You won’t be able to score a ticket to many Wednesday matinees for “Hamilton” — unless you’re a New York City public school student.
Some 20,000 students from across the city will get the chance at the hard-to-see show, which has blocked out a dozen more Wednesday matinees over the next year for NYC public school students only.
The program is possible as part of a $1.46 million grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, which will offer the show for $10 at matinees performed exclusively for students over the next year. (So, even if a student is absent and a seat is empty, forget about trying to score a seat if you're part of the general public.)
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Wednesday’s inaugural “student-only” matinee for the hit Broadway musical included 1,300 city students from 12 high schools, including the Bronx Engineering and Technology Academy, Bronx Theater High School and the Marble Hill School for International Studies.
As part of the educational collaboration, students will get to see the show — presented hip-hop style with the Founding Fathers played by black and Hispanic actors — after studying it in their classrooms through an integrated curriculum designed by the Gilder Lehrman Institute.
(And no, the show’s profane language is not edited for the student audiences.)
Part of the grant supports the in-class curriculum designed around the musical, which includes a “Hamilton Student Performance and Study Guide” and an online “Hamilton” portal for students and teachers offering students a creative platform for developing and producing their own original performances of poetry, rap, songs, scenes and other art expressions, to be performed at the theater prior to watching the performance.
“I had the privilege to meet with students from the Bronx coming to the matinee, and their insights and enthusiasm confirm that our partnership with Rockefeller and Gilder to work with 20,000 public school students and bring them to Hamilton is one of our best investments,” the show’s creator and star Lin-Manuel Miranda said in a statement.
“There is no feeling on earth like performing for a theater full of students who are learning about our founders in class and seeing how it still relates to their own lives on stage,” he added.
Judith Rodin, president of the Rockefeller Foundation, was pleased that New York City students will have the opportunity to see a show with actors and actresses “who look just like them” and a production was created by a product of the New York City public school system.
“Hamilton has the ability to reshape history, redefine racial and gender roles, and above all else, inspire,” she said in a statement. “I've had this date in my calendar since we announced this partnership last fall — now that the day is finally here, I'm as excited as a tourist who won the Hamilton ticket lottery.”
