#though maybe that's a stylization thing? it's a little hard to compare cartoon vs real life with outfits

[higunky]

I'm going to speak my truth. the more you look at them the less they look like each other

[allthislove]

Actually, I understand the criticisms against Hamilton, and like, how having a black man play Thomas Jefferson doesn’t change the fact that Jefferson was a trash can and a terrible man who did horrible things to the people he enslaved, and raped a teenage girl because she was the half-sister of his dead wife, looked like her, and “belonged” to him. 

I get all of that.

But as a writer, if I was going to write this same musical... like, if it didn’t exist at all, and I got the idea for the very same musical Lin-Manuel wrote, I would cast it that way, too. 

(And, like, not for nothing, but we really can’t expect people to not make historical films, TV shows, plays, and books because historical figures did bad things, because a LARGE percentage of them did, because the world used to be a much more vicious place than it is, now. Like, things on our moral compass today, especially socially, were just not, back then. Like, even among the white abolitionists in America, at the time, all of them would be racist by today’s standards. That’s just the reality of it. I suppose an argument could be made for writing THAT play, instead; that celebrated what these men did to found our country, but also very plainly and honestly showed what awful things they did... I digress...)

But, for me, there is something powerful in telling the story of the founding of our nation using all actors of color. And also, it’s something that could’ve ONLY happened in theatre. I don’t think, if Miranda wrote Hamilton as a film, it would’ve happened. I don’t think, if it did happen, it would’ve been as acclaimed. (And, it’s not the same thing, but that’s also my opinion on The Greatest Showman. They should’ve just made it a Broadway show. It would’ve been much more acclaimed.) I also know that there’s no way the film industry would’ve allowed Miranda to even get past the pitch if he said he was writing a Hamilton musical about the founding of the United States and wanted to cast all people of color to play the main roles. Maybe it’s just because it’s my industry, but it really is a big fucking deal that he actually got a musical like this produced, and starring people of color. Can you imagine??? He’s lucky as fuck, and it really only happened, even then, because he had such success with In The Heights. 

Also, I don’t think it portrays any of these people overtly positively. Hamilton is trash in the play, he cheats on his wife, then writes a public document about it. Jefferson is trash literally every time he’s on stage. He’s rude, portrayed as a slaver (which is portrayed as negative), arrogant, flamboyant and conniving. He’s funny, because like King George, he’s a comic character, but I wouldn’t say he’s portrayed in a positive light. Burr is portrayed as an ineffectual, slimy guy who does/says what he must to get in someone’s good graces. 

If Hamilton was just a moderately popular Broadway musical, I also don’t think there would be much issue. The problem is it got super famous, and got a bunch of young, white fans (sorry, but yes) who then proceeded to do that very “uwu my trash son!” thing that’s been criticized. I’m only thinking about it this much because I recently watched the entire play on a bootleg, and it’s really well done, doesn’t actually make any of these people out to be other than what they were (because I’m a nerd, I also did a ton of reading about many of the figures in the play), and is beautifully written.

I can’t really imagine it differently. 

For me, I like the performances by the actors. I don’t think I can mentally romanticize any of the characters, because they were real people, and I know this is a highly stylized, fictionalized version of them. But no more than 1776, or Washington’s Spies, or any other play, film, or TV show about the Revolutionary War and the founding fathers. I like the songs and performances, like, I really love Wait For It, and Dear Theodosia. But I can’t then be like “OMG I love Aaron Burr, he so sad and cute”, because, like, Aaron Burr was a real man and he was not Leslie Odom, and I don’t know what Aaron Burr really wanted, did, or stood for. IDK, I just don’t get that, from it. Only thing I got was a curiosity to compare fact vs fiction by looking up these figures and reading about their lives. (Although I have this thing where I get sad when I read about people’s personal tragedies, and I did get sad when I read how his daughter died...) Only figures I came out of Hamilton with genuine respect for were John Laurens (started the first all black battalion, recruiting enslaved Africans with the promise of freedom after the war. His promise was only broken because he was killed right after the war ended, and the slavers took their slaves back), Elizabeth Hamilton (the work she did after her husband died, with the orphanage, dedicating her life to helping children who had no one), and Hamilton himself (fought tooth and nail to abolish slavery in New York, successfully got it abolished in New York City and took successful steps to get it abolished in New York state before his death- shortly thereafter, New York state did abolish slavery.) They’re the only figures from the play that I read about after the play and felt they genuinely wanted freedom for all Americans, and worked hard to make a better America right at the start of it.  

That said, I think Hamilton is a triumph of musical theatre, it’s something that could’ve only happened in theatre, and while we should absolutely criticize art, and most of the critiques of it have been valid, we shouldn’t be ridiculing it like it’s some idiotic thing. Like it’s the Justin Bieber of musicals. The founding of America is going to be told in stories forever and always. There will always be films, books, TV shows, plays... 

Lin-Manuel Miranda made the most famous telling of that story, to date. And it’s starring all people of color. That, in itself, is a triumph. I don’t want to criticize him for that. We could’ve just had a revival of 1776, guys. Instead, we got the greatest musical of our time. I feel blessed to be alive to have witnessed this era. From a theatre perspective, this musical is a masterpiece, and I wouldn’t change a thing.

I get it, though. White colonists did horrible things to most of the brown people they encountered, and some of us don’t wanna celebrate that. IDK. I just, I don’t know if that means Hamilton shouldn’t have been what it is. I don’t know. I just think it’s so brilliantly made, so perfectly executed...

I also wouldn’t want kids 300 years from now singing along to Donald Trump and the deplorable musical. But I also recognize that 300 years from now, all of us will just be concepts of people, to them, and this time period will also just be a concept. Just like we think of the Revolutionary War as more of a concept than something real people like you and me experienced. It’s not a fault, it’s just hard for us to imagine the past as complexly as we imagine our lives, now. I also think that any musical 300 years from now would be about Obama and Trump would, if anything, be a villainous buffoon character, because history is not going to be kind to him. Think about how we all imagine Napoleon Bonaparte; as a tiny little angry man with the original Napoleon complex; as a caricature in cartoons... I think that’s the type of image future people will have of Trump. Think about it; WE largely hate him, and we record so much history every single day. We are the most literate generation. We write how we feel several times a day on Twitter. Historians are already preserving stuff like Tweets for future generations. 

They will know how hated he was, and nobody will take him seriously. Obama will be as revered as a George Washington type figure. 

And speaking of Washington, I’ll leave you with his words in One Last Time, because it sums up what I’m trying to express about Hamilton quite well.

“Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors.”

They were complicated men, with mindsets of their era, and yes, some of them did things that are entirely inexcusable and that I want to say that by today’s standards would destroy their reputation, but in America right now, racist rapists seem to be all the rage with a disturbing number of Americans... But to pretend the play is simply a celebration of these guys is to purposefully misunderstand the play. It’s a telling of a story. It does celebrate Hamilton himself, but IDK, reading up on him, he seems like a cocky asshole, but a good guy with a good vision for what America should be. An early abolitionist. Which is one of my main litmus tests for good American figures. At any rate, the musical tells a compelling story, and it simply tells it. I think it kind of encourages you to do your own reading on the Revolution and it’s figures... Anyway, it’s brilliant, let’s let it be great, amen.