up their bathrooms to us when we would be sitting on their stoops filming all day,” said Rubin-Vega. “They would say, ‘Just don’t eat my food!’” (For grub, they’d go to Cuban hotspot El Floridita.)
The process was exhilarating, but also scary for musical newcomer Polanco.
“I was so nervous,” the actress said. “You know, having to perform and record in front of everyone, and — this is something that I had to struggle with throughout — wondering, ‘Am I gonna look fat if I dance this way?’ I kept thinking, ‘Oh my God, do I look crazy?’ That’s when I would push Daphne aside and we would have a little spiritual circle.”
“We would pray on it, ” Rubin-Vega added. ‘We would just hold hands and hold a thought — just center and hold a good thought.” Meanwhile, the Broadway vet had her own worries: namely, her character’s flamboyant costumes.
“There was a point when I wondered, ‘Does Daniela wear a bra?’” Rubin-Vega recalled. “I was like, I don’t think she wears a bra. Because I knew my character is this human being who doesn’t care what [other people] think and who shows out, but that was disturbing to Daphne the actor, because this film is gonna live for a long, long time.”
“We knew that this was bigger than us, that everyone was dancing and working and pushing for the same purpose,” added Polanco.
That purpose? Representing Latin-American culture in all its glorious forms: from its dances (flamenco to hip-hop) and food (ropa vieja to piraguas) to its diverse array of people.
“I had this feeling watching the film, and seeing this representation on screen, of ‘Oh, I didn’t know that I was missing it so much,’” Rubin-Vega said. “I realized that the absence of my physical self and presence and experience on film for so long says something: it says that I matter less. To see this film is not even to say, ‘Oh, I matter more.’ It’s just to say, ‘Hey, you: you matter, period.’ That is incredibly powerful.”
Photos: Tamara Beckwith/NY Post; Stylist: Elise Sandvik/See Management; Hair: Corey Tuttle/Exclusive Artists using R+CO, Tomo Nakajima/Sally Hershberger; Makeup: Juliette Perreux/The Wall Group using MAC Cosmetics, Andréa Tiller/Tracey Mattingly using MAC Cosmetics; Stylist Assistant: Lutèce Gault; Location: Treehouse Social Club @treehousesocialclub.nyc 190 First Ave., ground floor.