SOLTuesday: In the Heights for an “In the Heights” Walking Tour

A couple of weeks ago I went to a movie theater for the first time in a year and a half, to see Lin-Manuel Miranda’s “In the Heights.” The city street scenes were great, but I don’t know that neighborhood so well, and mentioned to a friend who lives in Washington Heights that there should be walking tours of sites associated with the film. She immediately volunteered to take me on one, and that’s what we did yesterday.

 

            If you haven’t seen the movie yet, I won’t say too much about the plot. But here are three scenes. The first is in the J. Hood Wright Park (a rich man who had a mansion on this site) where Benny and Nina, the secondary couple, sing a duet. This part is set on top of Manhattan’s bedrock and looks toward the George Washington Bridge, which BTW is the world’s busiest bridge: it carried more than 103 million vehicles, many trucks, in 2016 (latest figure on wikipedia). On the New York side it connects to the Cross Bronx Expressway, which I have heard long-haul truck drivers call the worst highway in the country; having driven it myself, I would agree.

 

           

            Next is a row of three-story houses on West 176th Street, very much like private homes in Greenwich Village much further downtown. Judging from the mailboxes, it looks like they have been converted to one apartment per floor. In the movie, people are sitting outside on the steps and Nina dances down the street, singing of her love for her neighborhood.

 

            This location I didn’t think really existed. It’s part of Usnavi’s song and dance to honor his Abuela Claudia (Usnavi is the Lin-Manuel character). But it is real: the tunnel leads from Broadway under the hills of Washington Heights (it’s called “the Heights” for a reason) to the #1 subway train. The graffiti is still being worked on — one man was adding finishing touches of red to one part — and from all the paper and cardboard near the walls, I suspect that people sleep there at night.

            I will definitely watch the movie again — it’s available on Hulu — now that I can see outside the frame of the camera. 

 

 

 

 

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It’s Slice of Life Tuesday over at Two Writing Teachers. Check out this encouraging and enthusiastic writing community and their slices of life every Tuesday. Add one of your own.

Slice of Life, #21

Part I. The Afternoon

            I met with a group of New York Mets fans who have been gathering before the season starts for 30 years -- I joined five years in. Three of the original members are still in it, all trivia mavens and sabrmetricians (people fascinated by baseball stats, from the Society for American Baseball Research), and they have real lives as well. We meet to talk about the team, its recent past, and, hopefully, better season this year, and then play a round of baseball Jeopardy. This year's categories were "Rogers" (players whose first or last name was Roger or Rogers); Mickey, Willie, and the Duke; Mets Hall of Famers; the Roaring '20s; and Cy Old (pitchers who won the Cy Young award when they were old -- by baseball standards). I won last year's pool for how many games the Mets would win: 79.

            We met at a beer connoisseur's bar/restaurant called the Ginger Man in Connecticut, where we commandeered a section of couches and banquettes, making a cozy spot for conversation. Being the only woman in the group made me a little nervous the first few years, but the organizer of this group is very welcoming and all I had to do was show knowledge of the game and the previous seasons. (How I came by my baseball knowledge and fandom is a long story, possibly for posts starting in April, when baseball starts up again; Thomas Boswell once wrote a book titled Why Time Begins on Opening Day).

Part II. The Evening

            A friend valiantly stood in line for standby tickets for Hamilton, the hip-hop musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda at the Public Theater. She was successful, so we got to see the best play of the season. It’s a history lesson, and a hip-hop concert. It’s a love story, and a civics lesson. In hip-hop vernacular and rhythms, we see the American Revolution in action and the rivalries, political as well as personal, among Hamilton, Burr, Jefferson, and Madison. A Cabinet meeting in Washington's administration is introduced to the audience as though Washington is an MC, inviting us to a performance. It is long, but it  packs in a tremendous amount of history in an immensely entertaining and informative way. I'm told that Dick and Lynne Cheney saw it recently, and I can hardly wait to see their reaction. The play is both patriotic and subversive, with almost all of the characters played by people of color.

            The shows at the Public are sold out through May 3 (but there are those standby seats if you are willing to stand in line). it moves to Broadway in July, and preview tickets are already on sale. They ought to offer discounts to high school classes; tickets are over $151 and $131. I think students would love it.