Julius Thomas III, Wichita State musical theatre alum and former titular character in “Hamilton: An American Musical”, visited his alma mater for a brief residency where he gave a performance and shared advice for the younger generation. 

Amy Baker Schwiethale, the musical theater program coordinator and the associate director of the School of Performing Arts, said that Thomas’ visit was a part of the school’s Connoisseur Series. 

“A lot of times that takes the form of just artist talks, but with a voice and a career like that there was no way we weren’t going to have (Thomas) do a full concert,” Schwiethale said. “(It) was to bring in a WSU alum who had such an incredible career and we knew could share so much wisdom with our current students.”

After his performance, the music theater department wanted to give Thomas another opportunity to share insights about working in the performing arts world before he ended his residency at the university. 

“When I (graduated), my only goal was to do good work and to make a living doing what it is that I wanted to do,” Thomas said. “Everything that’s happened in my career and in my life has far exceeded that.

“But the overarching thing is that I just want to leave the world better than I found it, and my way of doing that is providing respite and moments of release and relax in the context of theater and art and performance, and if I’m doing that then I’m on task.” 

When Thomas takes on a character and builds a role, he said he will always relate it back to something in his life that he has experienced before. 

“What is the thing that allows me to understand the emotion behind what we’re supposed to be experiencing?” he said. “That’s where I’m always sort of starting the journey from every character that I play, and I feel like that’s where I do my best and honest work is just leading from me.” 

The world of performing arts is a shifting one; artists never know where their next role will come from, or if they will even get the next role. Thomas keeps grounded by the thought that anything can happen. 

“All of it could be done tomorrow for any number of reasons,” he said. “It’s kind of a calming thing that says ‘today is all I’ve got, and the best show that I do today either determines that I will be here tomorrow or that whatever happens, happens. So how about we do as best we can today and we worry about anything else tomorrow?’” 

Thomas auditioned for “Hamilton: An American Musical,” 15 times before finally landing the leading role. 

“I went on a journey of all the men in the show, where they brought me in. This was something I was experiencing with Tommy Kali, the director, quite a bit, where he brought me in for many characters. I could see that he could see something in me, but he had no idea where to place me,” he said. “I started to get a little disillusioned with it, because it felt like he was getting too comfortable with passing me over. 

“They finally called me up, and they said, ‘Can we see you for Hamilton?’ and I said no, because I didn’t think that I was going to go in and excel at that. I wanted to feel very comfortable about going in the room and knowing that this was going to be a knockout, and I didn’t.” After some pressure from the people around him, Thomas auditioned for the role of Hamilton in 2019, and that was the fit for him. 

“It wasn’t ever about the fact that I wasn’t right, or I wasn’t good enough,” he said. “I let ‘no’ be the fuel for the fire; got a little discouraged along the way, but I ended up with the role that defined and changed my career for the rest of my life.”

Part of staying on top of an ever-changing field, for Thomas, is reinvention. 

“Certain things are not within my facility anymore, new things are, and so I’m constantly having to rethink of where I am in this moment in my life and govern myself accordingly,” he said. 

In his thoughts about reinvention, he said he looks forward to stepping into a writer or director role, tossing the idea of coming back to WSU to direct a show for the School of Performing Arts. 

“It’s been something that’s been burning in me,” he said. “I loved working with you guys, I loved trying to craft a thing, and so it’s just about finding the right projects and about the right moments and the right people to allow me to come.”