Hamilton was on display in all it’s glory in our very own living room!
I have been enamored with the idea of Hamilton since I first saw the original cast perform in the 2016 Tonys. I’ve frequently watched that clip on You Tube even though the intro from Barack and Michelle Obama breaks my heart since it reminds me that we once had kind, decent and intelligent people in the White House in the before time.
The fam has listened to the soundtrack on many a road trip.
I’ve seen documentaries and news features about the creation of this show.
The idea of ever actually seeing this show seemed a pipe dream never to be fulfilled.
Earlier this year, there was an announcement that a filmed version of Hamilton with the original cast would be released in theaters in the Fall of 2021.
2021? Well, that’s a long time to keep my sorry ass alive to see this.
But then in the heart of the pandemic lockdown, the news came that this Hamilton film would see the light of day in July 2020 and on the Disney+ streaming service.
Well, hot damn to that!
So having seen Hamilton in it’s full and complete glory for the first time, what do I think?
It was good.
Yeah, after years of hype, I can only say that Hamilton is just good.
Which is a damn lie! Hamilton is GREAT!
Hamilton is astonishing, awesome, awe-inspiring, beautiful, breathtaking, formidable, magnificent, stunning, wonderful, wondrous, grand, amazing, majestic, mind-blowing, moving, striking, fantastic, incredible and I might be using up all the words from the thesaurus to describe how I feel about this show.
The filmed version of Hamilton is not a straight up video recording of a live show. The production of Hamilton is edited from 2 live performances as well as a 3rd round of filming for some close ups and other shots not available during a live show. This version of Hamilton captures most of the panorama of the Broadway stage but captures intimate moments of vulnerability that even the best seat in the house at the Richard Rodgers Theater would not be able to witness.
Close ups not only afford us a more intimate look at these performances but also we can see a lot of spit. Jonathan Groff as King George lets loose a whole string of saliva.
The use of hip-hop and pop music as the foundation for Hamilton’s story effectively merges the world of today to this recounting of America’s founding, bringing to the proceedings a human immediacy that such a historical drama might otherwise lack. The saga of Alexander Hamilton gains added relevance to our world today when we see characters move, act and sound like people do today.
There are inversions of standard narrative structure. After we see Alexander and Eliza meet for the first time, time is reversed with the rotating stage rotating backward accompanied by a whirling static of sound being played backward and then we revisit that encounter from the perspective of Eliza’s sister. Angelica. The meet-cute scene we witnessed earlier between Alexander and Eliza takes on a tragic dimension when we realize the sacrifice Angelica makes for Eliza’s happiness.
Sacrifice is a constant companion for Alexander Hamilton and all in his orbit as the story progresses. Nothing is won without cost. The opening number makes this very clear: Hamilton’s childhood is sacrificed in the absence of his father, the death of his mother to illness, the devastation of his island home to a hurricane, long hours working in charter house, even longer hours lost in a deluge of books in a desperate bid to expand his knowledge. Hamilton sacrifices his present to prepare for a future he doesn’t always expect to live to see.
Hamilton takes a darker turn in the 2nd act. The 1st act is focuses on the revolution. The war is a hard and brutal time but Alexander thrives in the pressure cooker of fighting an uphill battle to secure the needed supplies and resources to fight this revolution and eventually leading his own regiment into battle. As Alex sings, he might die in this battle but he will die in the company of his friends. As the 2nd act unfolds, those friends are few and far between with the struggle to build a government for this new nation the revolution won for them. Instead of camaraderie, Hamilton is the target of attacks and infighting as he seeks to will this new government and it’s Constitution into being.
Isolated, Alex Hamilton makes his greatest mistakes. He pushes Eliza aside in deference to his work and then betrays her. It is a betrayal that sows the seeds of greater tragedies to come.
Hamilton ends with Alexander’s death. This is not a spoiler. History tells of the fateful duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr and if you’ve forgotten your history, Burr himself tells us at the end of the opening number in Act 1 Scene 1 that he is “the damned fool that shot him”.
But Hamilton doesn’t quite end there. Eliza’s final song that closes our the show is her story of what happens next, how she lives her next 50 years in the aftermath of her husband’s death, what she sought to accomplish in his name.
The absolute ending, Eliza’s last utterance, a emphatic gasp before the show goes dark, is something new if all you know of Hamilton is the soundtrack. What it means, what is Eliza reacting to, is the subject of much debate and Lin Manuel Miranda isn’t much help in that regard. Basically, it means what you think it means. Apparently Eliza’s last moment is not in the script but was worked out with actress Philippa Soo during rehearsals. By the way, Philippa Soo is extraordinary as Eliza, conveying the lightness of first being in love in Act 1 and the carrying the heavy burdens of betrayal and death in the 2nd Act.
There are a lot of outstanding performances in Hamilton. Daveed Diggs steals the show twice, in Act 1 as “America’s favorite fighting Frenchman”, Lafayette and in Act 2 as the boisterous Thomas Jefferson decked out in purple regalia. Leslie Odom Jr is fantastic as Aaron Burr, self deluded that he’s destined for great things in this new world, this new government but constantly frustrated by coming in second to Alexander Hamilton; Burr’s insistence on playing it safe, to talk less, smile more, never letting anyone know what he’s against or for is his undoing. Odom’s expressions and singing explores the cracks in Burr’s facade without actually dropping that facade.
Then there's Lin Manuel Miranda himself. As if writing this thing is not remarkable enough, Lin carries Alexander Hamilton himself from his early days of being "young, scrappy and hungry" to the end when he is an older man weighed down by his losses and his regrets. This aging is not an effect of make up and wigs but of Lin's expressive face.
The build up of expectation of actually seeing Hamilton was almost virtually impossible to live up to. But I’ll be damned if Hamilton not only lives up to those expectations but actually exceeds them.
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Later today is our regular Tuesday TV Touchbase post.
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