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...guiding spirit behind the production, likes to hammer home the parallels between the Vietnam protests of Hair's era and the current disillusion with America's adventure in Iraq. "A lot has changed since 1968," said Eustis onstage to welcome the audience before the first performance in Central Park. "They don't let us take pictures of the dead boys anymore." Says Eustis: "Now we have kind of a double perspective, because we realize in how many ways those dreams did not come to fruition in 1967 and 1968. To me, it's more tragic and beautiful than the original...
This summer, though, Hair may have its stars in alignment at last. A definitive version of the groundbreaking show has just started a monthlong run in New York City's outdoor Delacorte Theater in Central Park. Expanded from a concert version that ran for a weekend last September, the revival is being produced by the city's Public Theater, Joseph Papp's downtown theater lab that first opened its doors in 1967 with Hair. It is returning on the 40th anniversary of the show's Broadway debut. All the tickets, fittingly, are free. Most folks queue up on the Internet...
...certainly looks right at home in Central Park. The stage is grass, and the actors emerge from the wings or over a back fence and are able to climb in and out of the audience with a single bound. A couple of new songs have been added (unused material from earlier versions of the show, says Rado), some lyrics have been updated, and the book has been streamlined and pared down. For audiences crowding into the early previews, it's clear that Hair has not just been revived; it has been reinvigorated and reclaimed as one of the great milestones...
While working on the show, Rado and Ragni had seen a couple of men strip naked in Central Park as an expression of freedom, and that gave them the idea to have all the actors shed their clothes at the end of the first act. The nude scene was Hair's most notorious thumb in the eye of bourgeois inhibitions, though not all the actors were quite ready for the statement. Some were willing to disrobe, and some weren't; as an incentive, the producers offered a $1.50 bonus per show to any cast member who bared...
...snack shop north of the Forbidden City, hung on till the very end, wrapping their structure in flags and photos of Chinese leaders in hopes it might stop the wrecking ball. It didn't. Less than 48 hours after the store was demolished to make way for a park, the spot where it stood was a flower...