Hair (musical)

Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical is a rock musical with a book and lyrics by Gerome Ragni and James Rado and music by Galt MacDermot. The work reflects the creators' observations of the hippie counterculture and sexual revolution of the late 1960s, and several of its songs became anthems of the anti-Vietnam War movement. The musical's profanity, its depiction of the use of illegal drugs, its treatment of sexuality, its irreverence for the American flag, and its nude scene caused controversy.

Hair tells the story of the "tribe", a group of politically active, long-haired hippies of the "Age of Aquarius" living a bohemian life in New York City and fighting against conscription into the Vietnam War. Claude, his friend Berger, their roommate Sheila and their friends struggle to balance their young lives, loves and the sexual revolution with their rebellion against the war and their conservative parents and society. Ultimately, Claude must decide whether to resist the draft, as his friends have done, or serve in Vietnam, compromising his pacifist principles and risking his life.

After an off-Broadway debut on October 17, 1967, at Joseph Papp's Public Theater, and a run at the Cheetah nightclub from December 1967 through January 1968, the show opened on Broadway in April 1968 and ran for 1,750 performances. Simultaneous productions in cities across the United States and Europe followed shortly thereafter, including a London production that ran for 1,997 performances. Since then, productions have been staged around the world, spawning dozens of recordings, including the 3 million-selling original Broadway cast recording. Some of the songs became Top 10 hits, and a feature film adaptation was released in 1979. A Broadway revival opened in 2009, earning strong reviews and winning the Tony Award and Drama Desk Award for Best Revival of a Musical. In 2008, Richard Zoglin wrote in Time that "Today Hair seems, if anything, more daring than ever."

History

Actors James Rado and Gerome Ragni began writing Hair together in late 1964. The main characters were autobiographical, with Rado's Claude a pensive romantic and Ragni's Berger an extrovert. Their close relationship, including its volatility, was reflected in the musical. Rado said, "We were great friends. It was a passionate kind of relationship that we directed into creativity, into writing, into creating this piece. We put the drama between us on stage."

Rado described the inspiration for Hair as "a combination of some characters we met in the streets, people we knew and our own imaginations. We knew this group of kids in the East Village who were dropping out and dodging the draft, and there were also lots of articles in the press about how kids were being kicked out of school for growing their hair long". Many cast members (Shelley Plimpton in particular) were recruited off the street. According to Rado's obituary in The New York Times, the title was inspired by "a painting of a tuft of hair by the Pop artist Jim Dine. Its title was Hair." including non-traditional theater roles, blurring the lines between playwright, director and actor. By 1967, theaters such as The Living Theatre, La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club and The Open Theatre were devising plays from improvisational scenes crafted in the rehearsal space rather than following a traditional script. Ragni introduced Rado to the modern theatre styles and methods being developed at The Open Theater. In 1966, while the two were developing Hair, Ragni performed in The Open Theater's production of Megan Terry's play Viet Rock, about young men being deployed to the Vietnam War. Viet Rock employed the improvisational exercises being used in experimental theatre. Scenes were connected in "prelogical ways": a scene could be built from a tangent from the previous scene, in counterpoint to it, or connected psychologically. MacDermot had already won two Grammy Awards for Best Instrumental Composition and Best Original Jazz Composition in 1961 for his "African Waltz" (recorded by Cannonball Adderley). The composer's lifestyle was in marked contrast to his co-creators: "I had short hair, a wife, and, at that point, four children, and I lived on Staten Island." MacDermot wrote the first score in three weeks, The director, Gerald Freedman, the theater's associate artistic director, decided that Rado, at 35, was too old to play Claude, although he agreed to cast the 32-year-old Ragni as Berger.</blockquote>

Hair premiered off-Broadway at the Public on October 17, 1967, and ran for six weeks. The lead roles were played by Walker Daniels as Claude, Ragni as Berger, Jill O'Hara as Sheila, Steve Dean as Woof, Arnold Wilkerson as Hud, Sally Eaton as Jeanie and Shelley Plimpton as Crissy. Set design was by Ming Cho Lee, costume design by Theoni Aldredge, and, although Anna Sokolow began rehearsals as choreographer, Freedman received choreographer credit. The production had a "tepid critical reception" but was popular with audiences.

