Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
ENTHUSIASTIC CROWD WELCOMES ‘HAMILTON’
When the Broward Center for the Performing Arts underwent a $44 million restoration in 2011, the dream was to create a space where theatergoers would want to explore and linger in, dine and drink in, a beckoning face for the arts along the New River, a jewel of a building capable of attracting major touring productions.
For the most part, Kelley Shanley, Broward Center president and CEO, was fighting a losing battle against the smile that brightened his face Tuesday night amid the palpable buzz that greeted the soldout opening night for “Hamilton.” Dream realized.
“This is the kind of night we imagined when we were creating the new
“For some people it’s almost a milestone occasion. It’s hard to get tickets, and now that they’ve got their tickets, they want to be here and feel the excitement.” —Jan Goodheart, Broward Center for the Performing Arts VP, on the opening of “Hamilton”
Broward Center, expanding and offering additional spaces and experiences,” Shanley said two hours before showtime. “Tonight every one of those spaces is going to be active with people having a great time, just the way we imagined it.”
The touring production of “Hamilton,” the cultureshifting, hip-hop-flavored Broadway musical, began its long-awaited and unprecedented five-week run at the Broward Center, drawing an early-arriving audience of young and old, white-haired subscribers and newbies whose enthusiasm for the show was obvious.
Nathan Nieves, 13, of Boca Raton, stood in the lobby wearing a long, velvety red waistcoat with embroidered lapels and cuffs. His mother, Yolanda, said he knows every lyric to every song in “Hamilton.”
“I think it shows the revolutionary times and the clothes they wore back then. It was very complex,” he said.
“If he could live in that time, he probably would,” said Yolanda Nieves, who credits “Hamilton” with her son’s wide-ranging knowledge of the revolutionary era. She said she went “above and beyond” to get their sixth-row tickets. “This is his Christmas gift, probably until he’s 21,” she said, laughing.
A rock-show vibe enveloped the refined arts center lobby, where $20 programs were stacked next to $35 CD sets, $40 T-shirts and hoodies moved briskly (hung next to tiny onesies that declared “Just like my country: Young, scrappy and hungry”) and every Hamilton poster or cut-out became host to a tangle of fans seeking a selfie or Instagram moment.
From guests sipping Brandy Alexander Hamilton cocktails at Marti’s New River Bistro (inside tables are sold out throughout the run) to those seated for a meal in the New River Tavern, a new space created just for “Hamilton,” it was an early-arriving crowd, something the Broward Center anticipated and encouraged.
The Peck Courtyard opened 90 minutes before the show, more time to show off another new feature tucked in one corner,
Broadway Bites & Brews, featuring craft beers from the Funky Buddha Brewery in Oakland Park.
“People want to come and hang out early for this show,” said Jan Goodheart, Broward Center VP. “For some people it’s almost a milestone occasion. It’s hard to get tickets, and now that they’ve got their tickets, they want to be here and feel the excitement.”
She said the unprecedented five-week run of “Hamilton” serves as a stage to introduce a variety of changes the venue has made with audience experience in mind, some done with the help of the city.
The credit-card reader in the city parking lot across the street, which took an interminable two or three minutes to process, now completes a transaction in two seconds. Traffic lights have been synchronized to help traffic flow, including the circuit used by the valets, the first time the city has intervened in that way.
Goodheart noted that while “Hamilton” is sold out through Thursday, tickets were available for Friday’s performance. The show also will be seen in West Palm Beach and Miami during the 2019-2020 season.