Latest news with #LinManuelMiranda
CTV News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- CTV News
Learning how to beatbox with the cast of Hamilton
Ottawa Watch The Broadway smash hit Hamilton returns to the nation's capital. We give you a behind the scenes peek at this revolutionary production.
Forbes
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Telling The Story Of Tonight—And Beyond
This past week, Hamilton celebrated ten epic years on Broadway. After a joyous performance on August 6—a fundraiser for the Hispanic Federation's Immigrants: We Get the Job Done Coalition and the Public Theater, where Hamilton began—Hamilton producer Jeffrey Seller got onstage at the Richard Rodgers Theatre and addressed the crowd. 'How lucky are we to be in this room right now?' said Seller, who went on to share, 'There's a lot of history around us.' He noted that the Richard Rodgers Theatre was home to the original productions of Guys and Dolls, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, and Chicago. 'But guess what?' he added. 'Hamilton is the longest-running show in the history of the Richard Rodgers Theatre.' More than 100 Hamilton performers, including swings, standbys, and 23 original cast members, stood onstage to honor the show. As Lin-Manuel Miranda made his entrance, he fittingly led with the song lyrics, 'I may not live to see our story, but I will gladly join the fight, and when our children tell our story, they'll tell the story of tonight.' The night was a major milestone for many. For Jeffrey Seller, it marked another professional triumph in his storied career." In Seller's memoir Theater Kid, he recounts how he was taunted for living in a low-income neighborhood just north of Detroit, in a place mockingly nicknamed 'Cardboard Village.' The cheaply made homes could not withstand tornadoes, and their inhabitants were considered just as defective. 'It's the neighborhood where parents have less: less money, less education, less stability. And the kids are deemed less: less smart, less cooperative, less likely to succeed,' writes Seller in Theater Kid. But as a child, he found refuge climbing the massive backyard maple tree that had two giant trunks, strutting branches, and thousands of green leaves. 'I would be Jack, the tree my beanstalk,' says Seller, as he imagined himself climbing to the top of the tree, flying over the clouds, and soaring through the sky. Not only would Seller take flight, he soared to unimaginable heights. A producing legend, his shows—Rent, Avenue Q, In the Heights, and Hamilton—transformed musical theater and won a collective 22 Tony Awards. The only producer who has mounted two Pulitzer Prize–winning musicals, his productions have reached more than 43 million people and grossed over $4.6 billion. A groundbreaking musical, Hamilton seamlessly incorporates pop, R&B, and hip-hop into a Broadway musical. It also inspires new generations to go to the theater. The show also casts actors of color so that a diverse audience can see themselves included in the story of how the nation came to be. As Miranda has said, 'The show reflects what America looks like now.' And if that's not enough, the show's Hamilton Education Program (aka EduHam) incorporates the musical to get high school students seriously juiced about American history and the Founding Era. Inspiring thousands of students from more than 1,300 schools to learn about the show's context in history—and engaging them to create their own creative expressions—EduHam is a springboard for them to make their own magic. In his deeply personal memoir, Seller reflects on his incredible journey from a childhood marked by poverty and pain, with a father who bankrupted the family, to becoming a Tony Award–winning force. Not only is Theater Kid a master class in storytelling, the book is about art, life, and the complexity of family—and having the courage to soar through the sky. Especially when you don't have all the points on your proverbial roadmap figured out. Seller shares the inspiration behind Theater Kid, his evolving relationship with risk and resilience, and how EduHam continues to shape future citizens—on and off the stage. Jeryl Brunner: What inspired you to write Theater Kid?Jeffrey Seller: I have been asking myself for years: How did I get from here to there? From this neighborhood the kids derisively called Cardboard Village—a neighborhood in Oak Park, Michigan, just north of Eight Mile—to doing Rent on Broadway and then to Hamilton. I had no connections, no money. I thought, how do you do it? So this