Hair | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

A new milestone in Broadway history was set in 1968 when Hair, the first rock musical, opened to mass popularity. Tackling controversial and explosive issues of the era in a theatrically innovative fashion, the brash and exciting musical sustained a five year run at New York's Biltmore Theater. The show eventually spawned a total of fourteen national companies and produced eleven cast albums in different languages worldwide. A concept musical reflecting the anti-establishment energy of 1960s American "hippie" youth culture, Hair was seen by over four million people in its first two years of production, and the show ultimately grossed over $22,000,000 in revenue. The revolutionary musical generated several hit radio singles and brought to public attention a number of talented performers. The enormous success of Hair paved the way for a series of ambitious rock musicals, including Jesus Christ Superstar in the 1970s and Rent in the mid-1990s.

The project that eventually came to be known as Hair evolved in 1965 from the creative minds of Broadway performers Gerome Ragni and James Rado. Although they had never formally written a musical project before, the two co-authors were fascinated by the as yet untapped theatrical potential of 1960s youth culture and began to do field research in New York City. Ragni and Rado interviewed and documented the lifestyles of hippies who had rejected dominant social mores and values, choosing instead to fight for abstract principles like freedom, justice, and liberty. Celebrating the newly arriving "Age of Aquarius," these youth held decided opposition to American military involvement in Vietnam, carried a fondness for marijuana and other experimental drugs, cherished a newfound sense of sexual freedom, and positioned themselves firmly against environmental destruction, racial segregation, and religious dogma.

Ragni and Rado were also enticed by the opportunity to breathe new life into the musical theater scene. Daring musicals like Cabaret, West Side Story, and Fiddler on the Roof had already begun to experiment with form, relying less on text and placing more emphasis on music and dance. In 1968, Hair would come to alter the formal possibilities for musicals by explicitly drawing on both experimental theatrical techniques, including those pioneered by visionaries such as Antonin Artuad and Jerzy Grotowski, and on the energy of the avant-garde downtown New York theater scene. In contrast to Oklahoma, which had revolutionized Broadway theaters in the 1940s, Hair was less concerned with character and plot, and instead focused on thematic content and the depiction of lifestyle.

After completing the bulk of their field research, Ragni and Rado decided to collaborate with Canadian composer Galt McDermot, who wrote the amiable and infectious rock tunes that would bring Hair to public endearment. The nearly incoherent plot centered on Claude, a young man who had been drafted to service in Vietnam; his friend Berger who had "dropped out" from society; and their friend Sheila, an anti-war student at New York University. Joseph Papp of the NewYork Shakespeare Festival took an interest in the experimental script and decided to produce it at his Public Theater in downtown New York. Papp's off-Broadway run of Hair: An American Tribal Love Rock Musical at the Public Theater was only a modest success, however. Ragni and Rado came into frequent conflict with director Gerald Freedman, who chose to concentrate on the book of the musical and to polish its look rather than attempt to convey the "authenticity" of the youth counterculture on to the stage.

Upon the completion of the run of Hair at the Public Theater, Michael Butler, a young wealthy political with a pressing concern for the welfare of Native Americans, took an interest in producing the experimental musical. Butler financially backed the show at the Cheetah, a popular dance hall discotheque in Manhattan. The unsuccessful run proved that the show needed to be overhauled before being brought to Broadway. Tom O'Horgan, a director who had honed an impressive amount of experience in his work at the avant-garde New York theater LaMama, was hired to revamp the show; while Robin Wagner, Jules Fisher, and Nancy Potts were respectively hired to redesign the scenic design, lighting design, and costume design. O'Horgan virtually wiped the show clean of its narrative and concentrated more intently on the concept. Thirteen songs were added to enhance the show's pro-love, pro-sex, pro-drugs, and racial harmony message.

In its new form, the show fearlessly broke certain taboos of the theater. Headed by the two authors in the leading roles, the young and talented cast demolished the "fourth wall" of the theater by entering through the audience to arrive on stage. The cast often switched roles interchangeably. For the first time on the mainstream stage, audiences witnessed drug use, explicit language, an openly gay character, and drag queens. During the infamous "Be-In" scene, the cast stripped nude under blinking strobe lights to the shock and surprise of the spectators. The show's popularity was enormous; and in April of 1968, the members of the original cast performed a free, jam-packed show in Central Park.

For all its experimental bravery, Hair was met with derision by distinguished theatrical critics and lost the Best Musical Tony Award to a more traditional musical, 1776. Nonetheless, the musical brought to attention a series of gifted performers like Ben Vereen, DianeKeaton, Melba Moore, and Nell Carter, each of whom went on to greater success in areas of film, television, and music. The musical also spawned a series of spin-off albums like Disinhairted that consisted largely of outtake material that had been excised on the show's path to Broadway. As performed by groups like the Fifth Dimension and the Cowsills, infectious songs like "Let the Sunshine In," "Good Morning Sunshine," and "Aquarius" soon topped the American pop charts.

After generating an impressive number of road shows, Hair closed on Broadway in 1972. The show was revived in 1977, but by then, the material no longer seemed as topical and original as it had in 1968. In 1978, the musical became reworked as a critically acclaimed film directed by Milos Forman, and in 1988 some of the original cast members rejoined at the United Nations to celebrate the musical's twentieth anniversary reunion concert. A European tour of the musical continued to prove successful into the 1990s; and in 1998, an off-Broadway revival of Hair briefly played to commendable reviews. Yet, as evidenced by the success of the rock musical Rent in 1995, the impact of Hair has been long lasting. A document of a profoundly turbulent and explosive era in American history, Hair forever changed not only the look and the sound of the Broadway musical, but also its very possibilities.

Davis, Lorrie, and Rachel Gallagher. Letting Down My Hair. New York, Arthur Fields, 1973.

Horn, Barbara Lee. The Age of Hair: Evolution and Impact of Broadway's First Rock Musical. New York, Greenwood Press, 1991.

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