I have been craving to see “Hamilton” ever since it premiered at New York’s Public Theater in 2015 and way before it proved to be one of the biggest critical and commercial successes in Broadway history.
I unsuccessfully hunted for a ticket when staying in the United States. I listened to the original cast album through and through, learning the lyrics by heart. And I surely watched every video available online – like the cast’s performances at the White House and award ceremonies – scraping those pieces into some sort of “Hamilton” experience.
When I was finally watching the two-hour-and-forty-minute film version of the musical released by the Disney+ streaming service on July 3, I was on an emotional roller coaster, laughing and sympathizing, singing along and admiring the piece only more.
What I couldn’t wrap my head around is something that American television host and comedian Stephen Colbert famously put as: “At the end of that show, you just say to yourself, why am I crying about Alexander Hamilton?”
Exactly. Why was I crying over the United States’ first treasury secretary, the mastermind behind the country’s financial system, the lesser-known and the youngest Founding Father that even most Americans didn’t know much about until very recently? Me, a Ukrainian who doesn’t have a deep connection to that country, its history, ideals and figures that shaped them.
Somehow I related so strongly to Hamilton, but don’t remember feeling like that about any of the many heroes who fought for the independence of my country throughout centuries.
Most of them were two-dimensional images from my history books followed by bios. And on those rare occasions when their stories were brought onto the stage or screen in Ukraine, they too often remained these idealized flat figures that the audience couldn’t relate to.
“Hamilton,” meanwhile, went from what might have been one of the most boring pitches in the history of theater to a revolutionary art form blending history and hip-hop.
The creation of American composer and lyricist Lin-Manuel Miranda, “Hamilton” has acquired all of the highest accolades a musical can possibly receive: Pulitzer Prize, Grammy and the sweeping 11 Tony Awards, including Best Musical.
But the significance of “Hamilton” reaches far beyond the admiration of the art and critics circles.
It managed to make all generations sympathize with the old story about the “dead white males,” as they are often described, in a country where the interest in civic and history education has been reportedly declining for years.
The musical’s appeal was complex and driven by many factors starting with the extraordinary diversity of the cast, which featured mostly black and Latino actors playing people who were white.
As Miranda said in one of the interviews, it’s the story of America then told by America now, which is why “it looks like America now.”
No less interesting was Miranda’s decision to tell a period story through hip-hop and R’n’B.
Although “Hamilton” wasn’t the first hip-hop musical in history, it set a precedent to be the first piece made in the genre, whose characters weren’t people of color and which wasn’t set in a modern inner-city setting.
The lyrics make nods to the iconic rappers such as The Notorious B.I.G., Jay-Z and Ja Rule, as well as include references to Beyoncé and her early female group Destiny’s Child.
The Schuyler sisters in their ball dresses with their hair neatly tied all of a sudden become much more relatable when they bust some hip-hop moves.
Meanwhile, the Cabinet debate between Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson about the American financial system — a subject that normally would interest a limited circle of people — gets unexpectedly engaging when presented in a form of a rap battle with Founding Fathers dissing each other in between arguments as they hold modern vocal mics.
But all the present-day motives and language blend very naturally into a late 18th-century story.
Miranda says that it’s because Hamilton’s life embodies hip-hop.
“He was born a penny-less orphan of illegitimate birth, became George Washington’s right-hand man, became treasury secretary, caught beef with every other Founding Father and all on the strength of his writing I think he embodies the word’s ability to make a difference,” the musical’s creator said before performing a song from the future piece for the first time at the White House in 2009.
Very soon after the release of the musical album featuring all of its 46 songs, the far-reaching appeal of the piece made its magic and the “Hamilton” actors were getting stopped by children on the streets singing and rapping lyrics they knew by heart.
Miranda said that he wanted the historians to respect “Hamilton,” so to ensure the accuracy of the events in the musical, he collaborated with American historian Ron Chernow, whose biography book “Alexander Hamilton” was an inspiration and a basis for the musical.
That didn’t go unnoticed by history teachers all across the country.
Some used “Hamilton” to spark children’s interest in history by playing excerpts from the musical. Others played the whole album in classrooms at the American Revolution lessons. Others offered musical-inspired assignments like composing rhymed songs about historical figures or holding rap battles on debatable matters.
And so a bold, experimental musical based on historical events, against all odds, became part of that history.
There was no piece made in Ukraine that had even the slightest shade of the effect “Hamilton” had on the American people.
There have been few original theater productions touching Ukrainian history. On the rise of the country’s filmmaking, more and more movies (often state-financed) explore Ukraine’s past days. And yet none of them made at least an attempt to experiment and resonate with the modern Ukrainian society.
Ukraine has a long-standing tradition of leaning towards overly formal styles and over-idealized picturing of historical figures.
This kind of cultural mindset dates back to the Soviet Union times when art was a propaganda tool, and this “picture-perfect patriotic” style was encouraged. Soviet creators could only work within the limits of the one officially-recognized art style, social realism, while their pieces have been meticulously censored.
Sometimes it seems that Ukrainians still imagine a Soviet censor standing behind them when they’re creating.
One of the recent Ukrainian films, biopic “Censored,” told a story of Ukrainian dissident poet Vasyl Stus, a largely respected figure who opposed the Soviet oppressive system. Set only over half a century ago, the movie couldn’t be further away from the audience with book-like language and theatrical performance of actors. The film was labeled by some critics as nationalist propaganda.
The films that date further back, like those depicting some of the most fascinating pages in Ukrainian history, the time of freedom-loving Cossack fighters, are no less convincing. They are often overly epic pieces with polished characters wrapped into pathos.
In “Hamilton,” the front character’s image is presented with weaknesses and mistakes leading to his downfall. It makes the Founding Father more relatable and, most importantly, more real – something that isn’t easy to achieve in a story about a person so renowned that he is printed on 10-dollar bills.
The musical’s President Washington teaches both Hamilton and the audience that “you have no control who lives, who dies, who tells your story.”
And how those stories are told you have no control either, it turns out.
But I am convinced that the remarkable lives of numerous Ukrainians from the Kyivan Rus kings and queens, Cossacks, the fighters of the Ukrainian War of Independence and the opponents of the Soviet regime, deserve better than polished flat pieces that make no box office and ignite no discussion.
“Hamilton” shook the world of theater and music, triggered interest to history, but even more than that, it passed American ideals and beliefs from the Founding Fathers to the new generations, giving food for thought to the modern society.
History has a tendency to repeat and so learning its lessons is sometimes vital. It’s especially true for Ukraine, whose young independence is still under threat from Russia.
When, if not now, should Ukrainian artists be bold when depicting our country’s history? It is high time to leave the two-dimensional world of history textbooks behind and rejuvenate the heroes of the past.
