Hamilton Was A Dream Musical For Me
Every so often, we’ll observe something that makes us wish we were a part of that experience. It could be a movie, an outside party, or a powerful protest. We just never know when we’ll have those ‘’moments’’ until they hit us.
For me, Hamilton was that experience. It’s an experience I wish I could have been part of. Now I’ve had moments when I thought ‘’man, I sure would love to be a part of that group of people, they look like they’re having fun together’’, but, nothing as strong as watching Hamilton on the Disney app last year on the Fourth of July.
I remember seeing a small sample of an interview on it on a TV at this Jiffy Lube place — when I was getting my vehicle registration renewal. ‘’It looked interesting’’ I thought, but, I don’t think my headspace was ready to watch the Hamilton experience, so, I forgot about it.
TWO YEARS LATER
I’m in my apartment hiding from Covid-19 like a lot of people were (and still are), I’m enjoying the time away from work, and unemployment had me finally feeling like a King from the money I was getting every two weeks(the good old days, but, I went into a phase where I was trying to figure out what to do inside the apartment.
Watching movies was starting to get old. So, I tried learning some more Spanish, which lasted for about a week. After fading from the Spanish learning, I got into yoga because I started to have five-hour sleep nights, which had me confused. I was working, my anxiety wasn’t out of control. What gives?
So, I start doing yoga in my room on the floor every day, it makes my body feel good. The yoga pose called Vrikshasana was fun to try, but very hard to maintain after five seconds. Shortly, I discover on youtube eye yoga. I gave it a try, so I watched this video and followed the girl’s movements with her eyes. It’s not a bad exercise! It helped out with sleeping more.
The yoga experiment lasted for about a month. I may have just created a Medium account around this time.
A week before the 4th of July, I see a trailer of this interesting-looking play called Hamilton on my smart TV. The singing sounded really good…and this was based on founding father Alexander Hamilton. It looked really good and had me hyped! Every day, I would be eager to see that trailer and hear it again until the 4th of July.
As a history nut, this couldn’t be too bad. I’ve hoped. The colonial era was always an interesting time in history to me. How the United States came to be from King George III & Great Britain is incredible. The Colonials had France, Spain, and the Netherlands helping them by providing aid in the form of supplies, weapons, military leaders, and soldiers.
You had Native Americans who fought on both the Colonial side and the British side.
It is estimated that between 5,000 and 8,000 African-descended people fought with the Americans while 20,000 fought with the British.
So it wasn’t just Colonial whites fighting the British whites as certain history books made me believed. Plenty of different participants had a hand in the fight for Independence.
BACK TO OUR REGULAR SCHEDULED PROGRAM
So the fourth of July arrives, it’s the day to see Hamilton and I was excited. I would watch Hamilton around 6 pm, Hamilton is almost a 3hr watch, but it doesn’t feel like it when you see the musical. The play takes place in New York City at the Richard Rogers Theatre in Midtown Manhattan.
‘’This play looks like it’s gonna be good’’ I thought. From the first song that was called Alexander Hamilton, this play feels special to me. I’m enjoying the performances and acting so far, but when the song ‘’My Shot’’ comes around, it elevates the play to another level. Seeing everyone dance, sing and express themselves on the stage gets me hyped that I start to ‘’rise up’’ as the song says.
I mean the lyrics alone like ‘’I’m just like my country, I’m young, scrappy and hungry and I’m not throwing away my shot’’ are very moving. Seeing the guy who plays James Madison in the play do this huge jump in the air just made the hyped I was feeling every higher!
After the wave of my shot, the play does not let up showing us Alexander Hamilton’s life and the people who played a part in it like his longtime wife Eliza Hamilton, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Angelica Schulyer, his eventual nemesis Aaron Burr, and others through amazing acting and great musical numbers.
There’s not a bad song throughout the entire play. Songs like Washington On Your Side, The King George ones…forget it, every song is a standout in its own way and complements the part that it’s for.
The hip-hop and R & B flair in this play work really well with the subject matter. I still can’t believe something like this got made. As I watched in amazement, it made me wish I was there and a part of that experience with that great cast. I don’t even need to be one of the main characters, I wouldn’t mind being one of the background characters dancing around Hamilton.
Just being in that room when that musical went down would suffice for me. Those that were there were blessed — they got to witness the greatness that day from everyone on that stage telling the story of Alexander Hamilton. It’s been a year later since seeing the movie, and the Hamilton experience still lingers with me.
I’ve watched a few good plays/musicals throughout time like this Anne Frank play in third grade or watching Cats in middle school, but nothing like Hamilton.
To Lin Manuel Miranda, I say thank you for created Hamilton. You, entire cast & crew deserved all the accolades you’ve gotten. Long live Hamilton!
