Hair - I didn't get it.

Read the synopsis on wikipedia. It might help you understand what's going on. I saw the show from the balcony at the Al Hirschfield and I loved it. It's just a great show all around. I usually always try to see shows more than once even I I didn't "get it" or like it the first time around.

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Basically it is a bit a hippy who has his hippy friends and wants to know if he should go to war. Well sorta it didn't have much of a plot. It was more about hippy culture than anything of substance .

It's about a boy who finds out he's a wizard! And he smokes pot!

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I think of it as a snapshot of a time. I like the show, and enjoy watching it, but I agree that the narrative structure is weak. If you didn't enjoy it on Broadway, chances are you won't like the tour (since it's the same production), but why not? I rarely say no to seeing a show if I have time for it.

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But it was so random the story line !

It's doesn't have a linear story. It is snapshots or case studies of various people at a certain, very pivotal and emotional point in American history. It's a rebellion, a celebration, and a wake for our country all rolled into one.

The thing about HAIR is that is relies HEAVILY on the exuberance, energy and the appeal of its cast to carry the thinly pieced narrative. It also kind of relies on the times it is playing in.

When the revival opened, it was a happening. It was opening at the time when an African American was our new president and gay rights issues and marriage equality were bubbling to the forefront as volatile and important issues needing to be addressed. There was an urgency to the revival and the cast's crossover into the political arena off stage.

The revival was a perfect storm of everything coming together perfectly-cast, culture, and political climate. By the time the replacements took over, the moment had passed. HAIR onstage is exactly what it is in real-time-a moment captured that cant be fabricated.

That is why I feel the tour and the coming re-mounting on Broadway will not capture that urgency.

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"Hair" was successful in its original run but was as hated by its many detractors as it was beloved by its fans. The score was not considered to be that good (no Tony nomination) and the show itself was not embraced by the "younger generation" as it was called back then. Middle class, middle-aged folks wanting to know what all the fuss was about helped make the show a hit but the young "hippies" were most definitely not spinning the OCR on their turntables.

As for the show, I did it in college and thought the score was pretty awful and the show itself not that good, but we had a lot of fun with it and the audience seemed to really like it (even without the infamous nudity). So obviously there's something there that gets through to people regardless of artistic merit, and I guess that's still true today.

All that being said: it's ok if you don't like it. There are plenty of shows that have been lauded that I can't stand: Rent and Curtains spring to mind.

Maybe it just doesn't work for you, and that's ok.

(The first time I saw Hair, which was about 15 years ago on a tour revival, I HATED it. I went reluctantly to the Park's production and fell in love with it.)

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There is definitely something to get. HAIR was literally a protest on stage on broadway every night during the Vietnam war. It's meant to be a protest and tell a psychedelic story about a young hippie who believes in love who is drafted to vietnam. It's the inner struggle of the youth of the time. In the end Claude decides to go to Vietnam instead of dodge, partly because of the humiliation it would bring to his family if he dodged, and partly because NOT going would mean condemning the next kid who was sent in his place. The kids (tribe) are literally high the entire time, and the story is interspersed between trips of drugs. The result is that it should feel like you are high, and taking part in the show. Psychedelic art became very popular during this time period (art that replicates the illusions of being high). Hair was the first play/opera to be told in the psychedelic style.

You definitely would understand it more if you knew what they were protesting about in the different songs (LBJ, Red blue and white)... I went to a production in Dallas several years ago that had projections behind the cast that showed headlines and video clips of what the songs were about. It was the most clear version of Hair I've ever seen, and had a much bigger impact I think than the current version.

Either way, it is good to read up a bit on hippie life and the vietnam war before you see hair.

To add to all of this, I read in an interview with one of the writers (not sure which one) that the show was meant to make you feel like you're on drugs. You're supposed to be slightly uncomfortable, perhaps paranoid, to feel like part of the tribe. Which is, oddly enough, my biggest complaint about the revival. I was never sure if we were part of the tribe as audience members or a third party simply watching them.

The revival was also very campy and served as a nostalgic, retrospective look at a scary time in history. It was definitely a caricature. In contrast, the original production was a political statement and had a colder feel; the characterization was also more reality based. Both productions are powerful, just in different ways.

Edit: Crap, MadonnaMusical beat me to it. They said it a lot better than I did, I might add.

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Updated On: 6/11/11 at 03:31 PM

I have always loved the score....but after seeing the revival on Broadway a month or two after it won the Tony Award I wonder if that score is most enjoyed by me as a cast recording. It could have been how much I praise I had heard about it, or my own excitement to finally see the piece on stage, but I was just so disappointed.
What I say now is just my own personal opinion and observation so take that for what it is...just my opinion. That production seemed so very amateurish to me in the way that the cast seemed to be performing for their own enjoyment as opposed to connecting with an audience via the material. Perhaps that was part of the charm that I just did not get, but it is one of the most disappointing experiences I have had on Broadway. I was seated at the back of the orchestra and so often when the cast was back there, the personal conversations between them were so distracting to the show on stage that I was annoyed.....like when people talk during movies. They were not speaking in character but more along the lines of what they were doing after, what they were going to do in the next entrance, and in one really loud exchange, what they thought of the newly announced replacement cast. I was embarrassed that I had brought my friend to see it and that THIS was his first impression of the 'professional working actor'. I felt like I was in a community theatre production.
That being said, the score IS a masterwork and perhaps someday I will get a chance to have my impression of the piece changed in another production.
Again...just my experience.

What I find sad about most productions of Hair is many directors think the music carries it and they can disregard most of the script. A good director really digs out the plot and lets the music add to that instead of the other way around. Kevin Moriarty's (of DTC) HAIR at the Hangar Theater a few years back was the best production I have ever seen.