• About Us
  • Write For Us
  • Advertising
  • Support
  • Contact Us
October 3, 2023 2:33 am CDT
Heartland Newsfeed
  • Illinois
    • Local
      • Capital Area
      • East Central Illinois
      • West Central Illinois
    • Regional
      • Chicagoland
      • Metro-East
      • Northern Illinois
      • Quad Cities
      • Southern Illinois
    • Obits
    • Executive Watch
    • Legislative Watch
    • Road Conditions
      • Illinois
    • Weather Closings
      • Central Illinois
  • Missouri
    • Regional
      • Northeastern Missouri
      • East Central Missouri
      • St. Louis Metro
      • Southeast Missouri
    • Executive Watch
    • Legislative Watch
    • Weather Closings
      • Greater STL Metro (IL/MO)
    • Road Conditions
      • Missouri
  • Weather
  • National
  • World
  • Sports
  • Entertainment
  • OPINION
  • Radio
    • Affiliates
    • Network Schedule
    • Network Streams
    • Podcasts
  • Features
    • Business Directory
    • Classifieds
      • Current Ads
      • Job Board
        • Job Listings
        • J2CTalroo
        • Post a Job
        • Receive Alerts
        • ZipSearch
    • Community Calendar
    • Live Video
    • Newsfeeds
    • Puzzles & More
  • Store
  • Deals
  • Calendar
No Result
View All Result

No products in the cart.

Heartland Newsfeed
No Result
View All Result

KNAPP/SCHLOSBERG: Time to drop Hamilton’s economics

Thomas Knapp by Thomas Knapp
July 6, 2020
in Columnists, Opinion
Reading Time: 2 mins read
Donate
0
The July 3 premiere of Hamilton on streaming service Disney+ marked the end of a five-year wait for audiences who hadn’t seen the hit musical on stage. Alexander Hamilton’s rivals in Hamilton concede that he “doesn’t get enough credit for all the credit he gave us.” To the contrary, as Voltairine de Cleyre noted a century ago, Hamilton “devised a financial system of which we are the unlucky heritors,” an economic order designed “to puzzle the people and make public finance obscure to those that paid for it.” Broadway stage performance might seem a retrograde medium for the likes of Hamilton and The Book of Mormon during the decade when web media went mainstream. To the latter’s co-creator Matt Stone, this merely shows that “if you tell good stories, the platforms are sort of beside the point. We made the most analog thing you can think of, a play at the Eugene O’Neill Theater, and it worked out as well as anything we have ever done.” But as Paul Goodman noted in People or Personnel, the capital-intensive, high-risk nature of Broadway (or Off-Broadway aspiring to move off Off) “powerfully influences the choice of plays and style of acting and production.” Skyrocketing rents in and around the Broadway theater district in midtown New York City — with access to real estate depending on political favors rather than business skill — restrict the space available to fresh talent. A production like Beetlejuice which reliably draws devoted crowds can be shuttered due to lack of available theater space. The Drama Book Shop, the space where Hamilton‘s Lin-Manuel Miranda penned his previous Broadway show, In the Heights, was set to close until Miranda personally bailed it out. For the fortunate shows that make it to Broadway, it can be lucrative to stay there. In the realm of what Goodman calls “un-free enterprise,” restricting supply reaps the benefit of stoked demand without the pressures of competition (while clamping the release valves of legal loopholes or ticket resellers). COVID-era theater shutdowns moved the filmed Hamilton premiere to the Internet instead of movie theaters. If the benefits of withholding had not been artificially inflated, it might have long been viewable via live broadcasting (a la  the Metropolitan Opera’s productions since 2006), research collections like the New York Public Library’s Theatre on Film and Tape Archive, or DVDs. Hamilton arrives on an Internet video landscape well on its way to consolidation. Like Marvel Comics antagonist Galactus, compelled to continually devour entire worlds to survive, Disney has absorbed Pixar, Star Wars, the Muppets, Marvel itself, and even major-studio equal Fox into its vault. Those collections make it to home viewing missing words (including an expletive cut from Hamilton), visuals, or even entire episodes. As de Cleyre understood, the creativity restricted by Hamiltonianism can best be unleashed by “the voluntary association of those interested in the management of matters of common concern, without coercion of the uninterested or the opposed.” New Yorker Joel Schlosberg is a contributing editor at The William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism.
Thomas Knapp
Website | + posts

Thomas L. Knapp is the director and senior news analyst for the Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism. Knapp is a journalism veteran of over 35 years and a full-time libertarian writer, editor and publisher since 2000.

Knapp has been the publisher of Rational Review News Digest since 2003 and a former columnist for Antiwar.com.

  • Thomas Knapp
    https://www.heartlandnewsfeed.com/author/thomasknapp/
    KNAPP: Make impeachment great again
  • Thomas Knapp
    https://www.heartlandnewsfeed.com/author/thomasknapp/
    KNAPP: Bank collapses: Yes, it’s a taxpayer bailout
  • Thomas Knapp
    https://www.heartlandnewsfeed.com/author/thomasknapp/
    KNAPP: Time for the spoiler whining
  • Thomas Knapp
    https://www.heartlandnewsfeed.com/author/thomasknapp/
    KNAPP: Things always change with Election Day

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • Tumblr
  • Telegram
  • Print
  • Email

Like this:

Like Loading...
Tags: Alexander HamiltonDisneyHamiltonLin-Manuel MirandaMatt StonePaul GoodmanVoltairine de Cleyre
Share196Tweet123Share5Send
  • Workforce training center opens in Litchfield

    1497 shares
    Share 599 Tweet 374
  • Missouri law to crack down on porch pirates

    980 shares
    Share 392 Tweet 245
  • Missouri Dems critical of proposed tax cut

    959 shares
    Share 384 Tweet 240
  • No management pay raises in UPS deal

    917 shares
    Share 367 Tweet 229
  • McARDLE PAPERS: The most corrupt committee in the national Libertarian Party

    915 shares
    Share 366 Tweet 229

OPERATING HOURS

Online all the time 
Office Hours: 8 AM to 8 PM

Sitemap | Published Press | Privacy Policy
Staff Email | Independent Media | Buy traffic for your website

LIVE WEBSITE VIEWERS

Some rights reserved 2017-2023 by Heartland Newsfeed, a subsidiary partnership by Heartland Internet Media Networks and Heartland Media Group of Central Illinois LLC. Content published by Heartland Newsfeed staff is covered by the BipCot NoGov license. This allows use and re-use by anyone except governments and government agents. License on record. JNews theme designed and developed by Jegtheme.

No Result
View All Result
  • News
    • Politics
    • Business
    • World
    • Science
  • Entertainment
    • Gaming
    • Music
    • Movie
    • Sports
  • Tech
    • Apps
    • Gear
    • Mobile
    • Startup
  • Lifestyle
    • Food
    • Fashion
    • Health
    • Travel

Some rights reserved 2017-2023 by Heartland Newsfeed, a subsidiary partnership by Heartland Internet Media Networks and Heartland Media Group of Central Illinois LLC. Content published by Heartland Newsfeed staff is covered by the BipCot NoGov license. This allows use and re-use by anyone except governments and government agents. License on record. JNews theme designed and developed by Jegtheme.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In

Add New Playlist

WP Radio
WP Radio
OFFLINE LIVE
This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.
-
00:00
00:00

Queue

Update Required Flash plugin
-
00:00
00:00
%d bloggers like this: