games without frontiers/war without tears

Claude died in his Converse sneakers tonight.

That is the only negative comment I will let fly from my mouth (or uh, keyboard) about the Public's concert presentation of "Hair," which I saw tonight at the Delacourte Theatre. Being as ingrained as I have been in the HAiR universe, I was beyond lucky to not only see it for free, but without waiting in any kind of line whatsoever. I say this not to brag, but to acknowledge my good fortune and to emphasize something I wish several people had when they came to see our show for free: any piece of theatre that is well put together represents the sweat and blood of many many people. If you see the final product and don't even pay for it, to speak against it is both selfish and spoiled. As if their work was done just to please you, and you didn't even shell out a dollar for it.

However. I have shelled out many a dollar to acquire my opinions and understanding of HAiR. Both myself and the company have researched this thing beyond reason. What I appreciated most tonight was where I could see, very clearly, Jim's hand in the piece. Bizarre for me, the former fan of freewheeling actor riffing and taking a piece and fucking with it until it's barely recognizable. For so long, I was little miss mess-with-it. But you know...I spent so much time, with so many dedicated and brilliant people, learning what the sinews and the soul of this piece are. So I found myself searching for that. And I found it. It was small, but there it was - shockingly, in the show's starlet, Mr. Jonathan Groff.

Just saw Spring Awakening two weeks ago. Was very confused that they cast this...um...spitter...in this uber famous tricky role, despite his obvious vocal talent and nice looks.

But there it was! In the acting of the scenes - not really in the songs, which I gather were discussed a lot more musically than they were acting-wise - I could see Jim's work. I could see that Jim had explained what he was talking about. Which is MANDATORY, I think, for HAiR. Someone's gotta sit the leads down and be like: "Look. You're saying THIS. Not THAT or THAT, but THIS. It's up to you how to act it, but know that this is the definition of what is coming out of your mouth."

Because it's not obvious. It's very very confusing to look at the HAiR book cold. You miss 80 percent of it without a tour guide. I was so blessed to have one of the two who could do it best, plus several others - Nina Dayton, Anthony D'Amato, Robert Camuto.

But I digress. The point is, after the trip, when Mr. Groff started in on wanting to be invisible, I saw that he got it. Maybe not pitch-perfect, maybe a few more weeks before he felt really in it, but he knew what he was saying, and so he came out and said it, and I was with him, man. I dig it. I dig it.

Now as for the platform shoes on various tribe members...I don't. I don't.