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music by Galt MacDermot, book and lyrics by Gerome Ragni and James Rado, directed by Diane Paulus

Mirvish Productions, Royal Alexandra Theatre, Toronto

December 14-31, 2011

“Mystic Crystal Revelation”

If you’re too young to have seen Hair when it played at the Royal Alex back in 1970 or if you just want to celebrate the dawning of age of Aquarius in all its robust vitality, then hurry down to the Royal Alex where the love-in is happening all over again.  The touring production of the 2009 Broadway revival reveals that this convention-shattering musical is no mere artifact of the 1960s but a celebration of youthful idealism that transcends its time period.

One might think that a musical about hippies and Vietnam War protests is too much an artifact of its own time.  One might think that all the deliberate taboo-breaking--a mixed race cast, drug use, simulated sex of all kinds, nudity, coarse language--has now all been done so often that it would have no effect in 2011.  The genius of Diane Paulus’ direction is that she has found a way to make it new in both form and content. 

To revitalize Hair in terms of form, she stages the performance of the musical as a performance and inescapably emphasizes that the performance is happening now.  First of all, Paulus moves the band from the pit to the stage so that they are always visible.  Next after the opening song “Aquarius” establishes the time, place and mood, she immediately tears down the fourth wall by have first Berger and then the rest of the Tribe repeatedly rush into the auditorium and interact with the audience.  If you’re sitting in the front or on the aisles expect a lot of hair mussing and perhaps a lap-dance or two.

Paulus make Berger not just the most charismatic of the Tribe of hippies but really their embodiment.  As Steel Burkhardt plays him he’s the most outrageous and transgressive.  By “Donna”, the second song in the show, he’s already stripped down to a fringed leather thong and flirted with both women and men in the audience.  Burkhardt risks making him camp and quite often his pansexual Berger is just fishnet stockings and a corset away from becoming Dr. Frank N. Furter.  Nevertheless, he embodies the Tribe’s boundless energy, their rejection of convention and their looniness, since the creators of Hair do include satire in their portrayal of youth culture.

To renew Hair in terms of content, Paulus’ looks closely at the underlying story and find complexities there that others have missed.  One of the main difficulties of Hair is that the story is very slender and can easily get lost in the creators’ onslaught of very short songs, most lasting less than three minutes, none of which actually move the action the forward.  The show can easily seem more like a ‘60s revue than an actual book musical.  Yet, there is a story and Paulus’ greatest service to the musical is to tell it so clearly. 

The show’s central character is Claude (Paris Remillard), a guy who is not happy with who he is and fakes a Manchester accent (as in his song “Manchester, England”) to give himself some caché.  His vague goals in life are to become invisible and to work miracles, but the real option that presents itself is to join the army.  The question that Act 1 turns on is “Will he burn his draft card along with the other members of the Tribe?”  The question of Act 2 is “What will happen after he joins the army?”  While burning a draft card links the story to the 1960s, Paulus emphasizes the more universal aspect of his decision, “Will he accept or reject the Tribe?”  Claude doesn’t want the tedium of life as a dentist or lawyer, but he also doesn’t want to end up as a bum, he says addressing the remark directly to Berger.

The pregnant Jeanie (Aleque Reid) loves Claude, Claude loves the activist Sheila (Sara King), Sheila loves Berger and Berger loves both Claude and Sheila.  By portraying Claude’s decision as accepting or rejecting his peers, Paulus uncovers a new dynamic in the musical that most people have never perceived.  While the musical seems to be a celebration of the free lifestyle of the Tribe, the show’s central character is the one who chooses to reject that lifestyle.  Presenting the performance as a performance thus reflects the ironic perspective on the action that Paulus finds within the action itself.  The result is a more coherent and moving production than one might have thought possible.  According to one friend, the present production is even more coherent and clearly presented than the 1970 version.

Paulus’ clarity of vision extends to the long dream sequence of Act 2 which is really a portrayal of the bad trip Claude is having from smoking an adulterated joint Berger gives him.  Rather than allowing the dream to become a confused kaleidoscope of images, Paulus gives it a definite beginning, middle and end as Claude imagines leaving his friends, his first deployment in Vietnam and his death.  Never have I seen this section make so much sense before or be so disturbing.

Claude’s song “What a Piece of Work is Man”, its lyrics taken from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, now does not seem like an attempt to show Shakespeare as a rebel but rather draws an apt parallel between Claude and the tragic hero.  Both vacillate concerning how to act in a world where they feel they don’t belong and both accept rather than fight a fate that they know will likely result in death. 

Remillard brings out all the doubt and sensitivity of Claude and even in an upbeat song like “I Got Life” suggests an underlying unhappiness.  Sara King has the strongest voice and clearest diction of the cast and gives lovely performances of her two main songs “Easy To Be Hard” and “Good Morning Starshine”.  Other standouts include Kaitlin Kiyan as Crissy, who captures just the right sense of whimsy in her one song “Frank Mills”.  Will Blum and Liz Baltes play Claude’s worried parents.  The roles are written as caricatures but both actors play them with as much sincerity as possible.  They really cannot be made to seem fools since Claude does, after all, follow their wishes.  Blum also is hilarious as (spoiler alert!) Margaret Mead and sings her song “My Conviction” so convincingly I really didn’t know she was a he.  Baltes fooled me in a similar way when she played John Wilkes Booth.  As proof that the Hair creators satirize as well as celebrate their subjects, you need look no further than the completely blissed-out Woof, well played by Ryan Link, who says he’s not gay but still loves Mick Jagger.

A major asset to Paulus’ conception of the musical is Karole Armitage’s choreography.  She accomplishes the difficult task of making all the performers’ movements look completely spontaneous and improvised. 

By the end Paulus has found a way to make the story resonate in a new way both within the musical and with the audience.  The final song “Let The Sun Shine In” is often sung by the Tribe in reaction to Claude’s death as an angry challenge to the audience to stop wars like Vietnam that have taken his life.  Costume designer Michael McDonald shows the deceased Claude in a military tunic sporting numerous decorations as if in the army Claude actually had found his vocation.  Paulus stages the final song as if the Tribe is praying for enlightenment for themselves about the meaning of Claude’s death. 

At the same time it is clear that this is a musical about ideals and the wish to acknowledge rather than prohibit any human activity that does not cause harm to others.  Much of what the Tribe of 1967 wants has already happened, but the question the musical now poses is “Where has this kind of fervent idealism gone?”  Apolitical youth happily caught up in consumer culture don’t seem to have it.  Political parties have lost it.  Is the ramshackle “Occupy” movement the closest we will get?  The Tribe literally and metaphorically asks us to join them.  In the theatre people leap out of their seats to dance on stage with the cast.  Let’s hope that people can somehow find a way once they leave the theatre to cast off the habit of easy cynicism that inhibits compassionate action.                 

                                       

©Christopher Hoile

Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.

Photo: Paris Remillard and Steel Burkhardt (centre) with the cast of Hair. ©2010 Joan Marcus.

For tickets, visit www.mirvish.com.