Hair Reviews
Hair Reviews
#2re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:05pm
hmmm....IF this show gets RAVE reviews (which probably would) my chances of seeing this show is slim! 
J*
dave1606
Broadway Star Joined: 12/8/07
#2re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:16pm
i hope you get to Jay! I saw it yesterday and thought it was amazing. I thought groff was great and don't care what everyone else has been saying. The dance party/curtain call was really cool!
Overall I think it should do very well critically.
#3re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:25pm
Thanks, Good to hear-
I hope to get there soon.
"Forget regret or life is yours to miss."
#4re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:30pm
I thought Jonathan Groff was great. He was one of the stand outs for me, along with the guy who plays Hud, and the girl who plays Jeanie (sorry I don't have the Playbill with me).
Last night, Groff was kinda struggling towards the end of the Act II though. Other than that, he was very good.
Manchester England, England!
#5re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:32pm
AM New York gives the show 4 Stars out of 4:
...As you'd find in almost any revival of "Hair," the uncensored nude scene is performed and the audience is invited to dance onstage with the cast during the finale. In fact, there is a serene sensation of friendship and love among this young, gorgeous cast so strong that it radiates into the audience.
As Claude, the play's conflicted, Hamlet-like protagonist, Jonathan Groff is deeply committed, weepy and heartbreaking. Will Swenson, as his animalistic bosom buddy Berger, perfectly captures the character's childlike charisma and sexual playfulness.
While it would be a crime for this revival to not transfer to Broadway, the experience of seeing "Hair" in Central Park, exposed to nature and the elements, can never again be replicated. So, stop reading this review and start waiting on the line for free tickets. We're not kidding. Go now!
http://www.amny.com/entertainment/stage/am-hair0808,0,5510884.story
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#6re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 4:34pm
I think my ONLY chance is to donate $165.00 a person. (total for us $330.00) I just CAN'T drive down to NYC w/o sure tickets! or else the 8 hours commute wont be worth it! can you imagine IF I fall inline: 8 hours of drive (r/t) + another how many hours of falling inline? 8 hours? lord have mercy!
If I buy tixs to HAIR~ there goes my subscriptions to either Huntington or Goodspeed- I just can't justify it! A friend of mine here (which I wont mention his name ) offered to fall in line for me, which is soo nice of him! His offer was just soo kind and I am indebted to him BUT I just cannot let anyone do that for me- its too much to ask! Honestly, (if shoes reverse) I don't think I can even do that to anyone here! lol!
hmmm..let me think... HAIR tickets or my whole year subscriptions to either Huntington or Goodspeed??
My only chance really is winning a Virtual ticket which I am trying! Why do they make this FREE tickets so hard to get? lol!
J*
Updated On: 8/7/08 at 04:34 PM
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/31/69
#8re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:07pmHas anyone actually had any luck in the virtual line? I've tried each day this week and have not had any luck. I get the feeling it's pretty unlikely that one gets lucky this way. What time have you all gotten to the non-virtual line in order to get tix? A friend of mine who hangs out on "All That Chat" says that people have to get there at like 5 am!?
"The price of love is loss, but still we pay; We love anyway."
#9re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:15pm
Variety is a Rave:
While it was off-limits for review, the Public Theater's 40th anniversary concert staging of "Hair" last summer was one of the more exhilarating New York theatrical events of the year. Directed by Diane Paulus with fluid physicality and performed with passionate conviction by its young cast, the presentation demonstrated that this landmark Vietnam-era rock musical -- so often neutered by revival companies that substitute embarrassed flower-power affectation for the social commitment, political disillusionment, pacifism and bittersweet optimism that are its foundations -- could still foster an urgent connection today. Those virtues are further strengthened in the full-scale season now back in Central Park.
