Lin Manuel Miranda speaks about casting “Hamilton” in this article:
In Hamilton, we’re telling the stories of old, dead white men but we’re using actors of color, and that makes the story more immediate and more accessible to a contemporary audience. You don’t distance the audience by putting an actor of color in a role that you would think of as default Caucasian. No, you excite people and you draw them in.
I … laugh when Aaron Burr is shaking hands and saying, “Talk less. Smile more. Don’t let them know what you’re against or what you’re for,” because that’s not left or right, that’s most contemporary politicians. And we recognize him as, “Hey, that guy’s from our era.
This paints a different picture than “random” color-blind casting that ignores race. This is casting that speaks to race by saying “Here is how this figure is like you, even though you didn’t see it before.” That is USING race and not IGNORING it.