book is my way of answering that question. Brunner: What kept you going when you first got to New York?Seller: Drive. I thought, I will not stop. I will persevere. I didn't use highfalutin words like persevere, but I just knew nothing is going to stop me. I have so much love for these musicals. I have so many ideas. And I had the arrogance to think I was better than everybody else. So I was like, so you better go prove it. Brunner: How has your relationship with risk, rejection, and resilience evolved since those early days? Seller: I have always had courage. It's a quality that I believe is innate. And in spite of my courage, I'm super afraid of rejection. If I'm asking someone to go to a movie and they say, 'I'm not available,' it can be very painful. But finally, through my own late-life maturation, I have gotten over that, where I have finally taken in that it's not about me. Brunner: How did you get over it?Seller: I remember when I was a booker I used to sweat when I would try to sell a one-week engagement of Blood Brothers. If they said no, I would take it as rejection. But I needed to make a living. You have to make the booking. You have to raise the $10 million. I never had a net. If I don't make the rent, no one else will. I moved to New York in 1986. At my first job I made $205 a week. That was $820 a month, minus $400 for rent, minus $120 for the guaranteed student loan payments. So now we're down to less than $300 a month to pay for utilities, subway, The New York Times, and food. When you don't have a net, you make it work. Brunner: This year marks the 10th anniversary of Hamilton. And EduHam, the educational program connected to the show, has connected thousands of students to theater in profound ways and also connected them with history and their own creativity. Why is the program important to you? Seller: We are creating the citizens of tomorrow. Not just the theatergoers. Not just artists, but teachers, doctors, engineers, community leaders, representatives and mayors, cooks and hairstylists. We are creating the citizens of tomorrow. And the most important ways in which I've wanted to use my resources is to help children receive opportunities they otherwise would not have been able to receive. That includes after-school theater programs, college tuition, and EduHam. And the chance to learn American history, see the power of theater unfold on that stage, and participate in its very creation through their creation of scenes and monologues and songs and poems and dances. When we participate, our experience is richer and the outcomes are deeper. Brunner: Theater Kid is filled with so many great stories—like the devastating pain of Rent creator Jonathan Larson's death while dealing with the meteoric success of the show and bringing it to Broadway, or unexpectedly winning the Tony for Avenue Q. What was one of the most challenging sections to write? Seller: Writing the Rent section just kind of came right off of my fingertips on the computer. I have lived with the experiences of developing the show for 30 years now. So it just poured out of me. The hardest part of the book to both write and reread was my father asking 19-year-old me for money. It was very painful for me to read it out loud, and then to do it again with Danny Burstein [who played Seller's father on the audiobook], who was so brilliant. I still cry when I read that because I'm so sad, angry, and ashamed of my father. I'm a 60-year-old man. I have a 22-year-old daughter and a 21-year-old son. And the notion of me showing up and asking them for money is still unbelievable to this day. Brunner: How did writing Theater Kid change you? Seller: It was a catharsis and a great sense of accomplishment. I had wanted to do this for many years. I had been frightened. I was stymied by the question, how do you connect the dots? I questioned whether or not I had the skill and talent to pull it off, and writing it was ultimately an amazing challenge. And by writing the book, my own appreciation for and love for my father grew. While I was holding him accountable for his many decisions and behaviors that harmed our family, I was also zeroing in on any time I ever asked him to take me to an audition. A rehearsal. A performance of a show at another theater. He always answered with the same sentence—because he had brain damage, so his vocabulary wasn't as big anymore. And the answer was, 'Get in the car.' By repeating that quote over and over in the book, I thought, yes. He always said, 'Get in the car.' And wasn't that a beautiful thing?
