Hamilton

Critical response

Marilyn Stasio, in her review of the off-Broadway production of the show for Variety, wrote, "The music is exhilarating, but the lyrics are a big surprise. The sense, as well as the sound of the sung dialogue, has been purposely suited to each character. George Washington, a stately figure in Jackson's dignified performance, sings in polished prose. ... In the end, Miranda's impassioned narrative of one man's story becomes the collective narrative of a nation, a nation built by immigrants who occasionally need to be reminded where they came from."[159]

The Hamilton cast and crew greeted President Barack Obama on July 18, 2015. This performance was led by Miranda's then-alternate, Javier Muñoz (center left), in the titular role, while Miranda (far left) accompanied Obama in the audience.

In his review of the off-Broadway production, Jesse Green in New York wrote, "The conflict between independence and interdependence is not just the show's subject but also its method: It brings the complexity of forming a union from disparate constituencies right to your ears. ... Few are the theatergoers who will be familiar with all of Miranda's touchstones. I caught the verbal references to Rodgers and Hammerstein, Gilbert and Sullivan, Sondheim, West Side Story, and 1776, but other people had to point out to me the frequent hat-tips to hip-hop ... Whether it's a watershed, a breakthrough, and a game-changer, as some have been saying, is another matter. Miranda is too savvy (and loves his antecedents too much) to try to reinvent all the rules at once. ... Those duels, by the way—there are three of them—are superbly handled, the highlights of a riveting if at times overbusy staging by the director Thomas Kail and the choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler."[160]

Although giving a positive review, Elisabeth Vincentelli, of the New York Post (which was founded by Hamilton himself), wrote that Hamilton and Burr's love/hate relationship "fails to drive the show—partly because Miranda lacks the charisma and intensity of the man he portrays", and that "too many of the numbers are exposition-heavy lessons, as if this were 'Schoolhouse Rap!' The show is burdened with eye-glazingly dull stretches, especially those involving George Washington."[161]

Reviewing the Broadway production in The New York Times, Ben Brantley wrote, "I am loath to tell people to mortgage their houses and lease their children to acquire tickets to a hit Broadway show. But Hamilton, directed by Thomas Kail and starring Mr. Miranda, might just about be worth it...Washington, Jefferson, Madison—they're all here, making war and writing constitutions and debating points of economic structure. So are Aaron Burr and the Marquis de Lafayette. They wear the clothes (by Paul Tazewell) you might expect them to wear in a traditional costume drama, and the big stage they inhabit has been done up (by David Korins) to suggest a period-appropriate tavern, where incendiary youth might gather to drink, brawl and plot revolution."[90]

Melanie McFarland of Salon.com wrote, "Enthralling [and] uplifting."[162]

In Time Out New York, David Cote wrote, "I love Hamilton. I love it like I love New York, or Broadway when it gets it right. And this is so right. A sublime conjunction of radio-ready hip-hop (as well as R&B, Britpop and trad showstoppers), under-dramatized American history and Miranda's uniquely personal focus as a first-generation Puerto Rican and inexhaustible wordsmith, Hamilton hits multilevel culture buttons, hard. ... The work's human drama and novelistic density remain astonishing." Cote chose Hamilton as a Critics' Pick, and gave the production five out of five stars.[1]

In an issue of Journal of the Early Republic, Andrew Schocket wrote that while Hamilton makes bold choices to stray away from what he calls the "American Revolution Rebooted" genre,[163] it remains "forged in the mold of this genre, and despite its casting and hip-hop delivery, is more representative of it than we might think".[164] In the same issue, Marvin McAllister noted that the production's heavy hip-hop influence works so well because "Miranda elevates the form through this marriage with musical theater storytelling, and in the process, ennobles the culture and the creators."[165]

A review in The Economist summed up the response to Hamilton as "near-universal critical acclaim".[5] Barack Obama joked that admiration for the musical is "the only thing Dick Cheney and I agree on."[166] In 2019, writers for The Guardian ranked Hamilton the second-greatest theatrical work since 2000.[167]

Philosopher Michael Sandel critiques Hamilton for its oversimplistic multiculturalism, avoidance of discussions on Hamilton's financial doctrines, and a blind embrace of liberal meritocracy in his 2022 edition of Democracy's Discontent.[168]


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