Hamilton 

Thomas Kail 

2hours 35mins

Musical 

98% Rotten Tomatoes

Hamilton is a Broadway performance and touring musical like no other with its modern and inclusive retelling of history.

Hamilton is a musical written by Lin-Manuel Miranda who is an actor, singer, songwriter, rapper, and award winner. Miranda has written many hit musicals such as Encanto, In the Heights and most notably Hamilton. Hamilton is a musical about the founding father on the ten dollar bill: Alexander Hamilton (played by Julius Thomas III). This musical made its debut on Broadway in 2015 and was a smashing success and grossed about $650 million dollars on Broadway alone.

This musical incorporates rap and hip hop to tell the tale of when Hamilton first met his friend and rival Aaron Burr (played by Donald Webber, Jr.) in 1776. In the same song titled “Aaron Burr, Sir”, Hamilton also meets his friends John Laurens (played by Deaundre’ Woods), Hercules Mulligan (played by Brandon Louis Armstrong), and Marquis de Lafayette or just Lafayette (played by Paris Nix). These three are Hamilton’s friends for the majority of the time he is fighting in the war. As Hamilton meets his new friends, the audience gets introduced to The Schuyler Sisters. Angelica (played by Marja Harmon), Eliza (played by Victoria Ann Scovens), and Peggy (played by Ashley De La Rosa) were all wealthy socialites in New York during the late 1700s. During a song called “A Winter’s Ball,” Hamilton meets his future wife, Eliza Schuyler.

After the war, Act II starts. Hamilton transitions from a soldier to a lawyer who constantly gets into legal debates with Thomas Jefferson (also played by Paris Nix) and James Madison (also played by Brandon Louis Armstrong). Hamilton feels as if George Washington (played by Darnell Abraham) is the only person really on his side. Hamilton becomes the first Secretary of Treasury for The United States and he remains a well known person in history even despite several scandals.

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s political activision shines in his choice of cast. Hamilton’s main characters are cast with people of color and that’s how Miranda wants it to be. He wrote Hamilton after reading Ron Chernow’s biography, Alexander Hamilton, on vacation. It instantly became popular. It easily ranks among modern classics like The Phantom of the Opera, The Lion King, and Wicked.

Hamilton was destined for success the moment it hit the stage. There have been several casts and the current traveling cast is just as good as the others. The show won 11 Tony Awards, a Grammy, and even a Pulitzer Prize. It incorporates many styles of music and has powerful lyrics that hype up the audience at the same time. Hamilton is not overrated. The musical has a power and hype that no other musical can hope to achieve. Miranda’s work is a level of genius. He succeeded in telling a historic story while also having catchy songs. It also helped that the cast is as good at bringing the hype as much as the original cast did.

Although it’s hard to not see the iconic faces of the original cast, the current cast does just as good of a job, as they took these famous roles and made it their own. The cast acted out heartbreak to celebrations as if they were actually there. They hyped up the audience just as a concert would and definitely did not disappoint with their wonderful singing voices.