Some productions have tried to circumvent the inescapable period-piece nature of "Hair" via contemporary updates, notably a 2005 revival at London's tiny Gate Theater, which shifted the action to the age of terrorism, the Iraq War and AIDS. Perhaps it's as much due to the current collective hunger for political change, fatigue with the war and eco-anxiety in a morally and economically depressed climate as to anything in the directorial approach, but this staging channels those same contemporary echoes without rewrites...
...Talk has long circulated about the viability of a full-scale Broadway revival of "Hair," which has been absent from the main stem since a short-lived and premature 1977 remount. A transfer of this production remains a distinct possibility, but welcome as that prospect is, it's hard to imagine the same thrill beneath a proscenium as the one being generated under the night sky in Central Park.
http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117937921.html?categoryid=33&cs=1
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#10re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:18pm
Talkin' Broadway is Negative:
...It can't be easy for them - what was practically yesterday's news by 1968 is now even quainter, a yellowed newspaper that crumbles at the touch despite its exciting headlines. When young people today go to theatre, its malaise-tinged voice is echoed most closely in Spring Awakening, In the Heights, and Passing Strange. The type of kids Hair captured likely never yearned for the music of 40 years prior; one doesn't suppose Whoopee!, Chee-Chee, or The New Moon were cherished or relevant to them.
It's squarely at them, and no one else, that this production is aimed, which makes it more relic than revelation. The problems of growing up and growing into yourself are perennials, but require more decisive writing to escape being superglued to the ethos of its era. This deliciously shameless embodiment of free-spirited fun has always been spiked with sobriety, but it can't bear the weight of looking back rather than forward. Why should Hair stay mired in place, when its tribe has long since moved on?
http://www.talkinbroadway.com/ob/08_07_08.html
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#11re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:22pm
Tony Vincent ( a poster here) got his FREE tixs thru virtual line. he is the only one I know from here. most of the guys here got theirs on Central Park. Ive heard they only gave limited tickets thru virtual line like 50-100 tickets.
If you donate money, youre surely be getting seats bec. that's their priority but they also have corporate sponsors that gave donations~they get most of the bulks of the tickets and they are running low now.
That's why I am on the fence to donate money~what IF they run out of tickets? btw- if you donate $$ (which I already inquire via phone) you will get callback within 48 hours from Delacorte Theater, if there will be available tixs for you and you have 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice! my case is EXTREMELY hard bec. I am only available on Saturdays, so if they ran out of Sats tickets...I am stuck with weekday tixs~which I cannot go!
and as I said earlier... its a DONATION! so can I tell them.. 'um I can't get tixs for my specified dates, so can I get my donation back?~ that's very awkward!
J*
#12re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:27pm
The New York Sun is Very Positive:
...With so little narrative, it is essential that the magnetic pull of these two men keep the non-plot moving. Sadly, only Mr. Swenson obliges. Mr. Groff, a compellingly uneasy leading man in "Spring Awakening," again comes across here as sweet and gentle, with a plaintive tenor voice. Unlike in the previous show, though, he is also utterly sexless. You half-expect to see his mom swing by Washington Square Park to pick him up before dinner. (Milos Forman's whacked-out 1979 film adaptation, with its dancing police horses and leering Army recruiters, is presumably of limited use to stage directors. However, its reconception of Claude — as an unworldly Oklahoma boy who stumbles onto the Tribe on his way to Vietnam — might have drawn upon Mr. Groff's empathic skills while avoiding these deficits.)
But this is the only substantial misstep in a night filled with vitality and emotion. (A recent press performance was interrupted by a half-hour of cold rain; rarely has a group of actors — or, for that matter, an audience — seemed to mind less.) And the fourth-wall-shattering antics of Mr. Swenson and many of his costars offer little preparation for the communal thrill of Ms. Paulus's finale. I have no idea whether the musical-theater community will draw new sustenance from the ramshackle pleasures of "Hair" or cast a slightly patronizing gaze back at its optimism and indignation before finding the next movie or greatest-hits album to ransack. But I do know that Broadway, if it has any sense at all, will find room for young treasures such as Bryce Ryness, Darius Nichols, Mr. Swenson, and the superb Patina Renea Miller in old as well as new shows. May these gifted young men and women let the sunshine in wherever they go.
