There's a real irony at play when people talk of casting "stars" in Hair, a show that was created to be the counter-mainstream work, performed by unknowns...
How about using really old stars? Carol Burnett, Betty White, Darlene Love, Kelsey Grammar, Tom Selleck, Pierce Brosnan?
I don't care who they cast to be honest. I'm just glad that I'm finally going to see a professional production! I'm already trying to order the window card & souvenir program. So excited for this!!
Did you hear of the 20th anniversary concert they did in 1988 as a UN benefit? Bea Arthur sang "White Boys," Dr. Ruth (as Margaret Mead) did the intro speech to "My Conviction," hell, they even managed to shoe-horn in Frank Stallone. It's not as though this practice is new.
Aaron Tveit as Claude wouldn't surprise me at all.
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
The Hollywood Bowl productions seem to draw a lot of B/C grade actors who usually put on a halfway decent show. A person who you can say was in a hit movie AND has their own cable show would fit the bill. It helps that they sing and have done Hollywood Bowl productions.
Aaron Tveit fits that bill nicely, as does Skylar Astin. Exciting? Not really, but far worse things have happened.
ucjrdude902, nudity was a very miniscule part of HAIR. It did last longer than the momentary flash of light in FULL MONTY. But it was done under very low lighting in the OBC and touring productions and was on a volunteer basis. Unless any of the star performers choose to go au natural at the Bowl, I imagine most the nudity will be done by the ensemble.
Here's mention of actress Diane Keaton's objections of baring all in the Broadway production per wikipedia:
"In 1968, Keaton became a member of the "Tribe" and understudy to Sheila in the original Broadway production of Hair. She gained some notoriety for her refusal to disrobe at the end of Act I when the cast performs nude, even though nudity in the production was optional for actors (Those who performed nude received a $50 bonus)."
Anna Kendrick is someone I can definitely see being approached about this. My first thought when I heard about the production was maybe Darren Criss as Berger?
Claude- Aaron Tveit, Jonathan Groff, Skylar Astin Berger-Zac Efron, Jeremy Jordan Sheila-Jennifer Damiano (Nxt2Nrml), Sarah Stiles (AveQ), Lindsay Mendez (Wicked) Jeanie- Kacie Sheik, Rachel Bay Jones Woof-Bryce Rynees, Chord Overstreet, Andy Mientus (Smash), Hud-Darius Nichol, Joshua Henry
Any news about the casting for this? I actually think no matter who they get, it will be fun to see Hair at the bowl. I'm just curious, though.
“I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.”
``oscar wilde``
Still no news, but as per Jim Rado's interview with this site, it will be the full script for the Paulus production, plus two songs that he felt needed to be restored ("Dead End" and "Exanaplanetooch," though that's not how he spells the latter anymore; I just refuse to learn a new spelling when it's been that way for forty some-odd years). It's the same script that was used on the just-finished actor/musician tour of Hair that no one heard about. The way he describes it, this may bear some relation to the current script being used at the ATC in Chicago, but he's used original Off-Broadway material sparingly in many of his revisions since the Nineties, so it's anybody's freakin' guess if it will bear any relation to that.
“I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.”
``oscar wilde``