[Mb-hair] HAIR-London TIMES review

Fri Sep 23 14:03:11 PDT 2005

michael you obviously have nothing to do with this
i am the one who trumpets the need for updating
but but
dramaturgical pt
i am not saying to change the tams witmark script
but in the places where improvising and topicality are indicated by the
authors
the same way in initials that lbj took the irt
became tricky dick took the irt

one just now fills in the contemporary reference
similarly the long bridge in aint got no etc

for the record corresponding / talking regularly with all the hair
originals; i can state unequivocally as the one who does the arguing on the
pro updating side; all of the original principals michael butler, jimmy
rado, galt macdermot and tom ohorgan have all been absolute classicists
where hair is concerned and all have been steadfast against new changes in
the script

all have been staunch traditionalists
so anyone who says any of them
were behind any such innovation is not telling the truth

i can vouch for that
welcome to show business

and michael your handling of the bdwy production
was sublime obviously
it launched the first one billion dollar world rights package
that is what a producer is supposed to do
achieve fiscal success
there just arent anymore qualifying factors

also you have the unique talent i felt in working with you
that you have great artistic talent as a producer
which is one of your unique qualities as a producer
( eg not all producers do )

as far as i know
jimmy was the one who relented and encouraged the kid at least sporadically
i take some responsibility for that
because i was at the time pouring docket after docket
to rado on a daily basis
in support of drastically updating the mis en scene
if not the script
so obviously my name will be mud
on this one
lol and not lol

i still say im right
in the 1980 production we did update
we did it well
it did work
and even rado went crazy for it
came 10x ( said it was the best production ever ( which it was not ;
obviously the bdwy 68 production was )  ; i have multiple witnesses )

( this refers to the performances in the home space harry streeps 399 seat
the brook on west 18th street off fifth 1980 - 1981 )

not to one terrible performance in the 3000 seat loeb student center

anyway the debate continues
which is good

but the question of the hour is

why is frankel taking so long to make the baby?

????????

R in the project pit

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Michael Butler" <michael at michaelbutler.com>
To: "HAIR List" <mb-hair at islandlists.com>
Sent: Friday, September 23, 2005 3:07 PM
Subject: Re: [Mb-hair] HAIR-London TIMES review

> You will recall that I was attacked by Rado due to my Blog 'Answers to
> Simon' where he took umbrage to my putting down the rumored changes in the
> Gate production.
> I had never heard of them and was critical of this director or any
director
> for deviating from the Tams approved version.
> How was I to know that he and Galt had approved these changes. In fact it
> turns that Rado had supposedly made many of them.
> So I responded putting the record straight.
> Never a reply nor acknowledgment from them.
> PS: Rado also was critical of my handling the Broadway production of HAIR
> and the Russian production. I did respond with my last Blog 'Questions
about
> HAIR'.
>
> >
> > Yikes, sounds awful.  Claude-with-Playstation.  Hmmm.
> > and Berger with what, an Ipod...?
> > Maybe Sheila, instead of leading the protest march,
> > sits down and cc's e-mail petitions across the globe
> > in a single stroke.
> >
> > I'm curious: Was these changes due to a re-write by
> > the author(s) or a directorial enhanceement?
> >
> > rj
> > --- Michael Butler <michael at michaelbutler.com> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> September 23, 2005
> >>
> >> Times2
> >>
> >> Hair
> >> Benedict Nightingale at Gate Theatre, W11
> >>
> >> THIS show < meaning the original Hair, not last
> >> night¹s ineptly updated
> >> version < was a big deal when it hit London 35 years
> >> ago.
> >>
> >> That was partly because its portrait of stoned
> >> hippies brandishing their
> >> unshorn locks at American society had made it a cult
> >> in New York, but mainly
> >> because we had just dispatched the censor to the
> >> knacker¹s and were at long
> >> last free to see its famous nude scene.
> >>
> >> Here, let me inject a personal memory. Halfway
> >> through Galt Macdermot¹s
> >> ³tribal musical² I whispered to a colleague, ³When
> >> is the nude scene
> >> coming?², and he replied, ³It¹s just happened². So
> >> for me Hair will for ever
> >> mark the time when I realised I needed specs.
> >>
> >> At the tiny Gate there¹s no danger of missing what
> >> is, in 2005, a pretty
> >> standard display of bobbing genitalia. Indeed, one
> >> would only have to reach
> >> out a hand in anger to end several men¹s hopes of
> >> fatherhood. What¹s odd,
> >> though, is that the second such display is meant to
> >> evoke the human pyramids
> >> at Abu Ghraib. A musical that was once a protest
> >> against Vietnam has moved
> >> to the Iraq era, complete with a poorly caricatured
> >> Bush and a spoof
> >> sergeant who tells the anti-hero to ³get your ass
> >> out there and fight those
> >> sand-niggers².
> >>
> >> It doesn¹t work, least of all in the handling of
> >> that anti-hero, Charles
> >> Aitken¹s spindly Claude. This time he isn¹t the
> >> hapless victim of a policy
> >> that was forcing young men into the killing fields.
> >> Rather, he volunteers
> >> for the army, one moment sneering over his
> >> PlayStation at parents who want
> >> him to get a job, the next bewildering his fellow
> >> dropouts by telling them
> >> that he¹s about to defend democracy.
> >>
> >> I was bewildered too, despite a new ending and a
> >> dream sequence in which
> >> Claude twigs what he¹s doing. The hippies in general
> >> have become more
> >> aggressive and confident, which is fine when
> >> energetic dancing or singing is
> >> needed, but stops us seeing them as the baffled,
> >> vulnerable youngsters they
> >> were meant to be. A musical about a lost generation
> >> has become one about
> >> brash layabouts exercising their inalienable right
> >> to smoke dope, sing songs
> >> about love and refuse to grow up.
> >>
> >> Starting with that hummable ode to Aquarius, some of
> >> those songs still have
> >> zing. But evoking a zombie Establishment by dressing
> >> actors in judicial
> >> robes, plus plastic headdresses that can¹t decide if
> >> they¹re hair-curlers or
> >> coal buckets, is just one of several errors.
> >> Moreover, the hippies¹ flowing
> >> locks, like their clothes, have succumbed to spare
> >> modernity. This is a Hair
> >> without hair, which is no Hair at all.
> >>
> >> Box-office: 020-7229 0706
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>     Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd.
> >> This service is provided on Times Newspapers'
> >> standard Terms and Conditions
> >> . Please read our Privacy Policy . To inquire about
> >> a licence to reproduce
> >> material from The Times, visit the Syndication
> >> website .
> >>
> >>
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> >>
> >
> >
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