Chicago businessman Michael Butler was planning to run for the U.S. Senate on an antiwar platform. After seeing an ad for Hair in The New York Times that led him to believe the show was about Native Americans, he watched the Public's production several times and ran for 45 performances.

Revision for Broadway

Hair underwent a thorough overhaul between its closing at the Cheetah in January 1968 and its Broadway opening three months later. The off-Broadway book, already light on plot, was loosened even further were added, including "Let the Sun Shine In", to make the ending more uplifting. Newsweek called O'Horgan's directing style "sensual, savage, and thoroughly musical ... [he] disintegrates verbal structure and often breaks up and distributes narrative and even character among different actors. ... He enjoys sensory bombardment." O'Horgan and the writers rearranged scenes to increase the experimental aspects. O'Horgan and new choreographer Julie Arenal encouraged freedom and spontaneity in their actors, introducing "an organic, expansive style of staging" that had never been seen before on Broadway. The stage design was completely open, with no curtain and the fly area and grid exposed to the audience. The proscenium arch was outlined with climb-ready scaffolding. The spare set was painted in shades of grey, with street graffiti stenciled on the stage. The stage was raked, and a tower of abstract scaffolding upstage at the rear merged a Native American totem pole and a modern sculpture of a crucifix-shaped tree. This scaffolding was decorated with found objects that the cast gathered from New York's streets, including a life-size papier-mâché bus driver, a head of Jesus and a neon marquee of the Waverly movie theater in Greenwich Village. The costumes were based on hippie street clothes, made more theatrical with enhanced color and texture. Some of these included mixed parts of military uniforms, bell-bottom jeans with Ukrainian embroidery, tie dyed T-shirts and a red, white and blue fringed coat.

! West End Revival

!1967

! colspan="3" |1968

!1977

!2009

!2010

| style="text-align:center;"| Claude Hooper Bukowski

| style="text-align:center;"| Walker Daniels

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;"| James Rado

| style="text-align:center;"| Paul Nicholas

| style="text-align:center;"| Randall Easterbrook

| colspan=2 style="text-align:center;"| Gavin Creel

| style="text-align:center;"| George Berger

| colspan="3" style="text-align:center;"| Gerome Ragni

| style="text-align:center;"| Oliver Tobias

| style="text-align:center;"| Michael Hoit

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;"| Will Swenson

| style="text-align:center;"| Sheila Franklin

| style="text-align:center;"| Jill O'Hara

| style="text-align:center;"| Lynn Kellogg

| style="text-align:center;"| Jennifer Warnes

| style="text-align:center;"| Annabel Leventon

| style="text-align:center;"| Ellen Foley

| colspan=2 style="text-align:center;"| Caissie Levy

| style="text-align:center;"| Jeanie

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Sally Eaton

| style="text-align:center;"| Teda Bracci

| style="text-align:center;"| Linda Kendrick

| style="text-align:center;"| Iris Rosenkrantz

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Kacie Sheik

| style="text-align:center;"| Neil "Woof" Donovan

| style="text-align:center;"| Steve Dean

| style="text-align:center;"| Steve Curry

| style="text-align:center;"| Jobriath Salisbury

| style="text-align:center;"| Vince Edwards

| style="text-align:center;"| Scott Thornton

| colspan="1" style="text-align:center;"| Bryce Ryness

| align=center | Luther Creek

| style="text-align:center;"| Hud

| style="text-align:center;"| Arnold Wilkerson

| style="text-align:center;"| Lamont Washington

| style="text-align:center;"| Ben Vereen

| style="text-align:center;"| Peter Straker

| style="text-align:center;"| Cleavant Derricks

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Darius Nichols

| style="text-align:center;"| Chrissy

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Shelley Plimpton

| style="text-align:center;"| Kay Cole

| style="text-align:center;"| Sonja Kristina

| style="text-align:center;"| Kristin Vigard

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Allison Case

| style="text-align:center;"| Dionne

| style="text-align:center;"| Jonelle Allen

| style="text-align:center;"| Melba Moore

| style="text-align:center;"| Gina Hardin

| style="text-align:center;"| Helen Downing

| rowspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Alaina Reed

| colspan=2 rowspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Sasha Allen