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Hamilton' turns 10: Lin-Manuel Miranda announces movie theater release to celebrate the Broadway musical's anniversary
The film version of the hit show will debut in theaters on Sept. 5. Rise up, Hamilton fans: The Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning Broadway musical is coming to a movie theater near you. On Tuesday's episode of The Tonight Show, Lin-Manuel Miranda announced that the feature film version of his hit musical Hamilton will make its theatrical debut on Sept. 5 in celebration of its 10th anniversary. Hamilton premiered on Broadway a decade ago today, on Aug. 6, 2015. 'I have an announcement!' Miranda, who created and originally starred in the musical, said. 'So, tomorrow is the 10-year anniversary of Hamilton, and we've been celebrating all year. But we have one more way to celebrate. We filmed most of the original cast performing in Hamilton in 2016, and we always wanted to release it theatrically, but then the pandemic hit, and so we decided to release it on streaming so that everyone could see it at home whenever they wanted. But, Sept. 5, you will be able to see Hamilton in movie theaters nationwide and in Puerto Rico.' The film will be released in theaters in the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico on Sept. 5, in the U.K. and Ireland on Sept. 26, and in Australia and New Zealand on Nov. 13, per Variety. A special screening of Hamilton, organized by the Public Theater, will take place on Sept. 3 at the Delacorte Theater in New York City's Central Park. A limited number of advance tickets will be available for purchase, followed by a free ticket lottery and free standby line the night of the event. Hamilton premiered on Disney+ in July 2020. The movie functioned as a live recording of the actual Broadway production, filmed at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway in June 2016, with much of the original cast performing. Among the original cast members included in the film In addition to Miranda are Daveed Diggs, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Leslie Odom Jr. and Phillipa Soo. The month that it premiered on Disney+, Hamilton had the largest audience of any streaming program in 2020, Forbes reported. Celebrations for the Broadway musical's 10th anniversary — referred to affectionately as 'Hamilten' — are well underway. Tonight, at 7 p.m., an invitation-only anniversary performance of Hamilton will take place at the Richard Rodgers Theatre and will serve as a fundraiser for the Immigrants: We Get the Job Done Coalition. A fan-focused matinee took place at 1 p.m. today. Tickets were priced at $10 apiece and were distributed through a lottery. Former cast members have also used social media to commemorate the milestone. Broadway star Javier Muñoz, who took over for Miranda as Alexander Hamilton in July 2016, shared a lengthy tribute to the Hamilton creator on Instagram on Wednesday afternoon. Muñoz concluded his Hamilton run in January 2018. 'It all comes down to one relationship, one colleague, one friend; Lin Manuel Miranda. My place in this journey was singular. It was exactly where I was meant to be,' Muñoz wrote. 'The list of blessings in the form of friends, chosen family, opportunities, evolution, falling in and out of love, social change, overcoming, and becoming, is too long to spotlight each. None of it IS without Lin Manuel. I'd say yes and jump off any cliffs with you, my friend. Thank you.' Soo, who received a 2016 Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in Musical for her portrayal of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton, also shared a series of photos on Instagram. 'What a ride. 10 years. Eternally grateful. Love you all, thanks for the love. ❤️ @hamiltonmusical #hamilten,' the Doctor Odyssey actress wrote. Jones, who originated the role of Peggy Schuyler, posted several photos as well. 'Look at where you are… Look at where you started…. TEN YEARS AGO WE OPENED ON BROADWAY. Forever grateful. This show changed my life and gave me a forever family. ❤️,' she wrote. The original Broadway cast of Hamilton reunited earlier this year at the 2025 Tony Awards, where they performed a medley of tracks in honor of the show's 10th anniversary. With Miranda helming the ship, the cast serenaded audience with performances of hit songs including 'My Shot,' 'Non-Stop,' 'The Room Where It Happens,' and 'The Schuyler Sisters.' Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Hamilton' Marks 10 Years on Broadway with a Surprise Announcement
