Whether it was from CBS’s 60 Minutes, its recent Grammy Award, or from a current RMA senior that went on the New York trip, you have probably heard something about Broadway’s most recent hit, Hamilton. This lively musical that made its Broadway debut back in August has been sold out ever since (until 2018, in fact). This incredible musical follows the life of Alexander Hamilton through the Revolutionary War and the very beginning trials of our nation through the medium of hip hop and rap.

How could a play pull off the combination of modern-day rap and history that is nearly 250 years old? When I first found out that we would be seeing this play while we were in New York for our senior trip, I was very skeptical as to how it would all play out. How could a nearly three hour long play about Revolutionary America’s economic, social, and foreign affairs capture and keep 33 teenagers’ attention? Fast forward 6 months, to just days before we were set to see the play: hundreds of reviews written by the most respected of news sources were absolutely raving about “Hamilton” and the cast had just won a Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album. The expectations of the class had definitely risen from the beginning of the year to say the least.

The most capturing aspect of Hamilton was surely the witty rap that took the place of any spoken word throughout the entire play. While it was fast paced, the songs were not difficult to follow. The story included all of the major figures that helped form America: Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr, George Washington, James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson. While we all know these men to be instrumental in the creation of our free nation, Hamilton renewed the textbook history lesson. The cast was created as it was as if slavery had never happened; with the exception for three major characters, the entirety of the cast was black. The lead actor that plays Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda, which also wrote the play and all music is the son of two Puerto Rican immigrants himself. This incredibly bold and innovative idea contests to how unprecedented this play is. Learning about this time period and Alexander Hamilton in a classroom is interesting, but since having seen the play, I have a whole new appreciation for him. In the typical history lesson, Hamilton somewhat hides in the shadow of Washington and Jefferson. What I didn’t realize before seeing the play was how outrageous Alexander Hamilton’s life was. In the words of Lin-Manuel Miranda in character as Hamilton, “Hey, yo, I’m young, scrappy and hungry, and I’m not throwing away my shot.”  

Hamilton is the Broadway hit that will go on to define our time. While getting tickets for the next few years will be a difficult and expensive task, it may appear in DPAC in the coming years after its run in Richard Rodgers Theater in New York.