Of course, I have seen West Side Story and The King and I, both the movies and for the latter on Broadway. I have often thought that Rita Moreno should have gotten a shot as Maria, but even at her young age at the time, she looked too grown up and sophisticated to carry it off. I would see West Side Story or The King and I with actors of any shade or ethnicity, so long as a casting call notice didn’t say no white people need apply to be in the Sharks. Frankly, I think the Jets would be a great deal more interesting if they were ethnically diverse. It would lend a new depth to their motivations.
Honestly, if they had auditioned white people for Hamilton and chosen not to cast any of them because they weren’t right for the part, I would have been fine with that. I had no issues with the concept of Hamilton when the play originally opened and was actually planning to get tickets at some point. It was the blatant display and the apparent thought that as a POC, they could just do what they complain was done to them (and I agree that it was, for way too long) that offended me. I still intend not to see Hamilton. I have never said that anybody else should not see Hamilton and I would not support a boycott of it, but that notice turned me off so much that I lost interest in seeing it. If it’s my loss, so be it. I also choose not to watch sports and many people think that’s also my loss.
I understand that Hamilton is a re-visioning of the Founding Fathers’ story, but isn’t discriminating against white people just doing the same thing that was done to POC? Why perpetuate the discrimination?
By the way, I only attached the links because a poster upthread implied that the original casting notice had never existed and that was inaccurate.