Hamilton

Hamilton, whose full title is Hamilton: An American Musical, follows Alexander Hamilton from his beginnings as an orphan on St. Croix to his years as the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote the book, music and lyrics, working from Ron Chernow's 2004 biography Alexander Hamilton. Nearly the whole evening is sung or rapped.

Miranda wanted the company to look like the country today, so the Founding Fathers and the people around them are played by Black, Latino and Asian American actors. Most of the action unfolds from 1776 onward, first in Revolutionary New York and on the battlefields of the war, then in the political fights of the young nation.

After a 2015 world premiere Off-Broadway at The Public Theater, the musical opened at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on August 6, 2015. At the 2016 Tony Awards it collected 16 nominations, still the record as of October 2026, and won 11, including Best Musical. The same year it received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. By October 11, 2026, it had given 4,021 Broadway performances, 16th on the list of the longest-running shows in Broadway history.

Aaron Burr narrates most of the evening, so the man guiding you through Hamilton's life is also the one who will become his rival.

Act I begins with a quick sketch of Hamilton's childhood on St. Croix and his arrival in New York. By 1776 he is studying at King's College, and that year he meets the cautious Burr. He soon falls in with three revolutionaries, John Laurens, the Marquis de Lafayette and Hercules Mulligan, and wins them over by sheer force of talk, while King George III is certain his colonies will come back to him.

When war arrives, Hamilton wants a field command but instead becomes George Washington's aide-de-camp. At a winter ball he meets Eliza Schuyler; the two fall in love and marry, while her sister Angelica keeps her own feelings for him to herself. Burr watches Hamilton race ahead and weighs it against his own slow, careful climb. Lafayette finally talks Washington into giving Hamilton a command, and the Americans win at Yorktown, helped by Mulligan's undercover work.

Once the war is over, Hamilton and Burr both become fathers and practice law in New York. Laurens is killed, and Hamilton pours himself into work: he helps shape the Constitution, co-writes The Federalist Papers and joins Washington's government as Treasury Secretary, even as Eliza pleads with him to slow down.

In Act II, Thomas Jefferson comes home from France as Secretary of State and, with James Madison, fights Hamilton's financial plan in cabinet. With his family away for the summer, Hamilton begins an affair with Maria Reynolds, and her husband starts to blackmail him. A private dinner trades the financial plan for a capital on the Potomac, and Burr, left outside, wants a seat at such tables. He switches parties, takes Philip Schuyler's Senate seat and turns into Hamilton's open rival.

Washington steps down, John Adams becomes president, and Jefferson, Madison and Burr confront Hamilton about money he has paid to James Reynolds. To prove he never misused public money, Hamilton publishes the whole story of the affair, which wrecks his standing and wounds Eliza. Then their son Philip, 19, fights a duel to defend his father's name and is killed, and shared grief slowly brings Alexander and Eliza back together. In the election of 1800, Hamilton backs Jefferson over Burr, and an exchange of letters ends with Burr challenging him to a duel.

Miranda's score is built on hip hop, and it also borrows from soul, pop and R&B and from the classic Broadway show tune. Because the show is sung through, the songs carry the plot and the arguments as well as the feelings. Some lyrics adapt phrases from documents of the period, including letters, The Federalist Papers and the Reynolds Pamphlet, and Miranda has said the TV drama The West Wing shaped his approach.

The first act has 24 numbers and the second has 23. A few that do key work in the story:

• "Alexander Hamilton" opens the show, sketching the hero's beginnings and setting Burr up as the storyteller.
• "My Shot" is Hamilton's bid to win over Laurens, Lafayette and Mulligan.
• "You'll Be Back" gives King George III his say as he insists the colonies will return.
• "Wait for It" lets Burr explain his patient approach to life and career.
• "Cabinet Battle #1" stages the fight over Hamilton's financial plan as a face-off with Jefferson in front of Washington.
• "The Room Where It Happens" follows Burr's frustration at being shut out of the dinner deal over the capital.

The orchestra has 10 musicians, including two keyboards, bass, guitar, drums, percussion and a small string section.

David Korins designed a set of wooden scaffolding in front of bare brick walls, and the lighting often suggests candlelight. Paul Tazewell's costumes take their cue from 18th-century dress: knee breeches, velvet frock coats and the like. The stage floor holds two concentric turntables, and Blankenbuehler's choreography is built around them.

Four actors each play one character in Act I and another in Act II: Lafayette and Jefferson, Laurens and Philip Hamilton, Hercules Mulligan and James Madison, and Peggy Schuyler and Maria Reynolds. Knowing this saves some confusion after intermission.

As of October 2026, the Broadway company is led by Marcus John as Alexander Hamilton and Donald Webber, Jr. as Aaron Burr, with Lauren Mariasoosay as Eliza, Lencia Kebede as Angelica and Jarrod Spector as King George III. Christopher Jackson, the original George Washington, is back in the role for a limited engagement from September 8, 2026, to January 3, 2027.

Miranda read Chernow's biography in 2008, on a break in Mexico from his run in In the Heights, and began to imagine it on stage. On May 12, 2009, he performed an early version of the opening number at the White House. On July 27, 2013, a workshop of the first act took place at Vassar College with New York Stage and Film, under the working title The Hamilton Mixtape.

The world premiere came at The Public Theater, with previews from January 20, 2015, and an opening on February 17, 2015; the run sold out and was extended twice. Before the Broadway transfer, several numbers were cut and part of the ending was rewritten. Except for King George III, a role Jonathan Groff took over, the Off-Broadway principals moved to Broadway with the show. Broadway previews began on July 13, 2015, and the official opening followed on August 6, 2015.

Miranda gave his last Broadway performance as Hamilton on July 9, 2016. Performances stopped on March 12, 2020, because of the COVID-19 pandemic and resumed on September 14, 2021.

In 2016 cameras recorded the original principal cast on stage at the Richard Rodgers, and that footage became Hamilton, a 2020 film directed by Kail. It premiered on Disney+ on July 3, 2020, and won two Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Variety Special. The original Broadway cast recording, released by Atlantic Records on September 25, 2015, climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and topped Billboard's rap albums list.

Outside New York, a Chicago production at the CIBC Theatre ran from 2016 to January 5, 2020, playing 1,341 performances. U.S. tours launched in San Francisco in 2017 and Seattle in 2018, and a third opened in San Juan, Puerto Rico, on January 11, 2019, with Miranda back in the title role for three weeks. London's production, from Cameron Mackintosh, opened at the Victoria Palace Theatre on December 21, 2017. Others followed in Australia and in Hamburg, where the show was performed in German, a first for Hamilton.

The 10th anniversary brought an original-cast reunion at the 78th Tony Awards on June 8, 2025, and, on August 6, 2025, a fan matinee with a curtain speech by Miranda and a block party outside the theater with Questlove as DJ. Leslie Odom Jr. returned as Burr from September 9 to November 23, 2025.