These ‘Hamilton’ performers have to be ready to go onstage at a moment’s notice (Washington Post):
One of the most demanding roles in “Hamilton” is one you probably won’t notice: that of the “swing,” a performer who is prepared to play multiple parts in the show, sometimes with only a moment’s notice.
“I have to be ready at the drop of a dime to go onstage, and I have seven tracks in my head,” says Jacob Guzman, 23. “You’re always on the edge of the seat, not sure what’s going to happen tonight.”
Guzman was still memorizing his responsibilities as the touring company that’s now at the Kennedy Center launched last year in San Francisco. Mid-show, he was told he’d have to step in.
“You have to act like you know what you’re doing,” says Guzman, whose twin brother, David, is a swing in “Hamilton” on Broadway. “You can’t go on and be frantic. It was definitely a whirlwind of a night.”
Swing performers, who jump in in cases of illness, vacation or injury, don’t slide into big roles like Alexander Hamilton or Aaron Burr. That’s done by understudies who are typically in the ensemble playing supporting parts (or “tracks”), singing and dancing in the crowd scenes that propel the musical history across decades.
“If Hamilton is out, our ‘Man 5’ will step into the role of Hamilton, and I will be Man 5,” explains Desmond Nunn, 27, a “Hamilton” swing who, one way or another, is on most nights. “Our Man 6 covers Hercules Mulligan and George Washington. Our Mulligan is on vacation this week, so I knew I was doing four shows as Man 6. Sometimes you’re scheduled for four shows, and the rest of the week is kind of a ‘Jeopardy!’ You don’t know who you’re going to be.”
“It took time to mentally and emotionally come to terms with it, and to get used to the job,” says Yvette Lu, a 23-year-old covering all five female ensemble tracks. “But it really is a rewarding position. It keeps me on my toes. Keeps my brain moving.”
Lu is in her very first professional job out of college at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and she didn’t know she was being considered as a swing until she was hired.
“Then I realized my audition process had been a test for that,” she says. Auditions were a week of “boot camp,” full days with performers learning multiple parts and then being asked to switch without warning. Lu groused to another auditioner, “Can you imagine being a swing for this show? That would suuuuck. I would never do that.”
Now she says, “I was so frustrated — ‘They’re not going to see me do stuff! This is so unfair!’ But that’s exactly what a swing does. You just have to jump in.”
“It’s such a specific brain to be a swing,” she says. “Growing up dancing, you learn to pick up things fast, and it gets into your muscle memory. When I go back into a track I haven’t done in a while, if I’m overthinking or nervous, I get tense, and that’s when I might mess up. Remembering that I’ve done it before and that it will be okay, and not putting pressure on to be perfect, it all just comes out.”
Like Guzman and Nunn, Lu strictly monitors her fitness and considers each day how much to rest and how much energy to spend on dance or voice classes, or visiting the sights as the company tours the country. “Maintaining myself for the surprises that are going to come,” Lu says, “it’s a whole lifestyle thing.”
