'Hamilton’s America' Unlocks the Mystery of the Musical

Alexander Hamilton is the founder of the New York Post and the Coast Guard, the author of 51 of the essays in the Federalist Papers, and most recently, a Broadway star. Even if you’re not big on musicals, you’ve probably heard about the musical “Hamilton.” And whether you’ve seen the show, listened to the music, or just sat confused while your Broadway-obsessed roommate talked about it for 20 minutes, the PBS Great Performances special “Hamilton’s America” is worth your time.

Over the course of slightly less than an hour and a half, “Hamilton’s America” takes viewers on a behind-the-scenes tour of the writing of the Broadway hit. Scenes where historians explain the intricacies of the history behind the show are interspersed with interviews with a slightly younger Lin-Manuel Miranda, the show’s writer and star. The documentary focuses initially on his writing process, starting two years before the show’s Broadway premiere. A harried Miranda has just moved into a new apartment with his wife and is working on preparing his show for Broadway, and the audience comes along with him for the ride. We learn the inception of various songs, how he wrote them, where he wrote them, and the inspiration behind them. Some of the most engaging parts of this section come when the Miranda of the past is still drafting his lyrics, atonally rapping an unfinished line or two; the uncertainty of his past is contrasted with a following shot of the lyrics as they appear in the finished show, and there’s a great sense of artistic progression, an “Oh, that’s how he thought of that” that comes from seeing the vulnerable roughness that came before the polish.

The documentary maintains its focus on Miranda’s process as a motif throughout the piece but intersperses those longer interviews with short quips from prominent modern figures—among them “The Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, and Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush—as well as members of the cast on their specific roles.

This is where a lot of the soul in the documentary comes in. Christopher Jackson, the actor who plays George Washington in the musical, visits Mount Vernon and spends a tense scene in the slave quarters at Washington’s estate. Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton) and Leslie Odom Jr. (Aaron Burr) handle real dueling pistols and read the letters exchanged between their characters more than 230 years ago. Renee Elise Goldsberry (Angelica Schuyler) and Phillipa Soo (Eliza Schuyler) discuss their characters’ complex relationships with the historical Hamilton. These are the moments that offer a glimpse into not the cold hard truths behind the show but the human elements: Why these people chose these roles and what they bring to it.

That said, there’s a lot of music in the documentary too. Never-before-seen recordings of the Broadway performance are interspersed throughout the feature, along with commentary from prominent musicians and actors on the unique style of the show. Daveed Diggs (the Marquis de Lafayette, Thomas Jefferson) and prominent musicians Black Thought (Tariq Trotter) and Questlove (Ahmir Thompson)—both founders of the band “The Roots,” which is currently the stage band for Jimmy Fallon’s “The Tonight Show”—comment on the show’s unique musical style and offer insight into just how different the rap, hip hop, and R&B of the musical are from other shows.

“Hamilton’s America” is worth seeing if you’re not a fan of “Hamilton,” even if just to understand its appeal. If you’re a fan of the show, though, it’s a must-watch. Fall in love with “Hamilton” all over again, and learn about what makes the whole thing tick.