Cody Englander
Staff writer
Hamilton star, television actor and Tony nominee Christopher Jackson doesn’t see his artistic journey stopping any time soon.
“I don’t ever want to stop doing what I’m doing, and I don’t ever want to stop doing stuff that’ll make a difference in the world,” Jackson said in Playbill. “It’s a big ocean, and I feel like I’m still just starting to row.”
At 10:45 a.m. today in the Amphitheater, Jackson joins Kwame Alexander to end Week Seven’s Chautauqua Lecture Series theme, “Kwame Alexander and Friends: The Power of One.”
Jackson sprang onto Broadway in 1997 as an ensemble singer and understudy for Simba in the original Broadway cast of The Lion King. Since then, he has starred in Holler if Ya Hear Me, After Midnight, The Bronx Bombers and In the Heights — and, of course, originated the role of George Washington in Hamilton on Broadway.
Jackson has also starred in the six-season CBS drama, “Bull” and on the HBO Max series “And Just Like That…” Additional film and TV credits include “Freestyle Love Supreme,” “A Gifted Man,” “Gossip Girl,” “Tracers,” “Moana” and the film adaptation of “In the Heights.”
Jackson has performed throughout the country, including Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center and the White House.
Alexander is a poet, educator, producer and No. 1 New York Times bestselling author of over 40 books, including The Crossover, Becoming Muhammad Ali (co-authored with James Patterson) and The Door of No Return. He currently serves as the Michael I. Rudell Artistic Director of Literary Arts and Inagural Writer-in-Residence at Chautauqua Institution.
Alexander and Jackson will discuss Jackson’s personal journey along with the journey of America through “the soundtrack of our country.”
Alexander described every conversation this week as having two main points.
“What’s your origin story, and now, what’s your legacy?” Alexander said. “If you’re writing about your life, what is your life going to be?”
Jackson has reflected on Hamilton’s cultural impact, with more storytellers and audiences telling and interpreting stories from artists of color.
“There have been a lot of cultural shifts since Hamilton,” Jackson said in Playbill. “People of color and writers and artists of color have felt more empowered, and there’s been more of a wider reception for the brilliance that has come out of our community. I think also the audiences have experienced the shift, in which they’re ready to hear those stories and ready to look at that kind of art.”
One of the stories getting highlighted is Alexander’s 2013 book, The Crossover. It is currently in the process for a stage adaptation, commissioned by Chautauqua Theater Company, directed by Producing Artistic Director Jade King Carroll.
“In The Crossover, we enter a world full of dreams, melodies, and rhythms—the dribble of a basketball, the shriek of a sneaker, the whoosh of a game-winning three-pointer from deep, and the clicking of the clock as it counts down to that final buzzer,” Jackson told Playbill. “We’re bringing a high-energy, jazz- and hip-hop-laced score to the musical theatre stage, infusing the brilliance of Kwame Alexander’s poetry and the many characters that inhabit our hero Jordan Bell’s world.”