| style="text-align:center;"| "Aquarius" Soloist

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" | Ronnie Dyson

| style="text-align:center;"| Delores Hall

| style="text-align:center;"| Vince Edwards

Early productions

Broadway

Hair opened on Broadway at the Biltmore Theatre on April 29, 1968. The production was directed by O'Horgan and choreographed by Arenal, with designs by Robin Wagner (set), Nancy Potts (costumes), and Jules Fisher (lighting). The original Broadway cast included Rado and Ragni as Claude and Berger, Lynn Kellogg as Sheila, Lamont Washington as Hud, Eaton, Plimpton and Dyson reprising their off-Broadway roles as Jeanie, Crissy and the "Aquarius" soloist, Melba Moore as Dionne, Steve Curry as Woof, and Paul Jabara and Diane Keaton in the ensemble (both Moore and Keaton later played Sheila). Other replacements during the original Broadway run were Ben Vereen, Keith Carradine, Barry McGuire, Ted Lange, Meat Loaf, La La Brooks, Mary Seymour (of Musique), Joe Butler, Peppy Castro (of the Blues Magoos), Robin McNamara, Eddie Rambeau, Vicki Sue Robinson, Beverly Bremers, Bert Sommer, Dale Soules and Kim Milford.

The Hair team soon became embroiled in a lawsuit with the organizers of the Tony Awards. After assuring producer Michael Butler that commencing previews by April 3, 1968, would assure eligibility for the 1968 Tonys, the New York Theatre League ruled Hair ineligible, moving the cutoff date to March 19. The producers sued but were unable to force the League to reconsider. At the 1969 Tonys, Hair was nominated for Best Musical and Best Director but lost to 1776 in both categories. The production ran for four years and 1,750 performances, closing on July 1, 1972. Performers in these included Joe Mantegna, André DeShields, Charlotte Crossley and Alaina Reed (Chicago), David Lasley, David Patrick Kelly, Meat Loaf, and Shaun Murphy (Detroit), Kenny Ortega and Arnold McCuller (tour), Bob Bingham (Seattle) and Philip Michael Thomas (San Francisco). The creative team from Broadway worked on Hair in Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco, as the Broadway staging served as a rough template for these and other early regional productions. In Los Angeles, Tom Smothers was co-producer. Regional casts consisted mostly of local actors, although a few Broadway cast members reprised their roles. O'Horgan or the authors sometimes took new ideas and improvisations from a regional show and brought them back to New York, such as when live chickens were tossed onto the stage in Los Angeles.

West End

Hair opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London on September 27, 1968, led by the same creative team as the Broadway production. The opening night was delayed until the abolition of theatre censorship in England under the Theatres Act 1968 so that the show could include nudity and profanity. As with other early productions, the London show added local allusions and other minor departures from the Broadway version.

The original London tribe included Sonja Kristina, Peter Straker, Paul Nicholas, Melba Moore, Annabel Leventon, Elaine Paige, Paul Korda, Marsha Hunt, Floella Benjamin, Alex Harvey, Oliver Tobias, Richard O'Brien and Tim Curry. This was Curry's first full-time theatrical acting role, where he met future Rocky Horror Show collaborator O'Brien. Hairs engagement in London surpassed the Broadway production, running for 1,997 performances

Early international productions

Bertrand Castelli, Butler's partner and executive producer of the Broadway show, led the foreign-language productions. Castelli was a writer/producer known in Paris art circles. Butler called him a "crazy showman ... the guy with the business suit and beads". Castelli decided to do the show in the local language of each country at a time when Broadway shows were always done in English. produced and directed by Pierre Fränckel and choreographed by Arenal. It ran for 134 performances until March 1969.

