Hamilton Obsessed
I get obsessed with things. It happens. For most of high school it was Rent, with some marathons of Lord of the Rings thrown in. In college it was hard to maintain anything other than school and swimming in my mind, what with all of the classes and crazy growing up that was happening. For a long while it was Starkid and by extension Darren Criss. During Peace Corps my sister finally convinced me to read John Green and that rapidly turned into finding everything ever about John Green, Hank Green, vlogbrothers, Crash Course, and all things nerdfighteria. About halfway through Peace Corps I finally took the YouTube recommendations black hole into Pentatonix. I never really abandon my obsessions and I still keep up with the things I loved in high school, but the new ones take over my internet life for a good long time. I tell my sister about this obsession nonstop, so this is just a natural extension of that almost daily conversation.
The current obsession is Lin Manuel Miranda, and by extension, Hamilton the Musical. I realize that the things I like about LMM can take up an entire post all of its own, so I'll save it. This is just my Hamilton obsession.
You've probably heard of it since it's all over the news and Broadway and the White House and everywhere. The New York Times just did an article, and it's positively glowing. It's a hip hop musical about Alexander Hamilton. The music is awesome. The cast is awesome. The staging is awesome. EVERYTHING is awesome. It makes me incredibly happy and inspired.
If I were a teenager, this would have most definitely been me with my friend Julia. This was me with Les Mis and Rent, and seeing the traveling Broadway cast of Rent was one of the most epic moments of my high school life.
As it is, I did for Hamilton what I did for Rent all those years ago. I searched out just about every scrap of information, every book, every video, every article and interview I could find. I know tons about Lin Manuel Miranda's life, about the cast, about previous work the cast has done, about the process of writing the musical, the cut raps, #EduHam...the list goes on. The more I find out, the more I like it, and the more I respect and admire and am thoroughly entertained by Lin-Manuel.
There are endless things I like about the show, including, but certainly not limited to:
They do a weekly mini show at the stage door for people waiting for the $10 lottery for front-row tickets called #Ham4Ham, sometimes bringing out the cast to sing, sometimes inviting actors from other shows and sometimes getting other awesome people to come sing or dance for the crowd. They always have someone filming it, and when they can't make it they do a #digitalham4ham
The cast - the story of America then, told by America now:
The women are fierce
It has had a pretty public gestation process as Lin-Manuel performed the first song at the White House back in 2009 when he was actually invited to perform something from his Tony-winning In The Heights, but decided to do Alexander Hamilton instead. He's also on Twitter all the time, so a lot of little snippets came through that.
It makes history accessible, and I love history. And the raps are EPIC.
It connects history and the present and all of those pieces of our fractured history that so many Americans feel disconnected from.
The glorious golden voices:
It did win a grammy.
King George thinks you should listen to it, watch it, know it. He's pretty persuasive.
The drunk history is hilarious.
There are many many more things I love about Hamilton. Remind me of them and I will add endless gifs.
Update: I FORGOT THE FAN ART!
P.S. Kate, the LMM one is coming soon.
The current obsession is Lin Manuel Miranda, and by extension, Hamilton the Musical. I realize that the things I like about LMM can take up an entire post all of its own, so I'll save it. This is just my Hamilton obsession.
There are endless things I like about the show, including, but certainly not limited to:
They do a weekly mini show at the stage door for people waiting for the $10 lottery for front-row tickets called #Ham4Ham, sometimes bringing out the cast to sing, sometimes inviting actors from other shows and sometimes getting other awesome people to come sing or dance for the crowd. They always have someone filming it, and when they can't make it they do a #digitalham4ham
The cast - the story of America then, told by America now:
It has had a pretty public gestation process as Lin-Manuel performed the first song at the White House back in 2009 when he was actually invited to perform something from his Tony-winning In The Heights, but decided to do Alexander Hamilton instead. He's also on Twitter all the time, so a lot of little snippets came through that.
The story sounds dry, but it is intense
They've developed a curriculum and are bringing in 20,000 high school students to present their own artistic work inspired by the primary sources to the cast, then see the musical.
The drunk history is hilarious.
There are many many more things I love about Hamilton. Remind me of them and I will add endless gifs.
Update: I FORGOT THE FAN ART!
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| This tumblr, 0tterp0p, is one of my absolute favorites. #jediham |
I'm just going to leave this here: http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2012/12/les_miserables_movie_why_teenagers_tweens_and_kids_love_the_musical.html
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