Hair, Theater, and Politics

My wife and I went to see a local production of Hair last night at the Oakland Theater in Youngstown.  For those of you unfamiliar with the Oakland, it is a relatively small theater making the audience up close and personal with what was a very large cast.  It has specialized in “edgy” type productions, but as of last year the management changed.  It is still somewhat edgy, but on the “mainstream” side of the line.  Over the top or not, the Oakland has always produced a quality product and draws both cast and audience from beyond our area.  We have seen several productions of Hair over the years including the original Broadway production.  This was the best.

First the promo:  It was an outstanding production. This is Community Theater, and great community theater.  The word that comes to mind is gritty.  The intimacy of the theater plus a cast of “real” people who you might know personally made the tribe in Central Park come alive in ways you won’t see in New York or Pittsburgh or Cleveland or in the movie version. These were the people I saw protesting in 1968 as they marched to change America…and if you were in the audience last night, you were out there with them.  This is the beauty of the Oakland:  taking a show like Hair from Broadway perfection to exquisite local reality.  They did it with The Full Monty several years ago.  They have done it again with Hair these past few weeks. 

The audience reflected the age of the show.  There were lots of folks my age in the packed theater.  I was eighteen when Hair made its Broadway debut.  In the spring of my senior year in high school both Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated.  I campaigned for Eugene McCarthy.  I cheered when Lyndon Johnson said he would not run again for president.  I watched in disbelief the violence at the 1968 Chicago Democratic convention.  And then I worked for Richard Nixon because I am a Republican.  Those were scary and exciting times as America experienced a burst of creative energy in all aspects of the arts the likes of which we will never see again as the nation moves further into the digital cocoon. 

I thought the premise and music and message of the show would be dated.   I couldn’t have been more wrong.  Within the story line there was much to dislike about the main characters.  They were rude, goofy drugged up hippie freaks that desired a life of self gratification living as bums.  But underneath, they understood who they were...with lots of insecurities but understanding the necessity for some of life's evils such as money.  

What I remember most about those times was the overriding feeling of hope and idealism.  These concepts were rooted in respect for the individual.  Although the musical dealt with generally accepted liberal issues including race, drug usage, anti military, and a rigid social and governmental hierarchy, it wasn’t the “collective.”  The message was get government out of our lives so we are free to live our lives as we choose.  It is libertarianism. There is a difference. Libertarianism is where liberals and conservatives meet. 

Where did that idealism go?  Where is the hope?   We have been told by the media that folks running things in Washington today are the descendants of those protesting on America’s campuses in the late 1960’s and early 70’s.  I disagree.  They are the ideological descendents of the radical fringe of the movement.  In today’s Washington you are finding the progeny of the Weather Underground, the Black Panthers, the SDS, SNIC and other violent groups.  These folks believe in government control by force and use of government as a political weapon to achieve their goals.  We are just now finding out how autocratic these folks can be in the pursuit of their radical vision of an egalitarian utopia. For them, their end always justifies the means.

The reality, however, seldom matches the fantasy.  So now it is time to assess and move on as we face new issues of an over reaching government; rigid and unfeeling.  And the music goes on.

Somewhere

Inside something there is a rush of

Greatness

Who knows what stands in front of

Our lives

I fashion my future on films in space

Silence tells me secretly

Everything 

Everything

Let the sunshine in!