A German production, directed by Castelli, the tribe included Donna Summer, Liz Mitchell and Donna Wyant. A Paris production opened on June 1, 1969. The original Australian production debuted in Sydney on June 6, 1969, produced by Harry M. Miller and directed by Jim Sharman, who also designed the production. The tribe included Keith Glass and then Reg Livermore as Berger, John Waters as Claude and Sharon Redd as The Magician. Redd was one of six African-Americans brought to Australia to provide a racially integrated tribe. The production broke local box-office records and ran for two years, but because of some of the language in the show, the cast album was banned in Queensland and New Zealand. The production transferred to Melbourne in 1971 and then had a national tour. It marked the theatrical debut of Marcia Hines.

A production in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, in 1969, was the first Hair produced in a communist country. The show, translated into Serbian, was directed by Mira Trailović at the Atelje 212 theatre. It featured Dragan Nikolić, Branko Milićević, Seka Sablić and Dušan Prelević. Over four years, the production played 250 performances and was attended by president Tito.

Themes

Hair explores many themes of the hippie movement of the 1960s. Theatre critic Scott Miller wrote:

<blockquote>[Youth protests in the 1960s concerned] racism, environmental destruction, poverty, sexism and sexual repression, violence at home and the war in Vietnam, depersonalization from new technologies, and corruption in politics. ... [T]he hippies had great respect for America and believed that they were the true patriots. ... [Long] hair was the hippies' flag—their ... symbol not only of rebellion but also of ... the rejection of discrimination and restrictive gender roles. ... Drab work clothes (jeans, work shirts, pea coats) were a rejection of materialism. Clothing from ... the Third World and native Americans represented their awareness of the global community and their rejection of U.S. imperialism and selfishness. ... [N]atural fabrics were a rejection of synthetics, a return to natural things. ... [O]ld World War II or Civil War jackets [co-opted] the symbols of war into their newfound philosophy of nonviolence.</blockquote>

Race and the tribe

Extending the precedents set by Show Boat (1927) and Porgy and Bess (1935), Hair opened the Broadway musical to racial integration; fully one-third of the cast was African American. Except for satirically in skits, the roles for the black tribe members portrayed them as equals, breaking from traditional roles for black people in entertainment as slaves or servants. An Ebony article called the show the biggest outlet for black actors in the history of the U.S. stage. "Dead End", sung by black tribe members, is a list of street signs that symbolize black frustration and alienation. the U.S. Supreme Court had not struck down laws banning interracial marriage until 1967. "Abie Baby" is part of the Act 2 "trip" sequence: four African witch doctors, who have just killed various American historical, cultural and fictional characters, sing the praises of Abraham Lincoln, portrayed by a black female tribe member, whom they decide not to kill. The first part of the song contains stereotypical language that black characters used in old movies, like "I's finished ... pluckin' y'all's chickens" and "I's free now thanks to y'all, Master Lincoln". The Lincoln character recites a modernized version of the Gettysburg Address while a white female tribe member polishes his shoes with her blond hair. "Much has been written about that scene ... most of it silly", wrote Gene Lees in High Fidelity. It lasted 20 seconds. The scene prompted threats of censorship and even violent reactions in some places.

The nudity was optional for the performers. The French cast was "the nudest" of the foreign groups, while the London cast "found nudity the hardest to achieve". Donna Summer, who was in the German production, said that "it was not meant to be sexual. ... We stood naked to comment on the fact that society makes more of nudity than killing." Toward the end of Act 2, the tribe members reveal their free love tendencies when they banter about who will sleep with whom that night.

Illegal drugs taken by the characters include a hallucinogen during the trip sequence. Generally, the tribe favors hallucinogenic or "mind expanding" drugs, such as LSD and marijuana.

Pacifism and environmentalism

The opposition to the war that pervades the show is unified by the plot thread that progresses through the book—Claude's moral dilemma over whether to burn his draft card. The song is based on Allen Ginsberg's 1966 poem "Wichita Vortex Sutra", in which General Maxwell D. Taylor proudly reports to the press the number of enemy soldiers killed in one month, repeating it digit by digit for effect: "Three-Five-Zero-Zero". The song begins with images of death and dying and turns into a manic dance number, echoing Maxwell's glee at reporting the enemy casualties.

