Stars Talk About Why Diversity on Broadway Needs to Go Beyond 'Hamilton'

The success of hip-hop musical Hamilton may have been a groundbreaking moment for representation in theater, but according to these three Broadway stars, there's a still a long way to go.

Renee Elise Goldsberry, Danielle Brooks and Danai Gurira sat down for a recent video with Vanity Fair to talk about what Broadway is doing well when it comes to diversity, and what still needs to be done.

Goldsberry, who stars as Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton, discussed being part of a show that's spurred a new dialogue about race in theater. 

"We have Lin-Manuel Miranda, who's Puerto Rican, who's telling a story. And he is using every shade of the rainbow to tell the story, regardless of, you know, how 'accurate' that is in terms of what our founding fathers and mothers actually looked like."

"That is what diversity should be about," said Orange Is the New Black star Danielle Brooks, who is also starring in The Color Purple on Broadway.

"I think there's something very powerful about bringing young girls and women who might be in circumstances where they don't think that being on a stage or creating a play or doing the work that we've done is possible for them — but it is, once they see people who look like them doing it," Danai Gurira said, speaking about the importance of diversity in creating a new generation of women of color in theater.

And there just isn't enough representation, on Broadway or in any other media. 

Gurira points out that the only way to move away from a conversation about the lack of diversity in theater is to actually, intentionally create stories that reflect many different kind of identities. 

"Then," she says, "the conversation falls back, because inclusivity is apparent."

Watch the whole conversation here:

Read: The Cast of 'Hamilton' Just Showed the World Why It's a Modern Theater Masterpiece