“I feel out of place/Song out of tune,” sings Rose Garcia (Eva Noblezada), strumming her guitar on her bed, donning a red cowboy hat. “Like a velvet chair in a dusty sunroom.” She goes on: “Square peg/round hole.”
A Filipina girl living in a small Texas town with dreams of being a country singer, Rose knows something about being a square peg in a round hole. And if all that weren’t difficult enough, Rose is undocumented; she’s witnessed her mother get detained by ICE and is evading deportation herself.
Diane Paragas’ “Yellow Rose” tells Rose’s multi-pronged story as she chases her dreams of country music stardom, finds her place in Texas, and confronts the reality of immigration in America. Written, directed, and produced by Paragas, “Yellow Rose” draws heavily on the her own experiences. “After escaping Martial Law in the Philippines, my family moved to Lubbock, Texas when I was four,” she writes in the film’s press kit. “As the only Filipino growing up in Lubbock, I often felt alienated, and I used music and art as a means of escape” — much like the film’s titular Rose. She calls “Yellow Rose” “a deeply personal film” that she hopes will “put a human face on the plight of Dreamers, while entertaining the audience with original Americana music.”
And audiences are certainly entertained by the film. At its world premiere at the 2019 Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, “Yellow Rose” took home the Grand Jury Prize; at its next two festival screenings — the Bentonville Film Festival and CAAMFest — it took home the Grand Jury prize twice more. “It’s amazing,” Paragas told the Inquirer after the film’s LA premiere. “Just being in the festival on opening night was enough, but then to win the Grand Jury Prize is just everything.”
“Yellow Rose” is already a bold blend of genres, telling a coming-of-age story and an immigration story in a Western setting. But perhaps what makes the film most exceptional is its music. At the CAAMFest 37 Awards, Center for Asian American Media Executive Director Stephen Gong called “Yellow Rose” “deeply emotional and socially resonant, and it’s got some kick-ass music to boot.”
Making a good movie musical is no easy feat — it depends on dexterous performers who can act as they sing and sing as they act. Luckily, Paragas scored two of Broadway’s most lauded actresses as her stars. At just 23 years old, Noblezada already boasts two Tony Award nominations, for her starring turns in “Miss Saigon” and “Hadestown.” Her performance, which earned her the Special Jury Prize for Breakout Performance at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Fest, is stunning and delicately crafted. Despite her classical, musical theater training, Noblezada breezes through bluegrass melodies with an effortless cadence and gorgeous, gentle ache. Lea Salonga, who plays Rose’s estranged, hard-edged aunt Tita Gail, with whom she says after her mother is deported, is something of a musical theater legend. Salonga won a Tony — and was the first Asian woman to do so — for “Miss Saigon.” And you don’t need to be a theater geek to know Salonga’s work — she also leant her singing voice to two Disney Princesses: “Aladdin’s” Jasmine and Mulan.
“Yellow Rose” marks Salonga’s first live-action movie in over two decades. “I said yes to the script because it was something that felt so timely and relevant, given so much of what’s happening with regards to immigration debates and legislation and border patrol,” Salonga told Entertainment Tonight. “It’s a very human story, but it does show the process of what happens when somebody is deported. Nobody’s a two-dimensional caricature.”
Both Noblezada and Salonga sing in the film, showing off their stunning voices. But each character uses and relates to music in a different way. While Rose sings original compositions and strums at her guitar, Tita Gail sings a different kind of tune. “One thing Diane [the director] wanted me to do was to sing a Filipino song. It’s called ‘Dahil Sa Iyo,’ a song that has transcended music and become an integral part of Filipino culture,” Salonga shared. “[When] I sing this, it is something that brings the family together.” “It’s interesting how music in this movie weaves a thread and a through line and that’s how it connects people together,” she continued, “even if they may not always get along.”
But “Yellow Rose” isn’t just a musical romp through an Americana world—it’s also a deeply felt and at times tragic look at the lives of the undocumented. Rose’s mother is ripped from her violently; she must flee in order to stay in the only town she’s ever known. While her singing is mesmerizing and her lyrics are beautiful, they are the only solace Rose has in the face of aching loneliness, debilitating fear, and, most profoundly, supreme injustice.
“Yellow Rose” is poised to explode onto the film scene. Catch it before everyone else catches on.
“Yellow Rose” recently screened at CAAMFEST37 in San Francisco. Keep an eye on the film’s website and social media for future festival dates.