"Don't Put It Down" satirizes the unexamined patriotism of people who are "crazy for the American flag". "Be In (Hare Krishna)" praises the peace movement and events like the San Francisco and Central Park Be-Ins. Throughout the show, the tribe chants popular protest slogans like "What do we want? Peace! When do we want it? Now!" and "Do not enter the induction center". In a comic, pro-green vein, Woof introduces himself by explaining that he "grows things", and Berger weaves nature imagery into the title song.

Religion and astrology

Religion, particularly Catholicism, appears both overtly and symbolically throughout the piece and is often the butt of jokes. During "Sodomy", a hymn-like paean to all that is "dirty" about sex, the cast strikes evocative religious positions: the Pietà and Christ on the cross. Claude becomes a classic Christ figure at various points. In Act I, he says, "I am the Son of God. I shall vanish and be forgotten", then gives benediction to the tribe and the audience. He suffers from indecision, and, in his Gethsemane at the end of Act I, he asks "Where Do I Go?". The textual alludes to Claude being on a cross, and, in the end, he is chosen to give his life for the others. "Aquarius" was written after Rado researched his own astrological sign. The company's astrologer, Maria Crummere, was consulted about casting: Sheila was usually played by a Libra or Capricorn and Berger by a Leo. Playbill reported that she chose April 29, 1968, for the Broadway premiere. <blockquote>The 29th was auspicious ... because the moon was high, indicating that people would attend in masses. The position of the 'history makers' (Pluto, Uranus, Jupiter) in the 10th house made the show unique, powerful and a money-maker. And that Neptune was on the ascendancy foretold that Hair would develop a reputation involving sex.</blockquote> In Mexico, where Crummere did not pick the opening date, the show was closed by the government after one night.

Literary themes and symbolism

Hair makes many references to Shakespeare's plays and, at times, takes lyrical material directly from Shakespeare. According to Miller, the Romeo suicide imagery makes the point that, with our complicity in war, we are killing ourselves. This symbolism is carried into the last scene, where Claude appears as a ghostly spirit among his friends wearing an army uniform in an ironic echo of an earlier scene, where he says, "I know what I want to be ... invisible". Public Theater Artistic Director Oskar Eustis said: <blockquote>Both [Hair and Hamlet] center on idealistic brilliant men as they struggle to find their place in a world marred by war, violence, and venal politics. They see both the luminous possibilities and the harshest realities of being human. In the end, unable to effectively combat the evil around them, they tragically succumb.</blockquote>

Other literary references include the song "Three-Five-Zero-Zero", based on Ginsberg's "Wichita Vortex Sutra", and, in the psychedelic drug trip sequence, the portrayal of Scarlett O'Hara from Gone with the Wind and activist African-American poet LeRoi Jones. MacDermot said, "My idea was to make a total funk show. They said they wanted rock & roll—but to me that translated to 'funk'." Funk influence is evident throughout the score, notably in songs like "Colored Spade" and "Walking in Space". Miller ties the music of Hair to the hippies' political themes: <blockquote>The hippies ... were determined to create art of the people and their chosen art form, rock/folk music was by its definition, populist. ... [T]he hippies' music was often very angry, its anger directed at those who would prostitute the Constitution, who would sell America out, who would betray what America stood for; in other words, directed at their parents and the government. and walked out of the production. Richard Rodgers could hear only the beat and called it "one-third music". For High Fidelity, Gene Lees wrote that John Lennon found the show "dull" and "I do not know any musician who thinks it's good." Theatre historian John Kenrick countered:

<blockquote>[Hair's] explosion of revolutionary proclamations, profanity and hard rock shook the musical theatre to its roots. ... Most people in the theatre business [and] Tony voters tried to ignore Hair's importance, shutting it out from any honors. However, some now insisted it was time for a change. New York Times critic Clive Barnes gushed that Hair was "the first Broadway musical in some time to have the authentic voice of today rather than the day before yesterday."</blockquote>

Songs

The score had many more songs than typical Broadway shows of the day. This list reflects the songs most often included during the original Broadway run.

