My mother has said something to me at least a dozen times throughout the years, but only when she’s feeling extra-sentimental. “Remember when we used to go to plays together? You and I should go to more plays.” I have absolutely no idea what she is talking about. And frankly, neither does she. As far as I (or she) can remember, we attended EXACTLY one play together. It was sometime around 2001 to 2004 at the Bushnell Theater in Hartford, CT, and it was a touring production of David Merrick’s Broadway show Carnival! At least, I think it was Carnival! I remember the show being a musical about a carnival, and when I googled “carnival musical,” Carnival! is all that came up. Again, this was such a forgettable life event, it makes me think my mother has an illegitimate son stowed away somewhere. (FYI: the boy is probably around age 29 and working as Squidward’s understudy in SpongeBob SquarePants: The Musical.)
What Mom has failed to grasp after 24 years is that I know less about live theater, particularly live musical theater, than anyone in the world. I don’t have any excuses, it’s just one of those cultural blind spots. I’ve seen the movies—the Sound of Music, Grease, West Side Story, the Music Man, a certain butthole-free feline film that shall not be named—but I haven’t seen any of the productions in the flesh. In fact, despite being a two-hour jaunt away from Manhattan, I’ve never shelled out the cash for a Broadway show.
For the past hour, I’ve been straining my temporal lobe, trying to list every live musical I’ve ever seen. Besides (maybe) Carnival!, I remember a middle school production of the Wizard of Oz (at a middle school I never attended), a local production about the life Jackie Robinson (it was a fifth grade field trip to the same theater my mother dragged me to), the Festival of the Lion King show at Disney World’s Animal Kingdom (if that even counts) and, somewhere between 1999 and 2001, Barney’s Musical Castle (again, Mom says she took me and I enjoyed it; I remember loving Barney as a child, but I have no recollection of this event). This is an exhaustive list. Have my made my point clear? I am an uncultured swine.
I also enjoyed Hamilton.
I’m not sure what that’s worth to anyone. I am but one of many Disney Plus subscribers who got their first taste of Hamilton fever over the weekend, five years after its Broadway debut. Lord knows there are countless voices on the internet who can speak about the staging, choreography, set design, lighting and costuming with more authority than myself. Frankly, I have no way of knowing if Hamilton is a good musical. But I found the music to be incredibly earwormy, despite having never listened to the soundtrack. I found the sheer volume of historical information to be stunningly educational yet never overwhelming, a marvel considering the entire story is conveyed through song. I found the cast to be thrillingly dynamic—particularly Jonathan Groff, in a radical turn from what I’m used to seeing in Mindhunter, and Leslie Odom Jr, who radiates that “look at me, I’m a superstar” energy from the moment he walks on stage. And generally, I found the entire pursuit to be a moving celebration of American diversity and our nation’s founding principles, that never attempts to rewrite history or shy away from the complexities of our founding fathers.
As a guy who’s attended four and a half (?) live musicals in his entire philistine life, a feeling of majesty overcame me. It actually was quite humbling. I felt ill-equipped to criticize, analyze or proselytize, nor did I have any desire to. I just gave myself up to the art and enjoyed it, because there is absolutely NOTHING I have to say about Hamilton that hasn’t been said by someone smarter and more eloquent than me. If only certain internet commentators experienced the same sense of humility…
Look, I get it. The content creation business does not reward humility. It is also an increasingly frustrating paradox—somewhat for the audience consuming it, but especially for the creators engaged in it. Making stuff for the internet is, at once, the easiest profession in the world and the most demanding. There is a seemingly endless vacuum of webspace yearning to be filled with memes, vlogs, think pieces and (ahem) film criticism. But let’s be honest, the generation of this content requires relatively no effort. At least the bad stuff does. But that’s the nature of the game. Timeliness and volume are currency. Originality and insight are a luxury, one that only few can afford.
Keep this in mind when you scroll through Twitter and see your favorite amateur commentator’s sizzling hot take on Hamilton. Whether they think Lin-Manuel Miranda has black-washed American history to pander to Obama administration sensibilities, or he’s created a neoliberal wet dream that heroizes slave owners and glorifies the politics of a stuffy plutocrat, you’ll read their overlong threads and cringe. Because like them, you watched Hamilton this weekend (probably for the first time, since live theater tickets don’t come cheap). But unlike them, you liked it. And everything they’re saying betrays what your ears and eyes have already told you.
Still, I plead with you, don’t crucify these people. Understand that their job is not to enjoy art. Their job is to power the ever-churning machine that is cultural discourse, while preserving their infinitesimal role within it. That doesn’t mean they’re lying to you. They’re not sharing these ideas to conform to some cultural norm or virtue signal to some invisible mob. They’re sharing these ideas because they have to say something. And more often than not, that means to zig when the consensus zags. In our increasingly polarized internet culture, all expressions of enthusiasm must be met with equal and opposite skepticism. “Hamilton. It’s good” just ain’t gonna cut it.
Again, I’m not judging. I am one of those smug, unoriginal content creators who happens to be creating some smug, unoriginal content right now, despite stating four paragraphs ago that I just wanted to shut up and enjoy the art. And I don’t mean to suggest that cultural criticism should become any less biting or interrogative or political or, well, critical. But I do believe that anyone who shares an opinion online with the hopes of someone reading it has an obligation to not be lazy. You’re allowed to dislike Hamilton, and you’re allowed to tell my why. But just about every negative review I’ve read over the weekend has grasped at some pretty narrow straws. And I don’t know this for certain, but I suspect these detractors have roughly the same level of familiarity with Broadway musicals as my mother and I. Then again, I’ve never met anyone who has seen Carnival!
Smartest guy in the room, dumbest guy outside of it.
