Directing HAIR: My struggle with “White Boys”
Hey Tribe…
As stated in my last post, I’m directing Hair once again… and I’m promising to keep everyone updated!
With each production, of course, comes a production staff… people who I have to collaborate with and make some sacrificies. We have been going through creative meetings and everything has been working out pretty well… except for one thing. There’s a big disagreement over “White Boys”. I know, it’s pretty silly.
What it comes down to is this: I am the ONLY one in the production staff that would like to do what I’ve directed in the past, and what is traditional… the “Supremes” sharing the dress. Everyone else “hates” it.
No matter what the argument I give in favor of it, they just don’t like it. I don’t like the idea of separating them into three dresses; it just looks pointless and “over-produced”. To me, the music is arranged for the “Supremes” sound, and with the key change and pick-up of the music, it is built around the 3 separating to show that they are only wearing one dress.
They dislike it, yet they barely have another option… and because I’m 100% with the traditional staging, I can’t think of another idea either. I don’t mind something new and original, as long as it is smart and has a point.
Does anyone have any ideas? Ever see a production that used a creative alternative? Ever want to see it done a certain way yourself? Would love to brainstorm with all of you on this.
Thanks!
Anthony
This entry was posted on Monday, June 5th, 2006 at 8:57 PM and filed under Uncategorized. Follow comments here with the RSS 2.0 feed. Skip to the end and leave a response. Trackbacks are closed.
I think it should be kept. I agree that it would look overproduced if they wore 3 seperate dresses. So I say keep it!
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 6:40 am | PermalinkWow..Holy @#$% – how wrong can some people be – the single dress is one of the highlights of the show..part of the playful wink wink character of Hair, not a minor element to be debated imho .. insist on keeping it in
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 9:03 am | PermalinkThis is a major scene in the show. The dress when properly used creates a great audience response.
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 9:56 am | PermalinkTo not have the number nor the dress would not be true to HAIR.
Michael
Where and when is your production?
I agree with all 3 of the Mike’s! Why hire a fairly traditional “HAIR” director and not let me do the right things?
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The last production I directed, it was a true highlight of the show, with a big audience reaction. For some reason, the staff disagrees (although, I should know… as a director, you should be watching the audience as well as the show). It’s really odd. They feel like having the girls barely move for most of it because they’re sharing a dress, and having the rest of the cast go wild and create energy isn’t right. I told them how much I disagree with them, and how well it works to the eye and to the people performing it.
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*We WON’T be cutting the number, they just don’t want to do The Supremes/dress. I’ve seen TOO many productions where they are not educated enough with this show and don’t do it right… or they don’t have the talent to do it, which we will. I feel like we’ll be falling into that category automatically and it will make me look silly… even just for 3 minutes.
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I know it’s something that is going to bother me big time, even though we’re pretty much in agreement with everything else.
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The production is September 9-17 at the 1400 seat Count Basie Theatre in Red Bank, NJ. Very prominent, fairly big budget, great area.
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 10:11 am | PermalinkFirst, I have to say I concur 100% with the 3 Mike’s- the shared dress is one of the funniest bits in the show (I saw Original B’Way more than 40 times, and it always got a laugh and worked). There’s something dragqueenesque about the Supremes bit to begin with, and when the ‘surprise’ comes, it just compounds it. Where’s the sock in the eye if they’re in 3 separate dresses? Second, if the production staff is so insistently against the dress, what wonderful new idea are they offering in place of this? It really can’t be overstated what a powerful visual joke the original idea made. Would be a shame to just wipe it out. Stay strong!
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 12:51 pm | PermalinkThanks so much Doris!
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I agree with you, too. Really, nothing beats this staging, and it’s been a treat in the past to be the director working with the 3 girls who have clearly never been in that situation before (last time, our Dionne had done a production before and was the only black girl, so this was new for her, too!).
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They don’t have any new ideas. They keep saying how “dated” it is, and how many people barely know who the “Supremes” are. I completely disagreed and said it’s a cop-out. OH, and if this scene is dated, what show did they think they were doing? Cooome oooon noooow!
