Texas Church Stages “Anti-Gay” Version Of Hamilton

The church is called “The Door McAllen” and the senior pastor says that he definitely had permission from Lin Manuel Miranda.

Pastor Roman Gutierrez told the Dallas Morning News that he had obtained legal permission to use the script and songs from “Hamilton” for the church production.

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A spokesman for “Hamilton”, though, denies permission was ever given or even asked for.

In a statement Monday, the spokesman, Shane Marshall Brown, said, “Hamilton does not grant amateur or professional licenses…and did not grant one The Door Church.”

The church has removed videos of the play from its online platforms. But people who have seen it say that it’s basically just “Hamilton” but with some added scenes and dialogue.

Throughout the play when Hamilton or Burr or one of the Schuyler sisters does anything, they stop and praise Jesus Christ or ask for His blessing. In one scene, Hamilton is shown “praying and accepting Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Savior” before going into “It’s Quiet Uptown”.

The scene that’s being called anti-LGBTQ is a 15-minute tacked-on sermon at the end of the final act. In it, a pastor character says, “Maybe you struggle with alcohol, with drugs, with homosexuality. God can forgive you of your sins”.

A couple of thoughts on this story:

Why do some Christians feel the need to ruin everything that’s cool or awesome? They did it to rock and roll, they did it to rap…

(Actually, watch that video to see how even a Christian rapper manages to work the word “Hennessey” into a verse about Jesus.)

…now, they’re doing it to Broadway.

Can you imagine some church lady seeing Hamilton and saying, “I think we can ‘butch’ this up a little bit”?

Of course, I get why the New York production would be upset.  Every single Broadway show has dozens of LGBTQ persons working in every aspect of the production.

But, how about LGBTQ people in McAllen Freaking Texas?  Doing a churched-up version of Hamilton may be all these folks HAVE as a creative outlet.

I wonder what this church’s “improvements” on Death of a Salesman would be. Maybe Willie Loman has a conversion experience and decides NOT to kill himself.

Ooo! How about they do a production of “Waiting for Godot” but they leave out the O and T and call it “Waiting for God”. Just two guys in a park waiting for God to show up. (Spoiler: He never does).

Those songs in Hamilton are NOT easy to sing. That means this church either has really, really talented members…OR, it’s really, really terrible. I wonder which it is?

So, you know…not TERRIBLE. I mean, the costuming and set design are very commendable for a community theater-level production.  In fact, it’s almost TOO good. There’s no way they could have staged this without some really gifted gay people helping out.