A White Black Guy In Hairspray? — Page 4

I am curious who went on for Tracy, Prudy, and Sketch in the original post. Also who played "Tommy" and "Louie". I can't believe there were no female swings available. Both times that I have seen Hairspray on tour, I had a White Guy with Radio who did not appear in the record shop scenes. If Rashad Naylor went on for a Dynamite, would he dress as a woman or stay as a man?

I like Hairspray a lot and do find it ironic that a show dealing with race has trouble getting enough cast members of the requisite races. Surely the show is making enough money. If I remember correctly, there were no black swings in the original cast, just Josh Bergasse, Greg Graham, and Brooke Tansley. Willis White and Denosh Bennett were added later.

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Misto,

Michelle Dowdy was Tracy, Lindsay Nicole Chambers was Prudy, and Bryan West was Sketch. There were no slips in the Playbill as to who was playing Tommy or the Radio Guy (Sorry I don't know the actual name, it's either Thad, Duane or Gilbert I believe).

the show has 6 swings and 2 standbys.. they have 8 offstage cast members total.. that is quite a bit.. cometimes things happen and you have to improvise.... and they DO do that..... stranger things have happened at the Neil Simon....

I think Gilbert is "Black Guy with Radio." I wonder where were Liz Larsen, Gretchen Beiber, and Michelle Kitrell that Lindsey Chambers had to go on as Prudy and no-one could cover for her as Tammy. Actually on Playbill Online, Liz and Michelle are not listed.

So did "Tommy" appear in all the places that Tammy would for Good Morning Baltimore and You Can't Stop the Beat etc.?

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Wasn't Jesus black?

when Gretchen covered for Shelley on Easter...her costume and wig were identical to Donna Vivino's usual...the green sweater set and plaid skirt and dark wigs. Her Ms Teenage Hairspray dress may have been different though. When Michelle covered for Tammy on Easter, she had a blond wig...but it was more of a "beehive" style and different than Tammys usual hair style. She still had on the orangey flower print tank dress though. Her Ms Teenage HS dress was different than the usual Tammy one. Both of their "big doll hooker" outfits were different than the usual ones. When Donna was covering for Prudy that day...she had similar outfits...but not the same as Julie Halston. Same went for Joe Abraham who was on as Sketch. He had the traditional "blue Sketch sweater" in the one scene but the rest of his outfits seemed to be generic "nicest kid" plaid pants and sweater and shirt outfit and suit.

I heard Lindsay pulled off Prudy/Matron...I've just seen Donna do it and she was really good.

I'm calling bull**** on whoever said that to be cast in HS you have to be "very" white or "very" black. Back in mid-2003 well before they started cutting corners, they cast Michael Longoria as a swing. The POSITIVE thing in his favor (and the company's) was that he convincingly could go swing on as a black record shop guy or white council member. He was often Tommy, Louie, (and of course Fender, IQ, etc), but also went on as Thad, Gilbert, and Duane. One of the only people who has ever played all those roles.

Speaking of Hairspray, what is up with their website? It went from hairsprayonbroadway, to hairspraythemusical, and now you have to download macromedia in order to view the site.

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"I'm curious as to what songs/scenes were cut as a result of numerous people being out."

Dottie - No scenes or songs are EVER cut. They do, however, cut tracks when there aren't enough swings to cover. I've seen this quite a few times.

Tammy and Lou Ann aren't the only roles that are sometimes played by a Tommy or Louie. Shelley can be a Sammy. I think Brenda would be the only white ensemble girl that cannot be played by a man, unless someday it is possible for a man to get pregnant.

Hairspray has 2 white female swings: Gretchen Bieber and normally Michelle Kittrell. Michelle, however, is on a leave of absence doing the Legally Blonde workshop, so Cameron Adams has been the other white female swing. Cameron, however, was not there on the day in question because of an injury. Julie Halston was also out, so Lindsay had to step in to play Prudy, plus Donna Vivino was out, leaving two white ensemble girls out and only one female swing to cover. Because Shelley does have a bigger part, it was better to replace Tammy with Tommy, which is what happened.

As far as a white swing playing one of the black ensemble characters, this only happens in scenes where they absolutely have to have a certain number of people there, otherwise they just cut tracks out. For example, Terita Redd's track (Lorraine) is usually cut when there are two black girl ensemble members out (since there is only one black female swing), and one of the white female swings will come in just for the finale to cover the track so that there are no missing dancers. The same thing happened here: obviously the black male swing (Abdul Latif) was out, or was covering another missing black male ensemble member, and they just didn't have enough to cover, but they needed to have a certain amount of people in the detention scene, and it wouldn't matter that he's white...he's just another guy in detention. Had the white guy been at the record shop, that would've been another story.

Just because they have one black swing for each gender and two white swings for each gender doesn't mean anything other than that there are more white characters in the show. Do the math, and you'll see that the white characters totally outnumber the black characters, which means that more white swings are needed. 99 times out of 100 having just the one black swing in each gender has been enough. So ozone20, don't take it so personally as some kind of Hairspray racism. Having more black swings is unnecessary most of the time and would not be cost effective.

Sorry for the long post!!

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"I am Puerto Rican as well, and I feel that this issue IS the biggest problem facing latinos today. There is so much racism within our American created "ethnicity" that there is no real unity where maybe there should/could be. I dont know the answers, but please don't think there isn't hate or ignorance by the Latin population. Part of that assumption goes to the very route of the issue. Assuming things or making general statements hide the truth from people that need to see it."


Oh, I didn't mean to imply that there ISN'T racism or ignorance among the Latino population. There is, of course!! What I meant to say is that, generally speaking, Latinos aren't surprised to learn that I'm Puerto Rican when they see me, even though I have blue eyes. Generally speaking, white people tend to make the assumption that all Latinos are "dark". But we're not.

But of course I agree with you. There is an abundance of racism within our community. Especially in Puerto Rico, where in the 2000 census, 80% of the population listed itself as "white". Historically speaking, there has been a constant denial of our African and Taino heritage, focusing instead on the European heritage. There's been a breakage from that in the past years, but it's still there.

HBG, thanks again. You're the best!!

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Going WAY back here... for the record, "wigger" is an unacceptable term and should be avoided at all costs. :) I was in the 7th grade when this word "took off" and to this day, I can't believe how casually and OFTEN it was used.