When the musical Hamilton was first staged back in 2015, I, like many others, quickly learnt the lyrics to most of the songs, convincing myself I could rap. After having seen the musical on the West End in 2019, I moved on with my life, largely forgetting about it until its ten-year anniversary was celebrated at the Tony Awards this summer. Memories of this swashbuckling tale came rushing back to me, and with them, a desire to revisit the songs.
If you’re not in the know, Hamilton tells the story of young upstart Alexander Hamilton and his rise to become a military commander in the American Civil War and Treasury Secretary under President George Washington. Following accusations of embezzlement by his political adversaries, Alexander (as he is known in the musical) refutes these claims by revealing an affair he had with a married woman. This triggers his political downfall, followed shortly by his early death at the hands of his political rival Aaron Burr.
I’m a big fan of the musical. Not only did it introduce Lin Manuel Miranda, its composer, to the wider public, but it helped revitalise Broadway, challenging a lot of music theatre tropes, being particularly lauded for its diverse casting.
However, upon revisiting Hamilton this summer, I was reminded of one of my teenage misgivings about the musical: the (sometimes gratuitous) misogyny thrown into the plot, compounded by the overall limited role women play in the show.
The role of women
It’s worth noting that this is a musical written by men, about men. All of the senior members of the Hamilton creative team are men, and there are three times as many men as women on the title page of the programme. Of course, the musical is about Alexander Hamilton’s story, and so it makes sense that he and his perspective are the focus of the songs. However, only four of the 14 main characters are women, and their roles are limited to being wives, mistresses, and muses.
One thing that stood out to me even back in 2015 is that every woman who interacts with Alexander (which just so happens to be every female character in the musical) falls madly in love with him. This is notably the case of sisters Angelica and Eliza Schuyler, with the latter ultimately marrying Alexander. The only exception is Peggy Schuyler, one of the smallest parts in the whole musical, who dies without acknowledgement between the Acts I and II. The actress who plays Peggy then doubles as Maria Reynolds, whose entire role revolves around her affair with Alexander. This is a musical which doesn’t come close to passing the Bechdel test, with every single song a woman sings being about (finding) a man.
As Brigid Slipka writes, each of three female leads falls into a trope: the Muse, the Wife, and the Whore. Let’s break down what Angelica, Eliza, and Maria do in the musical.
The Muse: Angelica
From her first appearance, Angelica Schuyler is introduced as an audacious and forward-thinking woman, singing:
However, Angelica quickly acknowledges that she is living in a man’s world and never once upholds these values. These lyrics are merely the promise of some greater ideals which are never explored. In the words of Brigid Slipka, “Angelica’s few verses are the candle that make you hyper aware of the darkness everywhere else.”
In fact, Angelica’s main plotline focuses on her feelings for Alexander. Despite meeting him before her sister Eliza and feeling an instant connection, she decides that she is “a girl in a world in which my only job is to marry rich.” She states that social climbing (through marriage) is her responsibility because her “father has no sons” – an entirely fabricated detail which serves to legitimise the idea that she is only as good as the man she marries.
Angelica stays in touch with Alexander throughout the musical, and it's implied that she is his intellectual equal. She is the unattainable woman that Alexander longs to be with. Unfortunately, we don’t get to hear much from Angelica throughout the musical, as the male characters dominate the stage.
The Wife: Eliza
- She meets and simultaneously falls in love with him, describing herself as “helpless” (the word “helpless” is used to describe Eliza 27 times throughout the musical);
- She begs Alexander to return from war, hoping that she can “be enough” for her husband (in reality, it was Alexander’s decision to return to his wife – Eliza never forced him to do so);
- She pleads with Alexander to take a break over the summer and spend time with her and their children;
- She is heartbroken once she hears about Alexander’s affair;
- She forgives Alexander for his affair following the death of their oldest child;
- She works through her grief at Alexander’s death by dedicating the last fifty years of her life (she significantly outlived her husband) to his memory.
The archetype of the Wife usually falls into two categories: the devoted or the nag. Eliza has the honour of playing both of these roles. Throughout most of the musical, Eliza is seen nagging Alexander for his time and attention – she is even selfish enough to ask him to come back to bed as he goes off to get himself killed. It's only in the finale that Eliza devotes herself to preserving her late husband’s legacy.
The final song of the musical, “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story,” is set up to reinforce Eliza’s role in Alexander's life (and perhaps even given the audience the impression that the musical respects Eliza more than it does). The song describes how it was ultimately Eliza who secured Alexander’s legacy by working tirelessly for the latter half of her life to that end. This is historically accurate, Eliza did indeed lobby congress and devote a considerable amount of time to preserving Alexander’s writings and memory. There is certainly strength in being a narrator, and Eliza’s achievements in this regard shouldn’t go unnoticed. However, as Michael Schulman points out, the notion that men do great things and then women tell their stories is hardly feminist.
The role of Eliza is also revealing in how it upholds a clear division of labour in this world, which is left uncriticised. In Act I, when Eliza is trying to convince Alexander to come home from war, she sings:
This heavily implies that she sees herself as entirely separate from his world and what he is trying to achieve. Meanwhile, this line is reprised at the end of Act II, when, following the death of their son, Alexander begs Eliza’s forgiveness for the pain he has caused her, singing:
On first listen this implies a recognition that Alexander is not superior to Eliza, she possesses knowledge and experience which he does not. However, singing this line in the context of domestic challenges highlights the clear division of labour in Hamilton. Alexander exists in the public, political sphere, whilst Eliza’s domain is purely domestic. In fact, Alexander even says that he doesn’t know the challenges “we’re facing” – he is so distant from the domestic side of life that he doesn’t even know the challenges he himself is facing following his infidelity and the death of his son.
