Tony Winners Justin Peck and Patricia Delgado on the Power of Dance in Buena Vista Social Club

In Buena Vista Social Club, impassioned, deep-rooted dance expression drives the story behind the beloved album that gives the show its name. Thanks in large part to the vision of co-choreographers and dynamic husband-wife duo Patricia Delgado and Justin Peck, the musical recently earned four Tony Awards, including their own Best Choreography trophy—a testament to the platform they’ve given Cuban music and movement.

Launching his career at the New York City Ballet, Peck has become a Broadway mainstay, winning Tony Awards for every production he’s put his name to. He won his first Tony in 2018 for a revival of Carousel, followed by wins in 2024 for the Sufjan Stevens’-scored dance piece Illinoise (for which Peck also co-wrote the book with Jackie Sibblies Drury) and now 2025 for Buena Vista Social Club. Delgado, a former member of the Miami City Ballet and teacher at The Juilliard School, brought her own storied resumé as a dancer, as well as her Cuban heritage, to Buena Vista Social Club—her choreographing debut (with the exception of her time as Peck’s associate choreographer on the 2021 Steven Spielberg remake of West Side Story).

As the show continues its Broadway run with its well-earned laurels, a warm and candid Peck and Delgado shared what makes this production so vibrant, singular and meaningful to each of them.

There’s some history of collaborative choreography on Broadway. What’s better about working together? Are certain projects better suited for collaboration than others?

Justin Peck: Yeah, this was a project that was really well suited to the right co-choreography team. Part of that has to do with the practicality of this show being so much about duet work, two people moving as one, and how you can really empower two people to build that out together, and how that works to enhance the choreography at large. And then obviously, we both bring very different backgrounds and experiences and focuses within our craft. So to us, it made perfect sense.

Patricia Delgado: There's an organic relationship in the studio that has developed over time between Justin and I—me predominantly in the dancer role, and Justin as the choreographer. There's so much trust and comfort and natural flow from work in the ballet, the concert dance world, but also working on the West Side Story film together. We're very aligned in terms of dance being something that is supposed to communicate an emotion or a story. Also, because I've never choreographed before, when we were invited to do this, I felt compelled to lean into a calling from my Cuban roots and unpack what that meant for me. No one had ever asked me to imagine choreographing or even dancing to Cuban music. So I felt empowered by that.

Did you feel like you needed to go to Cuba in order to choreograph this show?

Justin: It's a longer story going back to 2016. I was invited to bring a group from New York City Ballet to the International Ballet Festival of Havana, and I was really excited about going. I wanted to bring Patricia because I wanted to share the experience. So the first trip to Cuba was together for us, and it was very emotional. It was very much focused on the dance community of Cuba, which is an amazing community to tap into, if you can. And they would do these performances where they would sit us in the front of their studio and dance their hearts out and be dripping with sweat at the end. Just for me and Patricia. We couldn't believe it.

Patricia: On that trip, I was a little nervous and I didn't know what to expect. My parents had never been back. Growing up, I always wanted to go to the island to train because I knew what the respect for dancing was like. And what Justin and I remember from that first trip was the artists embracing us and wanting to share so full-out who they were and what art was like on the island. I personally didn't have a place to put everything that I gained from that trip until we were offered this project.

We did end up going back with our associate choreographer, Carlos Gonzalez, who was born and raised on the island. We went and saw rehearsals of—they call themselves “Buena Vista Curry Club”—and they play all the music, and they rehearse on the rooftop of this building that's, you know, collapsing. And [it was powerful] to feel—no matter what the state of the island—the Cuban obsession and devotion to music and a vibrant quality of life.

It’s moving how the show pays homage to Cuba’s deep African roots with numbers like “Bruca Maniguá.”

Justin: I love “Bruca Maniguá” and the storytelling there. It's so much about seeing from young Omara's point of view and how it taps into something she didn't know was there in herself. The African influence of the culture and the music. And that's what really energizes her and surprises her in that moment. And the audience can feel it. I'm very proud of that number. And that it’s on a Broadway stage, too.

What was the most difficult song to choreograph—emotionally or technically?

Justin: I think the hardest to figure out was “Chan Chan.” Sometimes we'll call it the “dream ballet” because it's the closest thing to that. But it's a complex number and morphs over the course of the five minutes, and it was the most scrutinized by the team. We tried, like, 20 versions, and there were a lot of moments where people wanted to insert text, and we had to push against that a lot.

Something I'm learning, the more I work in theater, is that people in the industry are skeptical, or less trusting, of the expression of dance. I think the lack of words—it's almost like a foreign language to them. So, a big part of the process for every project I've worked on has been winning over that trust, to communicate with the team how to believe in the power of dance expression. Once it’s validated, people love it. It's the best thing ever. But the journey to get there is challenging.

Patricia: I also think why it's not trusted is because it isn't easy. Justin has a lot of experience and is a master at it. And I think it also takes the right cast and the right dancers who are dancing storytellers. It's a combination of that dancer who has command over their technique, but also when they walk on stage can just be a human. And it's hard to find. Our cast are unicorns who can really tell a very honest story through their dancing.

Is it more challenging to work with material that’s already well known?

Justin: It’s just a different challenge. I’m very much about creating a kind of organization from chaos. That's how my brain works. I like the puzzle of, OK, how do we turn Illinoise into a show while preserving all the music? But then I also love working on new projects where it's brand-new music and writing. We came on board for Buena Vista because we love the music so much. It's really that simple.

Patricia: When you first hear the music, you hear one thing, and then as you hear it over and over and over again, you start to hear different layers. You want to make something with enough complexity that it matches the music fully. You hope when people go away, even after seeing it one time, they now listen to the music and can picture what was being done on stage.

How does it feel to see such an enthusiastic reception to Buena Vista Social Club on Broadway—and then to win a Tony for it?

Patricia: We're really proud of it. The recognition and the enthusiasm that people—Cubans but also non-Cubans—have from seeing it, it's so rewarding. When we were making it, we didn't know what would happen. You're just making something that you believe in and all this extra is a little overwhelming because we didn't make it for that, right? So yeah, it's really special.