Act I

"Aquarius"  – Tribe and soloist (often Dionne)
"Donna" – Berger and Tribe
"Hashish" – Tribe
"Sodomy" – Woof and Tribe
"Colored Spade" – Hud, Woof, Berger, Claude and Tribe
"Manchester England" – Claude and Tribe
"I'm Black/Ain't Got No" – Woof, Hud, Dionne and Tribe
"I Believe in Love" – Sheila and Tribe trio
"Air" – Jeanie with Crissy and Dionne
"Initials (L.B.J.)" – Tribe
"I Got Life" – Claude and Tribe
"Going Down" – Berger and Tribe
"Hair" – Claude, Berger, and Tribe
"My Conviction" – Margaret Mead (tourist lady)
"Easy to Be Hard" – Sheila
"Don't Put It Down" – Berger, Woof and male Tribe member
"Frank Mills" – Crissy
"Be-In (Hare Krishna)" – Tribe
"Where Do I Go?" – Claude and Tribe

Act II

"Electric Blues" – Tribe quartet
"Black Boys" – Tribe sextet (three male, three female)
"White Boys" – Tribe Supremes trio
"Walking in Space" – Tribe
"Yes, I's Finished/Abie Baby" – Abraham Lincoln and Tribe trio (Hud and two men)
"Three-Five-Zero-Zero" – Tribe
"What a Piece of Work Is Man" – Tribe duo
"Good Morning Starshine" – Sheila and Tribe
"The Bed" – Tribe
"Aquarius" (reprise) – Tribe
"Manchester England" (reprise) – Claude and Tribe
"Eyes Look Your Last" – Claude and Tribe
"The Flesh Failures (Let the Sun Shine In)" – Claude, Sheila, Dionne and Tribe

The show was under almost perpetual rewrite. Thirteen songs were added between the production at the Public Theater and Broadway.

Recordings

The first recording in 1967 featured the off-Broadway cast. The original Broadway cast recording received a Grammy Award in 1969 for Best Score from an Original Cast Show Album and sold nearly 3 million copies in the U.S. by December 1969. The album peaked at number 2 in Australia in 1970. According to The New York Times, "The cast album of Hair was ... a must-have for the middle classes. Its exotic orange-and-green cover art imprinted itself instantly and indelibly on the psyche. ... [It] became a pop-rock classic [with] an appeal that transcends particular tastes for genre or period."

A 1969 studio album, DisinHAIRited, contains 19 songs written for the show but not included in previous recordings, a few of which were never included in stage productions. Some were cut between the Public and Broadway productions or were left off the original cast albums due to space. Such broad attention was paid to the recordings of Hair that, after an unprecedented bidding war, ABC Records paid a record amount for MacDermot's next Broadway adaptation, Two Gentlemen of Verona. The 2009 revival recording debuted at on Billboards "Top Cast Album" chart and at in the Top 200, making it the highest debuting album in Ghostlight Records history. The 1993 London revival cast album contains new music incorporated into the standard rental version. and topped the charts for six weeks. The Cowsills' recording of the title song "Hair" climbed to on the Billboard Hot 100, while Oliver's "Good Morning Starshine" reached . Three Dog Night's "Easy to Be Hard" went to . Nina Simone's 1968 medley of "Ain't Got No, I Got Life" reached the top 5 on the UK singles chart. ASCAP confirmed that "Aquarius" was the most frequently played song on U.S. radio and television in 1970. Among other artists recording Hair songs are Shirley Bassey, Barbra Streisand and Diana Ross. "Good Morning Starshine" was sung on a 1969 episode of Sesame Street by Bob McGrath, and versions have been recorded by artists such as Sarah Brightman, Petula Clark and Strawberry Alarm Clock. Liza Minnelli and The Lemonheads recorded "Frank Mills", and Andrea McArdle, Jennifer Warnes and Sérgio Mendes each made versions of "Easy to Be Hard". Run DMC sampled "Where Do I Go" on its 1993 single "Down with the King", which went to on the Billboard rap chart and reached the top 25 in the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Hair helped launch the recording careers of Meat Loaf, Dobie Gray, Jennifer Warnes, Jobriath, Bert Sommer, Ronnie Dyson, Donna Summer and Melba Moore.

