It's already a beloved play and a hit film. Now Real Women Have Curve is a Broadway musical. Based on the play by Josefina López, this funny, joyous, and empowering new show features music and lyrics by Grammy winner Joy Huerta of the Mexican pop duo Jesse & Joy and composer/lyricist Benjamin Velez, with a book by Lisa Loomer with Nell Benjamin.
The musical features direction & choreography by Tony and Olivier Award winner Sergio Trujillo. With Real Women Have Curves, Joy Huerta will become only the second female composer of Mexican descent to have a show on Broadway.
Summer 1987, Boyle Heights, Los Angeles. After eighteen years under the roof of her immigrant parents, Ana is ready to spread her wings. Her dreams of college and a career in New York City are bursting at the seams, but her family’s expectations would keep her home, working at their garment factory (and being driven crazy by her mother). Is it worth sacrificing the dreams of her family by Ana fulfilling her own?
Before broadway, Real Women Have Curves had its world premiere at the American Repertory Theater (A.R.T) at Harvard University in 2023. The play premiered at the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts in San Francisco in 1990. It was adapted into a film in 2002, starring America Ferrera (in her feature film debut) as protagonist Ana García.
As “Real Women” was celebrated in its earlier incarnations for promoting body positivity, the musical’s title song becomes a showcase both for the plump, pretty Ana’s comfort with her weight and for the different shapes and sizes of the company members as they strip to their undergarments. Their enthusiasm — captured with palpable affection by director/choreographer Sergio Trujillo, who serves the material as well as possible — was, at the preview I attended, received with a standing ovation.
“Real Women Have Curves,” which has opened tonight at James Earl Jones Theater, marks choreographer Sergio Trujillo’s Broadway directorial debut. If it has a predictable plot, it’s all these women together, and the proud characters they portray in the show, that make it work. “Make It Work” is the title of the first of twenty tuneful and rhythmic musical numbers in the show, and the guiding principle of its characters. They see the broken fan, or the shortage of thread, or their fear of la migra, as just obstacles to work around: “If you prick your finger…make sure the fabric’s red/When something breaks/Make it work instead.”
2025 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Choreography | Sergio Trujillo |
2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Lead Performance in a Musical | Tatianna Córdoba |
2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Music | Joy Huerta |
2025 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Music | Benjamin Velez |
2025 | Drama League Awards | DISTINGUISHED PERFORMANCE | Tatianna Córdoba |
2025 | Drama League Awards | DISTINGUISHED PERFORMANCE | Justina Machado |
2025 | Drama League Awards | OUTSTANDING DIRECTION OF A MUSICAL | Sergio Trujillo |
2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Costume Design | Wilberth Gonzalez |
2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Costume Design | Paloma Young |
2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding New Broadway Musical | Real Women Have Curves |
2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Score (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Joy Huerta |
2025 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Score (Broadway or Off-Broadway) | Benjamin Velez |
2025 | Tony Awards | Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) | Joy Huerta |
2025 | Tony Awards | Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) | Benjamin Velez |
2025 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical | Justina Machado |
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