Hamilton comes to the PAC
With the theatre industry in a major crisis at present, it is hard for our GCSE and A level Drama students to visit the theatre for their courses. As such, Examination Boards have recommended schools take up the option for students to write about digital and streamed productions. This being the case the Year Ten GCSE Drama classes were offered the opportunity to come to the Performing Arts Centre to watch the Disney+ streaming of ‘Hamilton’. Playwright, Lin-Manuel Miranda, who also starred as the title role, refers to this Historical Hip-hop Musical as a ‘story of America then told by America now’; and boy is it!
It was great to see a socially distanced Year Ten GCSE Drama cohort learning about the process of analysing theatre, whilst simultaneously learning about the early American political system and the Revolutionary War of Independence against the British, especially after a summer where the Black Lives Matter movement has come to the forefront of our thoughts. Never has a piece of art such as ‘Hamilton’ been so relevant as when Daveed Digg’s flamboyant ‘Lafayette’, says the line “Immigrants, we get the job done”, during the hit number ‘Yorktown’.
Next up, surely has to be a karaoke version of this international phenomenon. More streamed productions will be made available throughout the year.
Mr Dan Morgan, Teacher of Drama, Senior House Leader and Assistant Head of Year Eleven