Broadway Is Here!

By now you have all heard about the Hamilton show at the Technion, and if you haven’t, you’re missing out. A group of students – forty at first, and then a whopping seventy – spent their precious evenings bringing about a wonderful performance of the Broadway musical Hamilton.

Hamilton, a musical about the American founding father and first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, was written and composed by the legendary Lin-Manuel Miranda. Premiering in 2015 in New York City, it became a global cultural phenomenon overnight: in fact, it was such a force that it even managed to sway U.S. President Obama’s decision to keep Hamilton on the ten-dollar bill.

Closer to home, the musical inspired the Canonical Ensemble, a group of students enamored with it. In 2022–2023, they decided to mount Act I of the musical here at the Technion, to resounding success. Despite the war and reserve duty, they staged Hamilton Act II in November 2025. The results, in our opinion, were spectacular.

How it all Began

The Canonical Ensemble wasn’t born at the Technion. The original members of the ensemble first met while serving together in the same IDF unit, around 2015–2016, when Hamilton was still fresh. One of the original members who loved the musical suggested a Hamilton karaoke night. However, some of the members who arrived misunderstood, thinking they were supposed to prepare a performance of the entire show. They ended up performing in front of their unit several times. Members of the original production later began their studies at the Technion and, after their first year, decided to stage the show there.

They worked on Act I of Hamilton during the spring semester of 2022–2023, performing toward the end of the semester. The response surpassed their wildest expectations: both performances of Act I completely sold out of tickets, and the auditorium – full of Technion students, staff and families – gave them a standing ovation. The ensemble intended to perform Act II in the following semester - but the war delayed their plans.

To accommodate reservists and the unpredictable circumstances, the ensemble postponed Act II and decided instead to perform a “Mixtape” of songs (the ensemble showed twelve songs from various musicals in between their performances Act I and Act II - these 12 songs were dubbed Mixtape) from various musicals and Disney movies, allowing smaller groups of crew members to work on separate pieces.

Behind the Curtain

In order to shine a light on this incredible operation, we interviewed some key participants.. So, let’s meet the crew:

The crew behind Hamilton at the Technion started out as strangers. Each crew member had their own special journey to joining the show. Nikol reached the team by reading the Dean of Students’ email. Itay heard of Act I through posters and social media. Others have heard about it from friends who were in the original 2016 ensemble.

Some crew members did have some prior experience in their fields. Zoe was part of a choir while Miriam was in charge of a production of the Aladdin musical in her high school. Others didn’t: when Itay came to the audition, he admitted to the original crew he didn’t know how to sing, act or dance - but wanted to take part. He started out as the guy who just pressed on the music’s play button, and a year later he was a producer and now is the chief producer of the ensemble’s next show – Legally Blond.

Working Through War

Multiple members of the crew, including Boaz, worked on the show while serving on reserve duty (as well as studying). Boaz told us that in his audition for Act I(?), he proposed to the Canonical Ensemble that they have a live orchestra. The crew embraced the challenging idea, and Boaz found himself scoring six songs in his first semester on the show, eventually producing an incredible orchestral performance that wowed the audience. Boaz described how when preparing for Act II he reorchestrated the score for “Popular” at 2 AM on his laptop, between shifts during his reserve duty, all while juggling his degree. The next day, the song was rehearsed.

Boaz recalled laying awake in the middle of the night while working on the Mixtape, unsure how to combine flutes with different musical scales, thoughts racing through his brain five hours before he had to wake up for work. Eventually Boaz scored twelve songs in his first year for the Mixtape. For Act II, he had to score twenty-five songs. Boaz explained to us that notes weren’t available online, so he and his team had to rearrange the score with very little information.

When Hard Work Meets Talent

The amount of dedication and work the ensemble invests is stunning. We were curious how they managed to mount such a fantastic performance while remaining fully engaged with their studies. Nikol explained to us that though the work took a significant amount of her time, successful time management helped her balance her studies. Zoe said she frequently lost sleep and credited her professors, who were very supportive of her. Miriam said that when crafting the costumes, she would work until 6 AM while listening to recorded lectures.

Itay told us he found it easier to work on the show during his undergraduate studies and even said his best academic semester was the one when he worked intensely on Act I. The crew described the work on the show as the “points of light” during their week, and said it helped them get through the semester.

We asked them what other behind-the-scenes events occurred which they found, in retrospect, to be moments of pride. Zoe said she had only three days to learn the opening text the crew wrote for King George III – but pulled through. That wasn’t the only last-minute work the crew had to do:

Itay told us he had twelve hours to program 400 lighting cues for the show. These cues refer to the changing of lighting and spotlights during or between scenes, when the spotlight moves from one actor to another. While Itay had twelve hours, in the real world professionals would usually have about a week for such a task. Boaz also recalled a stressful moment during their final performance where there was a problem with the sound amplification during the curtain call. The orchestra needed to cue the actors to bow in a specific order, but the microphone failed.

Boaz instinctively improvised with the orchestra, adjusting the music so that it synchronized with the actors’ bows. The improvisation was so seamless that even other crew members did not realize what had happened, and the audience truly had no idea.

When asked what drives their passion, Miriam told us that in the end it is the people. Miriam, who described herself as “not the most social person”, told us that after two rehearsals she was already dancing with others on set. Nikol, who considered quitting after Act II of Hamilton to focus on her studies realized she would miss the people and the dancing too much and ultimately decided to stay. For Boaz, not only is making and being part of a musical incredibly cool, he also sees it as a place of community, a home for students like him.

With a Little Help from my Friends

The crew were not alone in this operation, and thank ASAT as well as the Dean of Students’ office and its cultural department for their help. They told us the Dean of Students’ office supported them every step of the way, both financially and logistically, providing backing and management as well as physical spaces where they could practice. Itay explained that running an independent musical in a university is a crazy idea, and yet the Technion was open to such ideas, even though musicals were at the time considered niche. He emphasized that students should not give up their passions and hobbies simply because they are students or engineers. Boaz added that many students begin their studies with the mindset that they are now only students. It does not have to be this way, he told us. “If you did music before, if you didn’t do music before, if you love creating, if you love production, if you love sound, there is a place to do this. We created a really cool, community-driven place to do this. Guard this aspect of your lives.”

As accomplished as these five members of the Hamilton crew are, they always insisted on crediting their peers. It is the work of seventy people, they explained. These seventy people have proven to all of us that any Technion student, if they are passionate and invest their time, can together create the highest level of art. And they’re not stopping here: the crew is already working hard on their next show, and invite everyone to come and see them rehearse for Legally Blonde on Monday evenings in Beit HaStudent.

The crew told us they are still looking for students to assist backstage or work as ushers. Those interested can contact them directly through Instagram: @the.canonical.ensemble.

We have only to thank them for their hard work and wait for their next show, Legally Blonde, in June 2026.

“It will be an hour and 45 minutes of pure fun,” they told us. “You should come.”