A rap for ‘Hamilton’s’ Lin-Manuel Miranda as he (possibly) prepares to leave the show

On Thursday, news broke that Lin-Manuel Miranda could be leaving the cast of Hamilton, the Broadway phenomenon he created, as soon as July. The reaction around the Web was appropriately horrified and forlorn. In response to the development, the following musical fulmination took root.

On the scale of major American calamity
This wasn’t like a bomb dropped on all of humanity
(We save that for the election in all of its agony)

But word that Lin would leave Hamilton in July
Had everyone wondering—is there nothing on which we can rely?

Blog anger went skyward; social-media patience south
Just read this tweet; it puts the witty words in our mouth

Hamilton star, leavin,’ to work on Mary Poppins
News, like our hearts, very quickly went droppin’

Called a press rep to say ‘Miranda, by what rights?
Would he be leaving New York City’s shiny midtown lights?’
Asked the cat from Sunshine Sachs
If there was reason to relax

Man wouldn’t confirm but also didn’t deny
Seemed like the end of the road might well be near nigh
Not much else to do but sigh, and cry, and ask why

What kind of kick was Lin now here rockin’?
With Poppins he’d be hoppin’ and soppin’ and floppin’
This wasn’t musical theater or a Broadway stage
This was sugar by the liter and a full-on outrage

To say nothing of those Hamilton patrons
So many, from the kids to the matrons
Had dropped lots of dead presidents
Tourists and day-trippers and even some residents

But as I considered what was slipping out of our palm
Thinking ‘bout George and John, Alexander and Tom
The more I reflected, the more I grew calm
Sure the news was a bomb
But how much would we really see harm
Show would still run, Lin’s words sweet as a Psalm
What’s more, let’s face it, he’d already gotten the nom

If he wanted to pick up and head to the pictures
Shackle himself to all of its strictures
Try with the screen in a way that is canny
To bring in some union and a more Perfect Nanny
Why not let him introduce the spice to what’s nice
Also, come on, he’s already paid more than the price

What Miranda was doing was much the same
As any artist who knows that to repeat’s to be lame
Performers want behind the camera, creators to act
Since Orson Welles’ days, seeking what you’re not is just fact

Besides, Lin was working on some new play notions
One or two even from across the oceans
Maybe a piece from Puerto Rico or some other islands
If Trump were to win we’d need much different than violence

There’s also the movie of his show In The Heights
Some new energy now, years after he’d packaged the rights
Sure those stage-to-screen pieces often were gnarly
But there remained some hope with the presence of—yes—Harvey

Fear still exists that without the folks at the Rodgers
Broadway will revert to all the standards and codgers
But no reason to suspect this will soon be the case
Especially now with so many getting a taste

In the rooms where it happens there’ll be audiences clappin’, actors crackin’, creators rappin’
The art of the trade where sausage gets made
Will host many others who show how the game can be played
So next Sunday when the Tony winners are laid
Minority wins plunging through like the tip of a blade
And Lin-Manuel wherever next should he wade
Leaving effects on the culture that won’t easily fade

@ZeitchikLAT