The Whore: Maria
The last female lead is Maria Reynolds, an incredibly sexualised character who exists only to bring about the end of Alexander’s political career. According to Brigid Slipka, whilst Eliza is an obstacle to Alexander's rise to power, Maria is the cause of his fall.
In the song “Say No to This,” Maria visits Alexander, explaining that she has been beaten and abandoned by her husband, and asking him, as a “man of honour,” for assistance. Alexander ends up bedding Maria and continues the affair even after her husband finds out and demands money in return for the privilege of his wife's company.
Lin Manuel Miranda is completely apologist in his depiction of the Hamilton-Reynolds Affair. He lists every excuse in the book for Alexander’s actions, stating that Alexander would not have been weak enough to succumb to his worst desires if it weren’t for the fact that he “hadn’t slept in a week” and was “in need of a break.” By having Alexander sing, “I don’t know how to say no to this,” the musical upholds rape culture by implying that Alexander has no control over his actions and is therefore not at fault.
Comedian Katherine Ryan makes the excellent point that, in the musical’s version of events, Alexander chooses to have intimate relations with a vulnerable woman who came to him, her local representative, for assistance. Alexander even sings, “my god, she looks so helpless, and her body’s saying ‘hell, yes’.” This choice of words is entirely unnecessary and suggests that vulnerable women are sexually attractive.
Whilst for all in intents and purposes, the real Maria Reynolds was a victim, first of her rapist husband, and then of a powerful man (Alexander Hamilton) who took advantage of her vulnerability, the Maria of the musical is villanised and blamed for Alexander’s political downfall.
The Others
A few other female characters are mentioned, but we the audience never meet them. Their roles are, unsurprisingly, just as limited and problematic.
Martha Washington is mentioned only to say that she named her cat after Alexander, presumably because he was such a stud.
Aaron Burr’s wife, Theodosia, exists only through Burr’s eyes. We know her simply as the woman he has an affair with and later marries, bearing his child. She serves solely to build on Burr’s character in the show.
Incredibly disturbingly, Sally Hemings gets name-dropped just so she can open a letter for Thomas Jefferson. Sally Hemings was Thomas Jefferson’s slave with whom she had at least six children, the first of which was born when she was just 16. Slaves had no legal right to refuse their owner’s sexual advances; the slave master owned their bodies and their children.
Alexander’s mother is mentioned a couple of times in the musical, and even as early as the opening line, where Alexander is described as the “son of a whore.” This description of his mother transforms her into an obstacle our hero had to overcome. His mother is never even given a name (she was called Rachel Faucette Buck), labelled instead with a sexist slur which bears no relation to reality. There is, in fact, no evidence that Rachel was a sex worker or at all promiscuous.
A missed opportunity
The point is not to say that none of this was true, that the women in Alexander Hamilton’s life were actually as successful and respected as their male counterparts. It’s true that women of the time were mainly confined to the private sphere and had very few rights. However, in a musical which takes so many liberties with historical fact, you would hope that the female characters could have been afforded a more active and interesting role in the musical.
Unfortunately, some songs and lyrics which had the potential to show a much feistier side of the Schuyler sisters were cut from the show. After the Hamilton-Reynolds Affair becomes public knowledge, Eliza sings the heartbreaking song “Burn,” where she wonders how her whole relationship could have been a lie, choosing to burn all the love letters Alexander ever wrote her. However, this is actually a later draft of a much angrier and more accusatory version of the song called “First Burn.” The original was eventually watered down because Lin Manuel Miranda felt that this version of Eliza would never have forgiven Alexander for the affair. Meanwhile, Angelica’s amazing song “Congratulations,” where she berates Alexander for his rash behaviour and for breaking her sister’s heart, was entirely cut from the final musical.
Despite the fact that a great many songs describe Alexander’s love life, just one of them is sung from his perspective. Unfortunately, this song is “Say No to This,” where Alexander justifies how he took advantage of the vulnerable Maria Reynolds. This general lack of Alexander’s perspective gives the impression that whilst women are falling over themselves to be with him, he is above it all, dedicating his time to work. Although there are a few lyrics here and there which attest to Alexander’s affection for both Eliza and Angelica, his romantic feelings are significantly downplayed compared to theirs. The women in this world are emotional, Alexander is not.
On top of this, Alexander Hamilton was himself known for his “traditional and restrictive” views on women (in stark contrast to the musical’s villain, Aaron Burr, who was far more progressive in terms of women’s rights). Exploring this side of Alexander could have presented an opportunity to cast a more critical light on the status of women in the 18th century and better explain some of Alexander’s more problematic actions (such as taking advantage of Maria Reynolds). Interestingly, these misogynistic views seep through in an off-Broadway song which was cut when the musical made it onto Broadway. In it, Alexander berates Eliza for interrupting him, singing:
All of this to say, whilst I remain a fan of Hamilton, it's hard to ignore the blatant misogyny which peppers the show. We've seen in some of his more recent work that Lin Manuel Miranda can write interesting female characters – it's just a shame they didn't make it onto Broadway.
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