Lin-Manuel Miranda & Jon M. Chu Discuss Making IN THE HEIGHTS for the Screen

For the most recent Variety cover story, Lin-Manuel Miranda and John M. Chu discussed bringing "In The Heights" from the stage to the big screen.

Miranda started with a discussion of how difficult it was to even start the conversation about adapting his 2008 Broadway musical.

"I was so naive. I thought once a studio buys the rights to the movie, the movie's getting made, he said. "I didn't know the sheer tonnage of miles between acquiring the rights and a green light. You can find interviews of me being like, the 'In the Heights' movie is happening any minute now!"

Director Chu chimed in to talk about what it means to tell a story that's interested in wide, social change.

"When you are trying to make stories that change what we've seen before, you can get caught in the small things. But you try to do as much as you can, to be as truthful as you can," he told the magazine. "And the rest, other people are going to fill. We got to crack it open a little bit."

Miranda also talked about certain changes he's made to the script - including eliminating the line about Donald Trump from the anthemic "96,000."

"When I wrote it, he was an avatar for the Monopoly man. He was just, like, a famous rich person," Miranda said. "Then when time moves on and he becomes the stain on American democracy, you change the lyric. Time made a fool of that lyric, and so we changed it."

Now, despite struggles and changes due to studio expectations as well as the COVID-19 pandemic, "In The Heights" is finally scheduled to be released in theaters and on HBO Max on June 11th. Find out everything we know about the film here.

The story is set over the course of three days in the vibrant New York community of Washington Heights - a place where the coffee from the corner bodega is light and sweet, the windows are always open and the breeze carries the rhythm of three generations of music. It's a community on the brink of change, full of hopes, dreams and pressures, where the biggest struggles can be deciding which traditions you take with you, and which ones you leave behind.

"This is a vaccine for your soul," Chu said of the finished film.

Watch the trailer here:

Read the full Variety cover story here.

Photo Credit: Frank Ockenfels 3 for Variety