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A year ago, Hamiton broke a Broadway box-office record becoming the first show to make more than $4,000,000 in ticket sales in one week. The show has forever entered the pop culture lexicon. I am one of two people who hasn’t seen it, but I recognize lines from it, and they’ve even made it (slightly altered) into book titles. If you are the other person in the universe who hasn’t seen the show yet, you’re in luck, because while a movie project has been talked about before, we’ve gotten official confirmation that it’s happening:

Movie theaters aren’t throwing away their shot to have “Hamilton” on the big screen. Disney is bringing a film of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical sensation with the original Broadway cast to cinemas in North America on Oct. 15, 2021.

The movie version isn’t an adaptation in the vein of Miranda’s upcoming “In the Heights,” but rather a “live capture” of a stage performance. It was shot at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in Manhattan before founding members began to depart the production.

Rights to the stage film went for an eye-popping $75 million, in a deal brokered by Endeavor Content on behalf of Miranda, three individuals close to the negotiations told Variety. Endeavor shopped the project around Hollywood, presenting to studios including Warner Bros. before Disney nabbed it. . . .

“I fell in love with musical storytelling growing up with the legendary Howard Ashman-Alan Menken Disney collaborations — ‘The Little Mermaid,’ ‘Beauty and The Beast,’ ‘Aladdin,’” Miranda said. “I’m so proud of what Tommy Kail has been able to capture in this filmed version of ‘Hamilton’ — a live theatrical experience that feels just as immediate in your local movie theater. We’re excited to partner with Disney to bring the original Broadway company of ‘Hamilton’ to the largest audience possible.”

[From Variety]

Finally! I’m looking forward to seeing the show in the comfort of my own living room, as I doubt I’ll ever be able to get tickets! This is going to break all sorts of records, too. I think it’s great (and smart) that this movie will be a performance of the original Broadway cast. No one would be happy with another cast, no matter how great they were. l am not surprised that Disney managed to get the film rights, both because of the size of the company’s wallet, but also because Lin-Manuel has worked with them on recent projects, collaborating on the songs in Moana and costarring in Mary Poppins Returns. He also worked on the music in the cantina scene in The Force Awakens and had a cameo in The Rise of Skywalker. Plus he lends his voice to Gizmoduck in the Ducktales reboot.

There are plenty of fun Hamilton-related clips on Youtube to keep you entertained for the next 618 days:

Here’s the cast performing at the Tony Awards in 2016, with an introduction by President and Mrs. Obama (who both saw Lin-Manuel give a White House performance of a song from the show when it was still a work-in-progress):

Last June, Ellen sent 9-year-old Hamilton superfan Macey Hensley to the new Hamilton museum in Chicago where Lin-Manuel gave her a tour (and she taught him a thing or two).

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