http://www.nysun.com/arts/that-60s-show-hair/83426/
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#13re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 8:34pm
The Associated Press is Very Positive:
...It's the musical numbers not the book that give the other actors moments to shine. From the opening refrain of "Aquarius," set ablaze by a magnetic Patina Renea Miller, to the final choral plea of "Let the Sun Shine In," the score throbs with a contemporary '60s sound that was practically nonexistent on Broadway when the musical first arrived there in April 1968 (after playing downtown at the Public Theater in the fall of 1967).
Even the show's numbers that individually never made the Hit Parade are known through the best-selling original cast recording, which now gives the show a kind of Greatest Hits feel. And despite their pop feel, they are songs that if they don't push the plot forward, at least they sometimes reveal character.
For example, take "Frank Mills," sung by Crissy (portrayed by the beguiling Allison Case). She's not a major character, but you learn a lot about her just by hearing her sing this plaintive love song to a boy she has barely met...
http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=e080787A
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#14re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 9:39pm
Newsday is Very Positive:
...Much has been noted about political, racial and environmental parallels between today and the Vietnam-era show. That's all stunningly true.
What's also important, however, is the subtle, shrewd, ongoing smartness of this show. The book, by lyricists Gerome Ragni and James Rado, may seem like a ragtag jumble of sketches about the rebellious young pursuit of "peace, love, freedom, happiness." In fact, the creators are cleverly telling layers of individual stories through an unconventional structure that still feels new.
And how did they and composer Galt MacDermot get so much detail and power into those tiny, unassuming little songs? Observations about the "dirty little war," the dirty little words, the dirty air and dirty dealings tumble exuberantly around in extremely precise forms -- each song almost a tiny play...
http://www.newsday.com/entertainment/stage/ny-ethair0808,0,5894934.story
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#15re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 9:49pm
Damn! They better move this show on Broadway!!! Circle in the Square is available, isn't it?
Hurry up!
J*
#16re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:00pmIt'd be a hard prospect, a transfer: two shows have been postponed because they couldn't find theaters.
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#17re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:04pm
I wish they extend the show again. it's really almost impossible for non-new yorkers to see the show.. you really HAVE to have a lot of time to see the show!
J*
Updated On: 8/7/08 at 10:04 PM
#18re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:19pm
Wow! I am very happy for this show! The electricity and joy that emanates from that theatre every night is wonderful! Pure magic! The Wannabe's and 'Membawhens both sharing the joy that one is left with (even with the really dark ending).
I'm hoping to see it again before the end of it's run.
Those Blocked: SueStorm. N2N Nate. Good riddence to stupid! Rad-Z, shill begone!
CurtainPullDowner
Broadway Legend Joined: 11/4/04
#19re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:24pm
I have tried the virtual line every day and then I get the nice "we are not really into you, but try again"
Over at ALL THAT CHAT, someone gets it everyday.
I stood or sat in line for the original HAIR on 47th St many times, but I was like 19, trippin in the park at my age, well here I go.
I wanna see it bad.
#20re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:27pm
The New York Times (with Brantley reviewing) is a Rave:
It is deep summer in the late 1960s in Central Park, and nobody is keeping off the grass. A heady concentration of anarchic youth has come out to play, flooding the shaggy green patch of turf that has been made of the stage at the open-air Delacorte Theater. And the whiff of hedonism that this crowd emanates induces a serious contact high in anyone who comes near it.
The pure hormonal vitality that courses through the Public Theater’s exuberant production of “Hair,” which officially opened Thursday night, is enough to make it the pick-me-up event of New York’s dog days this year. But middle-aged audience members who revisit this landmark work from 1967 in search of the feckless flower children they once were are likely to uncover more than they bargained for.
