Hi, I'm Stage and Stages, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and you're listening to the Hamilton's Philip company.

Hi, Marcus. What's up? How are you guys doing? Can you just tell me your pronouns please before we get started? My pronouns are he, him. Thank you so much. Well, your excellency sir, because I am in the presence of a George Washington. Thank you so much for being here and joining me on this Monday evening. I know that you have such a long history with he who will not be named. Oh, no.

Well, you know, it's just like I know, no, with Nick. And I know that you. And you know, I just remember him when we was talking about the hammer cast and the hammer cast and I was like, Oh, man. What's it going to be my turn three years later? Here I am.

You know, it's hard with the, you know, now that everything is virtual. Yeah, he's here. Yeah, you know, I saw the villain in our history just the other day. He's in a fantastic show called 82 Proud.

I don't know what they, what they're doing, putting him at the front of it. I hear he's all right. It's weird. It is that show is so good. And he is so good. And so everyone on that stage is just like, Oh my God. Oh my God. He's so good. You know, the thing about Nick is the thing that like drives me crazy is that he's always like, I'm not a dancer. I can't dance. Uh, hello. Did we all see the Tony Awards? I know. I know. It's his favorite line. That dude was killing it. Yeah. No, Nick Walker can dance. I don't care what he says.

He can dance. He can totally dance. I was in the third row for 82 Proud. I watched him dance for two and a half hours last week. He can do it. Um, and I remember. Oh my God. Time doesn't make any sense. Was it last Thanksgiving or the, no, it was the Thanksgiving. Two Thanksgiving's ago, I think he sent when, yeah, when he was still on tour with Hamilton, he sent me and Mike, because we have a group text, a video of him and rehearsals for 82 Proud. Oh, yeah, yeah. I remember when he was rehearsing for that. And I was like, you're a dancer. Like, you can't, like, that's

just, that is just a bit now. That is just a joke you say, because I mean, you can dance, Nick. And I know he's, he's hating every second of it. And you know what, good. Um, this, you know, every episode turns into, like, the Nick Walker show. So forget him for, right, right, right, right, get back to. Um, do we have a California cab? That's your favorite. We have a little bit of red wine. Um, I just picked this one up. It's, uh, Joseph Carr from Posse of Robles. Oh, amazing. Um, I thought I would say, you know, are you ready for a cab or name meeting? I, I, I,

I'm ready for a cab or name me. Well, you know, I thought it was appropriate because he, he, he has a glass of wine in, in the office, he didn't act too, you know. So, yeah. So, you know, wine, wine, it is. So what Mark is for Lax, have a drink with me. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. We're going to take a break. Yeah. Yeah. You know, we can have all night. We could do it on the clock. It's very early. Um, so how, how are you? I mean, you're recently back on tour. Just tell me like how you are. What that's been like. It's so.

New still. Yeah. Yeah. It's, um, it's, it's exhausting. You know, I'm so thankful and grateful to be back working again and, and, and just doing the thing. But, you know, like after we started rehearsals, um, we were in rehearsals for four weeks. And then, and then they, we just like shot right out of a cannon back on the stage. And it was, uh, we opened on a Sunday. I think we had like an invited dress on Sunday.

And then our official opening was on Tuesday or something like that. Okay. Okay. And, um, it was two, it was Tuesday. I was about to enter the stage and I just, I was standing there and I'm like, I'm exhausted. It's, I forgot how hard it was to do Hamilton. And, and I, you know, I, I say this all the time. Like, Chris Jackson crafted a genius track in George Washington. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It, it, it, it's.

Just like he has an amazing, amazing moments. His, his entrance is the best entrance I've ever seen on stage ever. Yeah. Yeah. And then he has like one of the highlights in his farewell speech in act two. And 40 minutes into act two. Basically, your responsibility is done. So like, even though I know that it's, it's a bit of, um, like a less physically challenging track. That first show back, I was like, I am so tired.

I, I, I was like, I, I wanted this, right? Yeah. I wanted to come back, right?

Well, it's also what you went through emotionally, what you went through. Sure. Sure. And then it's like, you kind of, yeah, you want it. But you, you, I think you do forget that it is two and a half hours of just like this emotionally draining journey. And also, like, we're all just, we're still in it. Like, we're not even going, we, it's not like, oh, we've really all been through it. No, we're still going through it. All of us. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, the, the great thing about it,

about our rehearsal process. And it was a very cathartic process as well. There was a lot of healing that happened. We would start the day off. I don't, I don't know if you would heard anything about this. But, um, we, uh, the Hamilton company hired this, this like healer, um, her name is cutting. She was, you know, old, you know, Broadway girl, been in a ton of shows. She's an amazing performer. But she's transition into healing, you know, and, and movement and yoga.

And, uh, so she, she would, uh, basically guide us through a physical warm up, a mental warm up, uh, like emotional warm up, uh, at the beginning of each day. And it was just so helpful, um, and just thoughtful, you know, to, to be able to kind of go through that process, um, every day because it's, it's not easy, um, to be thrust back into musical theater.

In 2021, yeah, because musical theater 2021 is different than 2019. Many things have happened. Um, the landscape has changed for the better in many ways. Um, and I think people are still still dealing with that, you know, we're still, um, transitioning and we're still learning.

And, um, and I think for everybody to be given the chance to, um, kind of start the process together, but thoughtfully from a place of healing and love and trust, um, I thought that was very, very, uh, important and thoughtful for, for, um, the, the, the Hamilton company to do for all of its cast.

I mean, what were your thoughts going back in to the show? I mean, so many people were saying, I'm not going back until this shit, not going back to work at all, not just Hamilton, you know, right, right, as an audience member, we were thinking, how do we feel comfortable giving our hard earned money to this institution that's like not doing great. So what was your perspective?

Well, you know, everybody is certainly entitled to their feelings and their thoughts. Um, and I feel like everybody's experience is different. And they are, um, they're definitely validated in, in, in their experience and how they feel towards returning to work. I personally, um, really look forward to coming back to work.

Um, I just, I, I guess for me because I was on tour, um, it just like, it was, it was everything. It was like the, my world, right, it's not like I was just living in LA or living in New York, um, you know, being able to audition while working at night and whatnot. But, you know, since we're kind of out here on Phillip Island.

Um, it's all we had, you know what I mean? And so, you know, I, I struggle with like, you know, putting my identity into the show because that's, you know, that was my world. But like, it's kind of hard to avoid when you're, you're traveling with your show.

And you're in this little tiny family of cast members, you know, and you're working with these people, living with these people and, and, and so, you know, it was, it was hard to kind of separate yourself from, from the identity of Hamilton, right.

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