Early critical reception

Reception of Hairs Broadway premiere was overwhelmingly positive. Clive Barnes wrote in The New York Times: "I think it is simply that it is so likable. So new, so fresh, and so unassuming, even in its pretensions." Richard Watts Jr. of the New York Post wrote that "it has a surprising if perhaps unintentional charm, its high spirits are contagious, and its young zestfulness makes it difficult to resist." Allan Jeffreys of ABC TV said the actors were "the most talented hippies you'll ever see ... directed in a wonderfully wild fashion by Tom O'Horgan." Leonard Probst of NBC said "Hair is the only new concept in musicals on Broadway in years and it's more fun than any other this season". John Wingate of WOR TV praised MacDermot's "dynamic score" that "blasts and soars", and Len Harris of CBS said "I've finally found the best musical of the Broadway season ... it's that sloppy, vulgar, terrific tribal love rock musical Hair."

A dissenting review in Variety called the show "loony" and "without a story, form, music, dancing, beauty or artistry. ... It's impossible to tell whether [the cast has] talent. Maybe talent is irrelevant in this new kind of show business." In Newsweek, Jack Kroll wrote, "There is no denying the sheer kinetic drive of this new Hair ... there is something hard, grabby, slightly corrupt about O'Horgan's virtuosity, like Busby Berkeley gone bitchy." A Time critic wrote that although the show "thrums with vitality, [it is] crippled by being a bookless musical and, like a boneless fish, it drifts when it should swim."

When Hair opened in London, critic Irving Wardle of The Times wrote, "Its honesty and passion give it the quality of a true theatrical celebration—the joyous sound of a group of people telling the world exactly what they feel." In the Financial Times, B. A. Young wrote that Hair was "not only a wildly enjoyable evening, but a thoroughly moral one." In his final review before retiring, 78-year-old W. A. Darlington of The Daily Telegraph wrote that he had "tried hard" but found the evening "a complete bore—noisy, ugly and quite desperately funny". Rado recalled that long hair "was a visible form of awareness in the consciousness expansion. The longer the hair got, the more expansive the mind was. Long hair was shocking, and it was a revolutionary act to grow long hair. It was kind of a flag, really."

The musical caused controversy. It was the first time a Broadway show had seen totally naked performers, These controversies, and the anti-Vietnam War theme, attracted occasional threats and violence during the show's early years and became the basis for legal actions. Two cases eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court. In Indiana cities, the producers were either refused booking, had difficulty securing a theater, or the production was picketed by church groups. Productions in the U.S. were frequently confronted with the closure of theaters by the fire marshal. Chattanooga's 1972 refusal to allow Hair to play at the city-owned Memorial Auditorium was later found by the Supreme Court to be an unlawful prior restraint.

Legal challenges against the Boston production were appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Chief of the Licensing Bureau said, "anyone who desecrates the flag should be whipped on Boston Common." Although the scene was removed before opening, the District Attorney alleged that "lewd and lascivious" actions were taking place onstage. Hair obtained an injunction from the Superior Court against criminal prosecution, and the D.A. appealed to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. At the request of both parties, several of the justices viewed the production; the court ruled that "the cast [must] be clothed to a reasonable extent." The cast defiantly played the scene nude later that night, saying the ruling was vague about when it took effect.

A 1969 Acapulco, Mexico, production played for one night. They were expelled from Mexico days later. In Bergen, Norway, citizens formed a human barricade to try to prevent the performance. In April 1971, a bomb was thrown at Hair<nowiki/>'s theater in Cleveland, Ohio, bouncing off the marquee; the blast shattered windows in the building and nearby storefronts. The same month, the families of a cast member and the stage manager died in a fire in the Cleveland hotel where members of the show's troupe were staying. The Sydney, Australia, production's opening night was interrupted by a bomb scare in 1969.

Hair effectively marked the end of stage censorship in the United Kingdom. London's stage censor, the Lord Chamberlain, refused to license the musical, and the opening was delayed until Parliament passed a bill stripping his licensing power. In Munich, authorities threatened to close the production if the nude scene remained, but after a Hair spokesman said his relatives had been marched nude into Auschwitz, the authorities relented. But even in Paris there was occasional opposition, as when a member of the Salvation Army used a portable loudspeaker to exhort the audience to halt the presentation.

