Student Blog: Seeing my First Musicals on Broadway

The first musical I ever saw was Wicked when I was in the fifth grade. Ever since then I have loved musicals and living in Chicago allowed me to have access to more musicals. Since seeing Wicked, I have seen musicals ranging from The Lion King to Phantom of the Opera, and so many others in between. But I have never seen a musical on Broadway, until the last few weeks when I got surprised for my birthday with a trip to New York. When I found out about this surprise, there were two musicals that I knew, without a doubt, I wanted to see: Hadestown and Hamilton.

Hamilton

Seeing Hamilton on Broadway was not the first time I have ever seen it. Because Chicago had a resident cast, I saw it almost every time I came back to Chicago for breaks. I also saw it when the tour came to Durham, North Carolina, and if it was not for Covid, I would have seen it again when it was supposed to come to Durham in 2021. All of this to say, I have seen Hamilton a total now of six times. It quickly became one of my favorite musicals, despite refusing to listen to the soundtrack while I was in eighth grade, and was very popular amongst my friends. I was so excited to see it, especially because the actor who played Hamilton in the Chicago cast, had gone on to continue to play Hamilton on Broadway, and he had become my favorite actor to play the lead role. While at this point, I know the entire musical by heart, there is always something different I get from watching the musical, which makes live theater so special: each performance is always going to be a little bit different from the one the day before.

Hadestown

I started listening to the Hadestown in early 2020, and I learned about it because of the song "Wait for Me" showing up in TikTok videos. I waited patiently for the tour to come to Durham but it was then postponed due to Covid, and the tour was not going to come until after I left for college. I really thought that I would not get to see the musical anytime soon. But, the minute we booked our tickets for our flight to New York, my mom and I also bought our tickets for Hadestown. We were lucky enough that most of the original cast was performing that night. The musical was amazing, and the only thing that I could say when it ended was "That was so freaking good." It easily became my favorite musical, and even now I cannot stop thinking and talking about it. Hadestown was so good, that on the last day we were in New York, we decided to get tickets to see it again. Obviously, it was just as amazing the second time. And even though I knew how it was going to end (spoiler alert!) with Orpheus turning around and Eurydice having to go back to Hadestown, it still left me speechless.

As with many others, Covid made me really miss going to see musicals. It was something that I took for granted because I never thought that Broadway and tour casts would have to shut down due to a pandemic. Seeing these two musicals were the first musicals that I have seen since the Summer of 2019, and for me, it was a great "welcome back" to the live theater experience. It made me excited when different tours of shows are coming to Chicago.

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