Lin-Manuel Miranda’s “Hamilton” has spent a decade on Broadway and in theaters around the world. Now, a new version of the musical is playing out … on TikTok.
A “Hamilton”-inspired social media trend is more concerned with the founding father’s subpar husband skills than with he changed the United States’ trajectory.
The trend involves people, usually women, dressing up like Hamilton — complete with hand-drawn facial hair and a lantern — and attempting to sneak away to the tune of the soundtrack’s “Best of Wives and Best of Women.”
“Why does everyone just casually have a founding father outfit?” said one commenter, asking what much of the internet is likely thinking.
This song captures the moment when Hamilton is leaving for New Jersey to duel his longtime enemy, Aaron Burr. During the sound clip, Eliza asks Hamilton to stay and come back to bed with her. Hamilton protests that he has a meeting at dawn. In the show, this is a tragic interaction, taking place right before Hamilton meets his end.
For TikTok, this song is a perfect moment to highlight Hamilton’s deficiencies as a husband. Hamilton, yet again, is prioritizing his career and reputation over his family … and it leads to his death.
The trend started in July, when TikTok user @actuallyHamilton posted a recreation of the scene while lip-synching halfway out a window.
From then, the trend has taken off. The internet’s new group of “Hamiltons” have found other methods of escaping, like a shower window, doggy door, barely open garage door, kayak (and another kayak) and even a washing machine. One throws a suitcase out of a window before trying to leave themselves. Another creative video was filmed entirely on a Nest cam footage.
“Suddenly the implication of this trend that Hamilton has to sneak out of his own home through a window is KILLING me,” reads one comment.
One thing remains consistent across the videos: Hamilton is fed up with Eliza’s clinginess. TikToker’s facial expressions paint a version of Hamilton as the opposite of a family man. The delivery of Hamilton’s “I know” is always particularly sharp, as is the “shh.”
The dark side to Hamilton’s personality also comes through in re-creations of other moments from the musical, like when Eliza asks Hamilton to pay attention to their son’s birthday in “Take a Break.” When their son Philip raps in the musical, Miranda’s Hamilton looks amused, but on in the social media parodies he’s always slightly annoyed and disgusted.
As one creator put it, the scene is the “I hate my family final boss.”
Others, usually men, are playing Eliza as exasperated and annoyed, a match to Hamilton’s disdain. “This trend but Eliza is tired of Alexander’s BS,” one creator wrote.
Miranda even got in on the action himself, recreating the trend with his new wax figure for Madame Tussauds with the caption, “Best of wax and best of figures.”
Miranda recently announced a limited theatrical release of Hamilton in early September, so fans will be able to experience that fateful scene — and Lin’s facial expressions — on the big screen.
