On Your Feet! The Story of Emilio & Gloria Estefan is a Pop Concert, Dance Party, Documentary, and Musical Theater, All Rolled Into One

This article was published by Triangle Review on 18 January  2024.

I didn't know what to expect last night when I attended On Your Feet! The Story of Emilio & Gloria Estefan, playing two nights only at the Durham Performing Arts Center. What I got was a pop concert, dance party, documentary, and musical-theater performance, all rolled into one. And the inspirational effect was contagious.

On Your Feet! features a book by Alexander Dinelaris and the 1980's music of the Emilio Estefan and Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine. The musical opens with a giant cruise-ship-like projection of Gloria Estefan, singing with microphone in hand, rather appropriate for a production that is set mostly in Miami, arguably the king of American cruise-ship departure ports.

The screen lifts to reveal Gloria and Emilio Estefan at the height of their musical careers, then flashes back to Gloria's humble beginning as the child of first-generation Cuban immigrants who immigrated to the U.S. in 1959 following the Cuban Revolution.

The scenes seamlessly change from the streets of Gloria's working-class Cuban neighborhood in Miami to Gloria's father Jose's injurious participation in the failed 1961 invasion of Cuba's Bay of Pigs, to the kitchen of the family's Miami home, the moonlit palm-tree-lined Miami coast, and performance (and practice) venues in Miami and beyond, using magically realistic projections on the screen that spreads across the back of the stage.

Scenic designer Clifton Chadick, lighting designer Ryan J. O'Gara, projection designer Patrick W. Lord, and prop designer Emmarose Campbell have some serious synergy between them.

The action alternates between intimate dialogue between characters and large song-and-dance numbers that rival a Saturday night at the Salsa Mia Latin music club, so energetically that the passage of real time is forgotten.

The talent of all the dancers is simply amazing, their bodies responding to the music with genuine joy. I'd rather see their performances again than attend an episode of America's hit television show Dancing with the Stars. Such an accomplishment is only possible with top-notch choreography. Hats off to director and choreographer Luis Salgado and associate choreographer Shani Talmor.

The musicians in On Your Feet!! superbly deliver the prominent horns/trumpets and percussion that are signature to Latin music but not typical of the orchestral accompaniment of the average American musical. This is especially a treat given the absence of live horns and trumpets in most of the music on the radio today. The leaders of the band, music director Daniel Gutierrez and music supervisor Clay Ostwald, deserve special acknowledgement.

Long slit-legged, red sequined dresses; high wasted, full-forming jeans; poofy white lace and organza wedding dresses; and yarmulke- and Shriner hat-laden party goers -- costume designer Jeannette Christensen's; apparel runs the gamut of a 1980's fashion show.

But the highlights of the show are the performers -- all of them. Kristen Tarragó, subbing for Gaby Albo, is absolutely delightful in her imitation of the exuberant singing and dancing of Gloria Estefan. Samuel Garnica has, perhaps, the best singing voice in the production and delivers his Latino accent and comically confused American translations in a way that no doubt endears him to every member of the audience.

Camila Aldet plays Gloria's mother Gloria Fajardo with 100% believability -- from her cut-short singing and dancing career in Cuba to her inevitable jealousy of the fruition of Gloria's dreams and their potential to take her precious daughters from her -- and her vocal and dance abilities rival those of her daughter (Kristen Tarragó) on stage.

And Adela Romero, who plays the role of Gloria Estefan's grandmother, Consuelo, with realistic grace, love, and go-for-it encouragement that often, deservingly, makes her the center of the audience's adoring attention. Every single performer deserves the standing ovation that last night's audience gave them well before the last scene of the musical.

I came away with a deep appreciation for the hard-won trailblazing of Gloria and Emilio Estefan as they demanded the rightful place of immigrant Latino music, culture, and happy make-it-work determination in mainstream America at a time when the influencers could not even imagine this possibility.

It's a shame that there is only one more performance of On Your Feet! -- at 7:30 p.m. tonight at DPAC. The house should be filled for the show's final Durham performance, and audience members should inform the producers and DPAC that they want it back for a longer run next year.