Interview: Trey Curtis on the Round the World Journey That Led Him to Starring in Hamilton

Trey Curtis has been everywhere, man. Since 2019, he’s been to Puerto Rico, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Toronto, Melbourne, and Manila, all in the service of the “ten-dollar Founding Father.” Working his way up the ranks, from swing to standby, Curtis has played a lot of roles in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton, and now, at the Richard Rodgers Theatre on Broadway, he’s the leading man. Here, Curtis tells us about his amazing journey, which he does not take for granted.

This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

You’ve done Hamilton all over the world at this point.
My mom made me a debut present, a letterman jacket that has patches from every country, every city I’ve done the show in, from Puerto Rico to San Francisco to Los Angeles. Then, I got my passport, went to Melbourne, Australia, for a little bit, came back to New York, and then got another stamp on my passport and went to Manila, which brought me back to New York. I’ve been everywhere and it’s good to see it all together in the gift she got me. So yeah, I’ve been all over the world now thanks to him.

Have you done the same roles in each production or are you bouncing around?
Pretty much. When I first started with the “And Peggy” company, in Puerto Rico and San Francisco, I was an offstage track which covered the leads and two of the ensemble tracks. I was kind of a swing/standby, offstage, and then I was going from standby to Man Five to standby, to now Hamilton. But I’ve always known the same roles since the beginning. I made my Broadway debut playing Man Five and covering Hamilton and the Sons of Liberty. It’s just like riding a bike. I’m feeling like my feet are finally on the ground again.

That’s wild.
I thought they got the wrong person at first, legit. I knew I could sing, rap, dance, act, but learning five different roles, five different harmonies, five different blocking tracks was a lot for me. Not gonna lie to you.

Is it a load off to just be able to play Alexander Hamilton?
Yeah. It’s such a blessing to know the show from different angles, but it feels really good to just do the one and focus on Act 1 and Act 2, and just really get into who this person is and how I can bring the most of myself to this one role. That feels amazing.

As full-time Alexander, how much leeway are you given by the production in terms of making the role your own, versus when you’re a standby?
When you are a standby, you’re supposed to do justice to the role just as if you were cast in the role on your own. I knew going into the standby role that if I’m called to step into a leading role, I have to make it as if it’s my role anyway. There are people in the audience that day who have never seen the show and I will be their Lafayette or Hamilton or Mulligan for the first time. Now that I’ve stepped into the role, my mindset hasn’t really changed. I have to hit my marks, but there still is freedom of doing it the way they trusted me to do it when they first gave me coverage of the role. I will say, the outside world of it all is very different.

Tell me about working with all the different Hamiltons you’ve played opposite and how their various takes on the role impacted your show.
My first Hamilton was Lin-Manuel. When In the Heights came out, I think I was in the eighth grade, and it really showed me that there was more than enough space for me on Broadway. Whenever I wasn’t on in Hamilton, I watched the show every single night by the sound booth. That man can rap and tell the story like no other. I kind of got the little cheat code. I got to watch him and learn from him every day. Then I had Julius Thomas in San Francisco, and Jamael Westman, who was the London OG, and I got to do it with him in Los Angeles. I was onstage that time, so I got to learn from him by interacting with him. I got to be Reynolds, the doctor, and Papa Schuyler with him. And then I got to work with Jason Arrow in Australia. I played Jefferson a lot with him. The rap battles taught me a lot. I can pull from all different types of Hamiltons, but I’m blessed to say that Lin was my first.

How does New York compare with all the other places you’ve done the show?
Broadway audiences are very honest and supportive, through and through. I’ll speak for myself, I feel a little insecure when they’re not super loud. Every other day, they’re screaming as soon as we come out. But even if there’s a quieter audience on Broadway, which is not usual, there’s still a standing ovation at the end.

In Manila, a place that has never, ever had a show like this come, the audiences are really, really quiet because they don’t want to miss anything. You could hear the quill drop in Manila. But Manila was the craziest stage door I’ve ever experienced.

The reason I bring up the stage door is because they’ll let you know what they think. This dude told me, “I hate musical theater but you really made me like it.” They’re really honest about it, and I prefer that over anything else. It makes me feel like I’ve done the best job that I could, because that was me. I didn’t like musical theater. I loved to act and perform, but when my mom put me into musical theater, I wasn’t into it. It made me uncomfortable to sing and dance. I broke out of that and fell in love with it in middle school. When I hear somebody took the chance to come to the theater on this random night, and they weren’t into this before, but now they are, that’s success in my mind. It makes me feel so good when I hear that because it’s coming from the heart.