The author believes Miranda’s “Hamilton” is leaving a deeper impression in the lives of theater-goers – even greater than one of his favorites, “West Side Story” – because it is changing the way people see significant figures and events in U.S. “But these gloriously talented, young, ethnically diverse performers have made the Founding Fathers seem approachable – bringing them to life.” “The idea of middle-aged men sitting around discussing politics in 1776 conjures up remote, musty figures in our minds,” Chernow said. Using hip-hop to pack Hamilton’s story into quick, condensed lyrics that told a very rich, complex story, the composer had seriously impressed the author.Ĭhernow recalled the whirlwind of emotions that have come with having a best-selling biography turn into a box-office-breaking Broadway musical. Miranda later invited him to be the historical adviser for the musical Chernow remembered asking, “Does that mean I tell you when something is wrong?” To which Miranda sincerely replied, “Yes, I want the historians to take this seriously” – which, Chernow said, was music to his ears. “And when he realized he was speaking to the biggest hip-hop ignoramus,” Chernow recalled, “Lin said, ‘Ron, let me educate you in hip-hop.’”
“When Lin first approached me about his idea, he said Alexander Hamilton’s life was a classic hip-hop narrative,” said Chernow, whose book, “Alexander Hamilton,” has been on the Times best-seller list for 22 weeks. Sitting down with Weill Cornell Medicine students, faculty and staff on March 1 as the latest speaker for the institution’s Readers and Writers Series – which seeks to expose medical students to disciplines and subjects they wouldn’t otherwise have the opportunity to explore – Chernow conveyed to the audience a sense of the magic behind making a smash Broadway musical. And just like the musical’s title character, Miranda told the story as it is – and not how it ought to be.įor Chernow, author of the biography on which the musical is based, that is the only way the life of Hamilton should be portrayed.
Author Ron Chernow is interviewed by Patricia Bosworth for the Weill Cornell Medicine Readers and Writers Series.Īmong the dynamic duos that come to mind in pop-culture – Fey and Poehler, Seinfeld and Costanza, or Scully and Mulder – there are two names that you should get to know: Ron Chernow and Lin-Manuel Miranda.Īlthough one is a New York Times best-selling biographer and the other a Grammy-award winning musician and actor, the pair has collaborated to create “Hamilton,” one of the most brilliantly executed musicals of the 21st century.
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