Ryan McNeil
Let me tell you what I wished I’d known, when I was young and dreamed of glory;
You have no control – who lives, who dies, who tells your story.
I heard those lyrics for the first time almost five years ago. This phrase in particular phrase cut through. Its perspective affected me, its tenderness, its melancholy. My listening experience was not ideal: I was sitting at my desk at work, doing other tasks while listening, not in the greatest mood, and fighting back massive amounts of advance hype. Despite all of those challenges, these two lines cracked my shell and opened me up to an experience.
It was just a glimmer of Hamilton’s brightness, but sometimes a glimmer is more than bright enough.
(Note: For the purposes of this piece, the stage production will be referred to as Hamilton. The film captured and presented on Disney+ will be referred to as HAMILTON)
HAMILTON is a live stage production of the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical. The film was captured in 2016 with the full original Broadway cast performing their parts. While shot and edited for the screen, the subject is still a live presentation – microphones are visible, the orchestra is occasionally glimpsed, the house audience is heard laughing, gasping, and applauding.
The story is that of American founding father, Alexander Hamilton (Lin-Manuel Miranda, also the show’s creator). Told from the point of view of his eventual killer, Vice-President Aaron Burr (Leslie Odom Jr.), the epic musical takes us through Hamilton’s role as a soldier and advisor in the American Revolution, before turning its attention to his work as the inaugural US Treasury Secretary.
His life will put him at the right hand of George Washington (Christopher Jackson). His time as a soldier finds him fighting alongside Burr, The Marquis de Lafayette, Hercules Mulligan, and John Laurens (Daveed Diggs, Okieriete Onaodowan, and Anthony Ramos). He will also find himself deep in the heart of two of the Schuyler Sisters – Angelica and Eliza (Renée Elise Goldsberry and Philippa Soo). Eliza he marries; Angelica he keeps as close personal counsel.
After the war, as Treasury Secretary, Hamilton will spar with Burr, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison (Diggs and Onaodowan in dual roles). His prospects will crash and burn in light of the original political sex scandal, and he will bear witness to the killing of his eldest son (Laurens in a dual role.
Hamilton is a story of The American Experiment, The American Promise, ambition, perspective, selfishness, selflessness, victories and losses. It combines traditional musical theatre tropes with heavy amounts of hip hop influences, The music is a unique melding of Gilbert & Sullivan and Biggie Smalls.
Reviewing the 2016 production of HAMILTON captured live and presented on Disney+ is somewhat foolhardy. Much of what can be said about the production has already been said…and refuted…and reconsidered…and retorted. The praise and backlash of this Broadway production has gone around and around to the point that debating whether or not it’s “good” is completely pointless.
Still, here we are, discussing the work again – and in my case reviewing it.
To be clear, what we are watching on Disney+ is not a film. A proper film of this property is still many years away – it will be epic, expensive, wrapped in pedigree, feature a completely different cast, and start this whole argument anew. Instead, what WE witness is closer to a concert film. It is a singular document of a singular show. HAMILTON has less in common with Rob Marshall’s CHICAGO or Wise and Robbins’ WEST SIDE STORY than it does with Jonathan Demme’s STOP MAKING SENSE or The Maysles’ GIMME SHELTER.
By that measure, this document of Hamilton is nothing special. It never goes out of its way to employ the paintbrushes of cinema to capture the broad spectrum of live theatre’s colours. “That measure”, however, is not what HAMILTON is after, and never was.
Instead what HAMILTON looks to do is share a special moment in Broadway history with as many people as possible. Putting aside the fact that the actors assembled in this staging have all gone on to other projects, and the fact that all worldwide productions of Hamilton have stopped, scoring a ticket to any production has always been a sign of means and/or luck.
In the face of that, we are given HAMILTON: A film takes the viewer beyond what they can hear through their headphones but stops short of putting them inside the Richard Rogers Theatre. It sacrifices immersion and intimacy for access. That may seem like a bad thing, but it’s really not. It doesn’t allow for the full grandiosity that a live production would – or even the cinema presentation that was originally intended. It does, however, allow the audience to witness nuances they may never have otherwise understood. It’s everything from the contrition and grace of “It’s Quiet Uptown”, to the joyful tomfoolery of “The Story of Tonight Reprise”.
It’s easy to overlook or underestimate the value of these subtleties, but the truth is that they take the viewer one step further in appreciating a work they might only ever have consumed one way…and won’t be offered for many other stage productions.
Hamilton is a story fixated with legacy, and how it is beyond the control of those at its centre. To that end, HAMILTON is an interesting case.
Hamilton arrived at a moment of great optimism – first brought to light before the first man of colour elected American President, just months after his political victory. It was an optimistic declaration that America was still a country where anything was possible for any immigrant with dreams and gumption.
HAMILTON drops into a moment of chaos and reconsideration. The discrimination it pushed against has tacked a lot more points on the scoreboard. The very men it lionizes are being held to account for the fact that the freedoms they brought to some came while they enslaved, murdered, delegitimized, and raped others. The production nods at the darkness of the issue, but never dares speak its name. It desperately wants to, but never gets as introspective as the issue requires.
It’s a contradiction; but then, so is America.
In a way, this moment seems to be the worst possible time to release HAMILTON into the wild. However, it may in-fact be the best moment to do so. As the show itself says:
(I) Felt the shame rise in me. And even now I lie awake knowing history has its eyes on me
Perspective waxes and wanes. Historical figures are built-up and torn down. They aren’t afforded a chance to argue their actions in the court of public opinion, leaving it to future generations to decide who is canonized and who is condemned – occasionally even canonizing and then condemning.
This is the ultimate takeaway from HAMILTON: the perspectives and reflections it leaves us with. The film didn’t have to subject itself to such scrutiny – it could have stayed tucked-away, counted the bank it continues to bring in, and kept its artistic legacy and influence intact.
Intentionally or not, HAMILTON has put its money where its mouth is and acknowledged that “oceans rise, empires fall”
Fact! Hamilton mentions a John Jay, his collaborator with the Federalist Papers. John Jay is the ancestor of a man who married and divorced a cast member of the Real Housewives of New York.
Anyway, your description of It’s Quiet Uptown as graceful is apt. Although my reaction to the song was less graceful and more of me messy crying. Four stars.
Well, TIL!
The show itself gets four stars. This cast gets four stars. This capture OF the cast in the show doesn’t push far enough, and only gets 3.5
For me, HAMILTON is the only way I could have ever experienced Hamilton. Living in Estonia, I think the closest we get to foreign theatre is Live National Theatre where they show UK’s productions. But even then, we get the HAMILTON version.
So to have Disney+ to bring this out, and to finally see it, was for me like I was finally invited into a conversation that has been happening for many years. I also heard these songs for the first time so everything was like… hitting me at the same time.
I understand the way it rips something intimate away but now, putting in perspective that this was not available for MILLIONS intimately anyway, I can’t fault it on failing at that. Those who backlash it for that should I just consider themselves lucky that they got to see it like Hamilton was meant to see, on Broadway (something I will probably never experience) and be glad that we didn’t get the movie version and got something inbetween.
Yes, Satisfied stage production would have seemed very different without the close ups but i still witnessed it. And for that, I mean.. especially now, it gives extra context to the conversations new fans can now start.