HAIR is about a group of young people in New York City's
East Village who band together as a TRIBE. They are
a New York contingent of flower children, (a freeform
phenomenon that had begun a little earlier in Haight-Ashbury,
San Francisco and would subsequently spread to Europe
& elsewhere). Taking on the feel of an American
Indian tribe, they question authority and the society
they are living in and the war in Asia. They seek to
find a new way. They yearn to change the world. They
begin by recreating themselves. They find a potent organic
natural esthetic; the most dramatic visible element,
all the men grow their hair long. They tune in to Eastern
thought & meditation. They turn on and drop out.
They hang out in self-made clouds of incense and grass.
They laugh and cavort, as they find a new freedom of
expression and camaraderie. They live in crash pads,
in the parks and on the streets. Unkempt, wild, free,
and deep, they are unique, colorful, something genuinely
original and beautiful...and so hip (yet in a different
style from the earlier hipsters and beatniks). A new
word is coined to identify them. They come to be called
hippies. They try to live by the philosophy of "Peace
and Love." They are on a trip of liberation. They
commune, join hands in protest and in song. Within the
context of the play, they struggle for the light, but
are forced to fight & die, only to be reborn, again
to suffer more, then to rise from the ashes, to glow,
to shine...
The authors of HAIR played with the idea that this
movement was connected astrologically to the heavens,
to the coming of the Age of Aquarius...
Theatre Information:
Al Hirschfeld Theatre
302 West 45th Street
New York, NY 10036
US
Show Run Time:
Two hours and 25 minutes, including one 15-minute intermission
.