'Hamilton' Marks 10 Years on Broadway with a Surprise Announcement originally appeared on Parade. Happy birthday, Hamilton musical! The trailblazing, historic show — written by and starring In the Heights creator Lin-Manuel Miranda — made its Broadway debut 10 years ago today. To celebrate, the show's producers and Disney Studios shared a major announcement that has Hamilton fans rushing to the comment section for the ultimate theater-kid group honor of Hamilton's tenth anniversary, Disney announced that the big-screen version of the Broadway show will hit theaters on September 5, 2025. Although the filmed version of the 11-time Tony Award-winning show was released on Disney+ during the pandemic, this theatrical release marks the first time fans can watch the musical in theaters — replicating the experience of seeing the show live on Broadway. 'Please tell me we're all going to sing along like the Era Tour movie!!' shared one excited fan. Another added, 'Now I wanna be in the room where THIS happens,' referencing the character Aaron Burr's now-famous filmed version of Hamilton features the original cast, including Lin-Manuel Miranda, Daveed Diggs, Leslie Odom Jr., Jonathan Groff (who did not originate the role of King George), Christopher Jackson, Phillipa Soo, Renée Elise Goldsberry, and others. 🎬SIGN UP for Parade's Daily newsletter to get the latest pop culture news & celebrity interviews delivered right to your inbox🎬 'Hamilton' Marks 10 Years on Broadway with a Surprise Announcement first appeared on Parade on Aug 6, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on Aug 6, 2025, where it first appeared. Solve the daily Crossword
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Hamilton' turns 10: Lin-Manuel Miranda announces movie theater release to celebrate the Broadway musical's anniversary
The film version of the hit show will debut in theaters on Sept. 5. Rise up, Hamilton fans: The Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning Broadway musical is coming to a movie theater near you. On Tuesday's episode of The Tonight Show, Lin-Manuel Miranda announced that the feature film version of his hit musical Hamilton will make its theatrical debut on Sept. 5 in celebration of its 10th anniversary. Hamilton premiered on Broadway a decade ago today, on Aug. 6, 2015. 'I have an announcement!' Miranda, who created and originally starred in the musical, said. 'So, tomorrow is the 10-year anniversary of Hamilton, and we've been celebrating all year. But we have one more way to celebrate. We filmed most of the original cast performing in Hamilton in 2016, and we always wanted to release it theatrically, but then the pandemic hit, and so we decided to release it on streaming so that everyone could see it at home whenever they wanted. But, Sept. 5, you will be able to see Hamilton in movie theaters nationwide and in Puerto Rico.' The film will be released in theaters in the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico on Sept. 5, in the U.K. and Ireland on Sept. 26, and in Australia and New Zealand on Nov. 13, per Variety. A special screening of Hamilton, organized by the Public Theater, will take place on Sept. 3 at the Delacorte Theater in New York City's Central Park. A limited number of advance tickets will be available for purchase, followed by a free ticket lottery and free standby line the night of the event. Hamilton premiered on Disney+ in July 2020. The movie functioned as a live recording of the actual Broadway production, filmed at The Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway in June 2016, with much of the original cast performing together. Among the original cast members included in the film In addition to Miranda are Daveed Diggs, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Leslie Odom Jr. and Phillipa Soo. The month that it premiered on Disney+, Hamilton had the largest audience of any streaming program in 2020, Forbes reported. Celebrations for the Broadway musical's tenth anniversary — referred to affectionately as 'Hamilten' — are well underway. Tonight, at 7 p.m., an invite-only anniversary performance of Hamilton will take place at the Richard Rodgers Theatre and will serve as a fundraiser for the Immigrants: We Get the Job Done Coalition. A fan-focused matinee took place at 1 p.m. today, too. Tickets were priced at $10 apiece and were distributed through a lottery. Former cast members have also taken to social media to commemorate the milestone. Broadway star Javier Muñoz, who famously took over for Miranda as Alexander Hamilton in July 2016, shared a lengthy tribute to the Hamilton creator on Instagram on Wednesday afternoon. Muñoz concluded his Hamilton run in January 2018. 'It all comes down to one relationship, one colleague, one friend; Lin Manuel Miranda. My place in this journey was singular. It was exactly where I was meant to be,' Muñoz wrote. 'The list of blessings in the form of friends, chosen family, opportunities, evolution, falling in and out of love, social change, overcoming, and becoming, is too long to spotlight each. None of it IS without Lin Manuel. I'd say yes and jump off any cliffs with you, my friend. Thank you.' Soo, who received a 2016 Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in Musical for her portrayal of Eliza Schuyler, also shared a series of photos on Instagram. 'What a ride. 10 years. Eternally grateful. Love you all, thanks for the love. ❤️ @hamiltonmusical #hamilten,' the Doctor Odyssey actress wrote. Cephas Jones, who originated the role of Peggy Schuyler, posted several photos as well. 'Look at where you are… Look at where you started…. TEN YEARS AGO WE OPENED ON BROADWAY. Forever grateful. This show changed my life and gave me a forever family. ❤️,' she wrote. The original Broadway cast of Hamilton reunited earlier this year at the 2025 Tony Awards, where they performed a medley of tracks in honor of its 10th anniversary. With Miranda helming the ship, the cast serenaded audiences with performances of hit songs including 'My Shot,' 'Non-Stop,' 'The Room Where It Happens,' and 'The Schuyler Sisters.' Solve the daily Crossword
