Twin Cities fans of "Hamilton" will no longer have to wait for it.
Single tickets for the musical's Minneapolis debut go on sale June 21 — but most buyers will need to register first for a new Ticketmaster service designed to combat scalpers and ticket-buying bots.
Hennepin Theatre Trust announced Monday that fans can begin registering immediately at verifiedfan.ticketmaster.com/hamiltonmin. Registration will close Friday, June 15, at 11:59 p.m.
An estimated 103,000 single tickets will go on sale June 21 at 10 a.m. for the Aug. 29-Oct. 7 run at the Orpheum Theatre. Prices range from $79 to $199, with a select number of premium seats at $479. There is a four-ticket limit.
In addition to the online sale, a "very limited number" of tickets will be sold at the State Theatre box office at 10 a.m. June 21. Tickets cannot be purchased by phone.
Roughly 120,000 tickets will be available for the six-week run of Lin-Manuel Miranda's blockbuster musical. About 15,000 of those already are earmarked for Hennepin Theatre Trust season subscribers.
If fans get shut out, there's still hope: There will be a daily lottery for 40 prime seats, priced at $10, for each performance. And high-buck tickets will no doubt wind up on the secondary market via Ticketmaster.
A few special matinees will be staged exclusively for school audiences under a program funded by the Rockefeller Foundation. Details will be announced later this summer.
When season-ticket packages went on sale Feb. 14, thousands of hopeful fans crashed the Hennepin Theatre Trust website while mobbing the box office and choking telephone lines.
"We know how challenging it is to buy tickets and this new Ticketmaster program will make the process a whole lot easier," the show's producer, Jeffrey Seller, said in a statement.
Users will need to have an account with Ticketmaster. After they register with Verified Fan, they will receive a confirmation e-mail. Registering does not guarantee tickets, however. If demand exceeds ticket supply, "fans may be selected at random to participate in the Verified Fan sale," Ticketmaster said. Those who are selected will get an e-mail notification the day before, then an access code June 21 to purchase tickets.
The system, which Ticketmaster has been using for about a year and a half, checks users' purchase histories and even their social media activity to weed out scalpers. It's been used for especially popular attractions, including Bruce Springsteen's one-man show on Broadway and an upcoming pop-up tour by comedians Dave Chappelle and Jon Stewart.
"Hamilton" has been Broadway's hottest ticket since it opened in August 2015. Adapted from Ron Chernow's biography of founding father Alexander Hamilton, this revolutionary musical uses hip-hop, jazz, blues, R&B and Broadway tunes to tell the story of the West Indian immigrant who became George Washington's right-hand man.
The play received the Pulitzer Prize for drama along with a record 16 Tony nominations, winning 11 Tonys, including best musical.
There are also productions in Chicago and London, and two U.S. tours, including the one coming to Minneapolis.
612-673-4390 • @rohanpreston
