I saw recently that the song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” from Encanto is a big hit, getting airplay on radio and moving up the Billboard chart.
It’s an odd song as a stand-alone, and, to my mind, much inferior to the best song of the movie, “Surface Pressure,” which is beautiful and complex and universal.¹ Without knowing the story of the movie, or reliving it during the song, as a stand-alone vehicle, for me, it feels taste-less (not “tasteless”). More on that in a minute.
Several characters take a turn on center stage bemoaning how the prophetic brother/uncle Bruno² foretold doom in their lives. Each talks about how horrific their prophecies were, until…. Isabela says,
He told me that the life of my dreams would be promised, and someday be mine
He told me that my power would grow, like the grapes that thrive on the vine.
Wait. That sounds awesome. I mean, actually fantastic. So what’s the deal? Spoiler Alert. She actually does not want these things. “The life of my dreams,” is actually the life of other people’s dreams. She’s got a great boyfriend who is handsome and sensitive, who is about to ask her to marry him. And her power, which is to be able to grow flowers, feels like a curse to her. For it to continue is a torture.
Now, about that boyfriend. Lin-Manual Miranda is a master of juxtaposing lines, and one coupling leaves me hanging. Are the Madrigal family actually vampires? Or cannibals? What is going on with their magical family on the edge of town?
When Isabela’s boyfriend gets to house of The Family Madrigal, we get this combination:
(Isabella, your boyfriend’s here)
Time for dinner!
WAT. Are they going to eat Mariano? Or does he just have impeccable timing? It’s just… weird, right?
And now, here’s Jessica Darrow as Luisa singing “Surface Pressure”:
¹ And while I think it is the perfect song of a father talking to his children, the line, “Give it to your sister, your sister’s stronger…,” gives one pause. But only a pause long enough to say that if it is not the top drag queen lip sync of 2022….
² According to Wikipedia, the character’s original name was “Oscar”, but Lin-Manual Miranda requested it be changed to “Bruno” to get that “no-no-no” part of the song to work.