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 1:21 pm | PermalinkI think that it would really overproduced if they were dancing around in the number…..
Also, if they are saying its “dated and old” why are they doing the show in the first place? There will be people who don’t really know about the show and go to see it for the first time, so they will barely know what HAiR is and the Sumpremes will not be any different to them
Michael
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 1:26 pm | PermalinkOh… and I saw a production of HAiR in Reykjavik [Iceland] while on a trip in the late nineties. They didn’t do the single dress and overall I don’t think they did a very good job with the show in the first place. It was weird without the dress, and VERY “Shmaltzy” New Broadwayish, which isn’t good for HAiR
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 1:29 pm | PermalinkMichael!
I said the same thing… that HAIR honestly isn’t something that is produced enough OR staged correctly that people seeing it for the first time should be seeing the Supremes.
Posted on 06-Jun-06 at 1:45 pm | PermalinkI’ve directed HAIR 3 times and never used the single dress for the Supreme’s. But my problem was an extremely minimal budget all 3 times!! I LOVE the single dress and will definitely incorporate it the next time I direct HAIR. And I’m with you 100% on trying to do as much of the original staging as possible.
PEACE,
Posted on 08-Jun-06 at 5:24 pm | PermalinkLeo
The Dress is one of the funnier sight-gags in all musical comedy and they are missing the boat entirely with their nutso attitude.For instance-the recent Canadian version:they went overboard by starting off in what looked like the B’way Dress but they unwound to reveal a dress with long panels at each side that were 15-20 feet long.They knew what the gag was and decided to”improve”on it and failed miserably,proving the not broke don’t fix theory,wins again.Michael
Posted on 11-Jun-06 at 5:40 pm | Permalinkthe original staging in the dress works michael but so do other things; eg the important pt now is that the girls evoke a black girl group;
Posted on 11-Jun-06 at 7:39 pm | Permalinkthis can also be accomplished by having them evoke a current r and b or hip hop girl group;
remember the image of the supremes is not as immediate now to the apperception as it once was.
Where are you directing it?
part of the reason that the major companies if not the second class companies of HAIR seem to be dieing is i believe this HAIR in aspic thing where all of a sudden HAIR has been turned into a religion or a bible; you have to play with the direction a little bit to make it relevant for today i feel; and i think tom would be the first one to second that; the idea of HAIR as a museum piece makes my skin crawl; i think because the freshness of HAIR is one of its biggest attributes; which is why i think these productions that treat it as a museum piece dont work
Posted on 11-Jun-06 at 7:42 pm | PermalinkLeo & Michael Arian –
I completely agree. Thanks for the responses. I gotta show these to my staff! Haha.
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writerdirector – I should have posted this, and I will again! I definitely don’t treat it as a “museum piece”… I keep the energy and tone VERY fresh, the tempos MUCH more upbeat, and the whole vibe is high high energy. Though I agree about seeing the Supremes isn’t so “immediate”… I wouldn’t stick a current group into a 60’s show, you know? That wouldn’t make much sense to me and would bug the hell out of me if I was in the audience.
Posted on 11-Jun-06 at 10:40 pm | PermalinkThe 2001 Vienna production was very interesting- the arrangements were quite different and were more current rock/pop. i think that they shouldn’t have changed it so much
Posted on 12-Jun-06 at 5:58 am | Permalinkbut it was a sell out. You should get the Vienna album and listen to it.
none of the singers sound modern broadway so thats good. I’d say its the best revival in the 1990’s/2000’s. It doesn’t have a splashy broadway sound. thats how HAiR is supposed to be. It could give you some ideas. I think they used the single dress
?
imho writerdirector should id him/herself
Posted on 12-Jun-06 at 12:59 pm | PermalinkI would wager that writerdirector is Richard Haase.
Posted on 12-Jun-06 at 4:33 pm | PermalinkIt’s Richard, alright.
Posted on 04-Jul-06 at 9:57 am | Permalink