Hair **** (1979, John Savage, Treat Williams, Beverly D’Angelo) – Classic Movie Review 6,934

The great Sixties Broadway hippy stage rock musical Hair was filmed in 1979 with vibrant young stars John Savage and Treat Williams as New York hippies who revolt and burn their draft cards when faced with being sent to the Vietnam War.

The great Sixties Broadway hippy stage rock musical Hair by Galt MacDermot (music), Gerome Ragni and James Rado (lyrics) was filmed in 1979, a decade too late to be relevant and a decade too early to be nostalgic, so it promptly flopped.

Hollywood gives it the best money can buy – top director Milos Forman, a costly production with New York location filming, and the big dance numbers – but still the public wouldn’t come in the expected numbers. Nevertheless, on a $11 million cost, it grossed more than $15 million in the US.

Now we can view it as magical nostalgia, and thrill especially to the all-time groovy songs, the exciting Twyla Tharp choreography of the dance scenes performed by the Twyla Tharp Dance Foundation and vibrant young stars John Savage and Treat Williams. They play New York hippies Claude (Savage) and Berger (Williams) who revolt and burn their draft cards when faced with being sent to the Vietnam War.

Young Claude leaves Oklahoma for New York City, where he makes friends with Berger’s gang of hippies and falls in love with rich sweet Sheila (Beverly D’Angelo) but is drafted to the Vietnam War.

Even if it perhaps all seems very silly now, let the sun shine in for this lively and poignant reminder of the glorious Age of Aquarius! The hit songs include Hair, I Got Life, Let the Sun Shine In, and The Age of Aquarius.

Fans of the stage might be unhappy as the film omits the songs “The Bed”, “Dead End”, “Oh Great God of Power”, “I Believe in Love”, “Going Down”, “Air”, “My Conviction”, “Abie Baby”, “Frank Mills”, and “What a Piece of Work is Man” from the musical. MacDermot wrote a new song for the film: ‘Somebody to Love’.

John Savage stars in Hair (1979).

Also in the cast are Nicholas Ray, Annie Golden, Dorsey Wright, Charlotte Rae, Miles Chapin, Cheryl Barnes, Don Dacus, Fern Tailer, Charles Denny, Herman Meckler, Agnes Breen, Antonio Rey, George Manos, Linda Surh, Jane Booke, Suzanna Love, Michael Jeter, Nell Carter, Cheryl Barnes, Richard Bright, Ellen Foley and Janet York.

The 1968 Broadway musical Hair: An American Tribal Love-Rock Musical is adapted for the screen by Michael Weller, who collaborated with Forman on Ragtime, two years later. Hair’s creators Ragni and Rado were unhappy with the film as its plot and soundtrack differed greatly from those of the stage musical, saying it failed to capture the essence of Hair, portraying hippies as oddballs and ‘some sort of aberration’ without any connection to the peace movement.

Hair is directed by Milos Forman, runs 121 minutes, is produced by CIP Filmproduktion GmbH, is released by United Artists, is written by Michael Weller, is shot by Miroslav Ondricek, is produced by Lester Persky, Michael Butler, and Robert Greenhut, is scored by Galt MacDermot, with music by Galt MacDermot, and lyrics by Gerome Ragni and James Rado, is designed by Stuart Wurtzel, with choreography by Twyla Tharp.

The studio sold Hair to syndicated television and it played on 115 syndicated stations all over the United States. Forman complained: ‘Out of 22 musical numbers, 11 were cut out from the film, and yet it was still presented as a Milos Forman film, Hair. It was totally incomprehensible, jibberish, butchered beyond belief.’

RIP Milos Forman (1932–2018), inspired director of The Loves of a Blonde (1965), The Firemen’s Ball (1967), Taking Off (1971), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), Hair (1979), Ragtime (1981) and Amadeus (1984).

Treat Williams was involved in a motorcycle crash on Vermont Route 30, near Dorset, on June 12, 2023. He was airlifted to Albany Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead, aged 71.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6,934

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com

Treat Williams in Hair (1979).