What’s so excitingly eye-opening about Diane Paulus’s interpretation of “Hair” isn’t that it’s fun. Put a bunch of kids with decent pipes, lithe bodies and adolescent energy on a stage and let ’em loose on Galt MacDermot’s abidingly infectious score, and a certain amount of giddy pleasure is guaranteed.
Mr. MacDermot, after all, once described “Hair” as “the ‘Hellzapoppin’ of its generation,” referring to a zany hit revue of the late 1930s. Sure enough, Gerome Ragni and James Rado’s book and lyrics, with their quick-sketch comic routines and satiric musical pastiches, suggest good old American vaudeville filtered through a mescaline haze. And Ms. Paulus, who was one of the creators of the long-running Off-Broadway romp “The Donkey Show,” does full justice to this show’s madcap friskiness.
But she also locates a core of apprehension in “Hair” that reveals it to be much more than a time-capsule frolic, a “Babes in Arms” for head trippers. The lively teenage rebels of “Hair” may be running headlong after a long good time. But in this production, more than any I’ve seen, it’s clear that they’re also running away, and not just from what they see as the dead-end lives of their parents and a man-eating war in Vietnam...
http://theater2.nytimes.com/2008/08/08/theater/reviews/08hair.html
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#21re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:28pm
Well, a transfer is sounding like a good idea right about now.
Say what you will about Brantley, but he knows how to make a show sound good.
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
Updated On: 8/7/08 at 10:28 PM
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
#22re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:30pm
Wow! Brantley gave a love letter to Diane Paulus!
CONGRATULATIONS! Cast & Creative of HAIR! -J*
#23re: Hair Reviews
Posted: 8/7/08 at 10:42pm
NY1 is a Rave (with video):
Maybe you didn't take drugs during the 1960s. Maybe you weren't even born in the ‘60s. Doesn't matter, everybody is in for one doozy of an acid flashback with the timely revival of “Hair,” the groundbreaking rock musical from 1967.
The Public Theater's triumphant, ecstatic revival takes us back to a simpler time, yet one that looks a bit like now.
“Hair” called itself the “American Tribal Love-Rock Musical,” and that basically sums up this still astonishing work by composer Galt MacDermot and book writers James Rado and Gerome Ragni. The familiar psychedelic hits are here: "Aquarius," Manchester, England" and "Let the Sun Shine In."
But what comes across this time is the tragic undertow of the material, the sadness beneath the youthful silliness and authority-tweaking. And the quaint, vaudevillian structure of the piece is striking, peaking out under love beads, motley costumes and yards of shaggy manes.
The plot, such as it is, follows a tribe of peace-and-drug-loving hippies cavorting outdoors, burning draft cards, until one of their members, the existentially-troubled Claude, decides to go to war to find himself -- or lose himself.
Director Diane Paulus has done a phenomenal staging and casting job. From goddess-like Patina Renea Miller's soul-stirring "Aquarius" to Will Swenson's hunky bad-boy Berger and Jonathan Groff's openhearted Claude, these intensely talented young actors leap clear over the generation gap to deliver a mystic crystal revelation we badly need. Add Karole Armitage's group choreography and a supremely groovy band, and the moon is smack dab in the seventh house.
Despite the uplifting dance party that ends “Hair,” with cast members inviting audience members onstage, you might leave this revival depressed. First, 40 years after the debut of this pacifist classic, the U.S. is again stuck in an unpopular military quagmire. Second, we have no antiwar movement like the one that inspired “Hair.”
Hey, I hear we also used to fly to the moon. Is America evolving backward?
http://www.ny1.com/ny1/content/index.jsp?stid=238&aid=84666
"Y'know, I think Bertolt Brecht was rolling in his grave."
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
Updated On: 8/7/08 at 10:42 PM
-Nellie McKay on the 2006 Broadway production of The Threepenny Opera, in which she played Polly Peachum
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