Subsequent productions

1970s to 1990s

The first college production took place in 1970 at Memphis State University, Tennessee, directed by Keith Kennedy. The cast participated in the Atlanta International Pop Festival in 1970. WMC-TV produced a 1971 documentary chronicling the production.

In 1977, a Broadway revival of Hair produced by Michael Butler and directed by O'Horgan ran for 43 performances at the Biltmore Theater. The cast included Ellen Foley, Annie Golden, Loretta Devine, Cleavant Derricks and Kristen Vigard. Reviews were generally negative, and critics accused the musical of "showing its gray". A 1985 production in Montreal was reportedly the 70th professional production. The event was sponsored by First Lady Nancy Reagan and introduced by Barbara Walters. Rado, Ragni and MacDermot reunited to write nine new songs for the concert. The cast of 163 included former stars from productions around the globe, Moore, Vereen, Williams and Summer, as well as guest performers Bea Arthur, Frank Stallone and Dr. Ruth Westheimer. Ticket prices ranged from $250 to $5,000, and the proceeds went to the United States Committee for UNICEF and the Creo Society's Fund for Children with AIDS. Even after Ragni died in 1991, MacDermot and Rado continued to write new songs for revivals through the 1990s. Hair Sarajevo, AD 1992 was staged during the siege of Sarajevo as an appeal for peace. and a London revival starring John Barrowman and Paul Hipp opened at the Old Vic in 1993, directed by Michael Bogdanov. A Guardian review suggested that its failure stemmed from a cast of "Thatcher's children who didn't really get it". South African productions began only after the eradication of apartheid. A 30th-anniversary Off-off Broadway production was staged at Third Eye Repertory, directed by Shawn Rozsa.

2000s and 2010s

In 2001, Reprise Theatre Company in Los Angeles performed Hair at the Wadsworth Theatre, starring Steven Weber as Berger, Sam Harris as Claude and Jennifer Leigh Warren as Sheila. Encores! presented a 2001 production at City Center, starring Luther Creek, Idina Menzel and Tom Plotkin, with MacDermot playing the keyboards. An Actors' Fund benefit of the show was performed for one night at the New Amsterdam Theater in New York City in 2004.

In 2005, a London production opened at the Gate Theatre, directed by Daniel Kramer. Rado approved an updating of the musical's script to place it in the context of the Iraq War. In Kramer's modernized interpretation, the nudity called to mind images from Abu Ghraib. In 2006, Rado collaborated with director Robert Prior on a CanStage production in Toronto. A revival produced by Pieter Toerien toured South Africa in 2007, directed by Paul Warwick Griffin. From September to December 2007, Hair ran at the MET Theatre in Los Angeles, produced by Butler and directed and choreographed by Bo Crowell, with musical direction by Christian Nesmith. It won the LA Weekly Theater Award for Musical of the Year.

Awards and nominations

Original Broadway production

{| class="wikitable" width="95%"

! width="5%"| Year

! width="20%"| Award ceremony

! width="30%"| Category

! width="35%"| Nominee

! width="10%"| Result

| rowspan="3"|

| rowspan="2"| Tony Awards

| colspan="2"| Best Musical

| Best Direction of a Musical

| Tom O'Horgan

| Grammy Awards

| Best Score From an Original Cast Show Album

| Galt MacDermot, Gerome Ragni & James Rado ; Andy Wiswell

2009 Broadway revival

{| class="wikitable" width="95%"

! width="5%"| Year

! width="20%"| Award ceremony

! width="30%"| Category

! width="35%"| Nominee

! width="10%"| Result

| rowspan="16"|

| rowspan="8"| Tony Awards

| colspan="2"| Best Revival of a Musical

| Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical

| Gavin Creel

| Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical

| Will Swenson

| Best Costume Design of a Musical

| Michael McDonald

| Best Lighting Design of a Musical

| Kevin Adams

| Best Sound Design of a Musical

| Acme Sound Partners

| Best Direction of a Musical

| Diane Paulus

| Best Choreography

| Karole Armitage

| rowspan="8"| Drama Desk Awards

| colspan="2"| Outstanding Revival of a Musical

| Outstanding Actor in a Musical

| Will Swenson

| Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical

| Bryce Ryness

| Outstanding Director of a Musical