'Hamilton' Is Heading To The Big Screen With The Original Cast

Here’s everything you need to know about the Hamilton movie

Unless you’ve been living under a literal boulder for the last five years, you know that the Hamilton musical is a pop culture phenomenon. Lin-Manuel Miranda’s theatrical masterpiece has been harder to get into than your skinny jeans after Thanksgiving since it first debuted in 2015. But now, fear not — if you haven’t been able to see the smash hit (tickets are also hella expensive), you will be able to see it on the big screen soon enough.

Hamilton is the story of Alexander Hamilton, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, loosely based on and inspired by Ron Chernow’s biography. In the original Broadway production, Hamilton is played by a ponytailed Lin-Manuel Miranda, who is responsible for creating the musical’s book, music, and lyrics. He and most of the original cast left the Broadway production back in 2016.

Miranda says the film version will be comprised of footage from recorded stage performances during the musical’s first year running, rather than a brand-new adaptation. Which, let’s be honest, is kind of what we all want anyway — to see the stage performance as it was intended to be performed. (At least, those of us who were number 47,692 in their respective city’s Hamilton lottery, but who’s counting?)

“You all have that friend who brags, ‘I saw that with the original cast.’ We’re stealing that brag from everyone,” Miranda said in a recent interview.

The original cast consists of Miranda as Alexander Hamilton, Leslie Odom Jr. as Aaron Burr, Phillipa Soo as Eliza Hamilton, Jonathan Groff as King George III and Daveed Diggs as Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson. Also featured: Christopher Jackson (whom we all know from Moana), Renée Elise Goldsberry, Okieriete Onaodowan, Anthony Ramos (also starring in Miranda’s upcoming film adaptation of In the Heights), and Jasmine Cephas Jones.

Speaking of In the Heights, which is coming out sometime this year, the first trailer promises everything we could ever ask for in a film version of a musical:

Miranda wrote the entire musical in 1999 during his freshman year of college, you know, as you do. The story takes place in the predominantly Hispanic neighborhood in New York City, and it won 13 Tony Awards the year it debuted.

Speaking of clout, did we mention Hamilton is the highest-grossing musical of all time? Yeah. It’s that big of a deal. Which just makes it all the more awesome that for the price of a reclining movie theater seat and a tub of popcorn (extra butter with a dash of salt, duh) that we can all take part in the splendor of this musical and the original characters.