“We get the job done!” the two men exclaim, complete with a high-five.

Rarely has political theater overlapped so much with political theatrics. In one scene Hamilton drops a thick batch of papers several feet to the floor, a screed against John Adams that lands like a punch — a moment that mirrors Senator Lindsey Graham’s dropping his cellphone from a roof, in a recent video, to mock his rival Mr. Trump for giving out his number. (In another video, Rand Paul takes a chain saw to a stack of papers meant to be the federal tax code.) Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, Rick Perry and Mr. Trump have also embraced a call-it-as-I-see-it style of attack that calls to mind one of Hamilton’s slaps at Jefferson: “And another thing, Mr. Age of Enlightenment, don’t lecture me about the war, you didn’t fight in it.”

At times it’s today’s Republicans who seem more in tune with the blunt Hamilton and bombastic Jefferson of the musical. By contrast the leading Democratic candidate in the 2016 race, Hillary Rodham Clinton, occasionally seems like a kindred spirit of Aaron Burr, the Hamilton nemesis who would probably approve of Mrs. Clinton’s refusals to take a stand on the Keystone XL pipeline and the Pacific trade deal. As Burr puts it in one song:

Talk less!



Smile more!

Don’t let ’em know what you’re



Against or what you’re for.

Like the Republican candidates now positioning themselves as unwavering opponents of President Obama, decrying his nuclear deal with Iran and his diplomatic opening to Cuba, characters in “Hamilton” stake out unyielding positions against their political enemies during the drafting of the Constitution and early in Washington’s presidency. But the art of compromise eventually becomes a focal point for the creator of “Hamilton,” Lin-Manuel Miranda, a close student of politics as the son of a Puerto Rican immigrant who became a powerful Democratic strategist in New York.

Ron Chernow, whose biography of Hamilton inspired the musical, said that compromise was the timeliest theme in the musical. “What Lin is showing is that it’s very easy when you’re in the political opposition to take extreme ideological positions, but when you’re dealing with real power, you have to engage in messy realities and compromises to move forward,” Mr. Chernow said.

After six and a half years of “no-drama Obama,” the dramatic flair of the political showmen in Cleveland and on Broadway — as well as Senator Bernie Sanders in the Democratic presidential race — is clearly connecting with sections of the electorate who are hungry for direct, colorful language. The crowds for Mr. Trump and Mr. Sanders in particular continue to grow, while “Hamilton,” coming off a sold-out Off Broadway run, has one of the highest advance ticket sales in Broadway history — more than $31 million. Among those who have seen it are President Obama, Vice President Joesph R. Biden Jr., all three Clintons and former Vice President Dick Cheney.

Mr. Trump, in an interview, said more theatricality was needed in American political life to rouse citizens and make them take part in the political process. “I don’t like using pollsters because they just want to give you a script to read and turn politicians into unoriginal, safe, timid people,” Mr. Trump said. “Do I get in trouble with some of the things I say? Maybe. But you have to start a campaign by finding ways to get people to listen to you.”