Hair: Be-In for Marriage Equality

After spending a Saturday night at a friend's bachelorette party (in spite of not being a lady), I went to a benefit for marriage equality with performances from the current cast of Hair. This is not the first benefit I've been to for the cause (regardless of my own semi-ambivalence: we'll get there), but it was a particularly special one as it happened to be the first day that same-sex weddings were happening in New York.

So let's just get this out of the way: I'm supportive of gay marriage in a very basic, "If they can do it, we should be able to do it," kind of way. My actual ambivalence is really toward the institution of marriage which to me seems a bit hokey and dated. While I understand the benefits in practice, I don't know that I believe state-recognized partnerships are really the world's best way to handle things like visitation rights and shared finances. It's the easiest, most obvious way to go about it, yes. But it seems to me to deny the complicated nature of human relationships. Plus, let's be honest: when I found out that gay marriage was legalized, my first thoughts were titally selfish: Fuck, I'd have to buy more presents, go to more weddings, and feel more pressure to find "the one." Hey, at least I'm honest about it.

You know what cuts through some cynical and/or self-centered bullshit? Seeing two women in their 50s in matching outfits and "Just Married" sashes, holding hands and kissing each other over and over as they waited to get into the show. Seriously. It was like a knockout punch to my heart. I couldn't have been any happier for two complete strangers. Near the top of the show, the two women were recognized from the stage and congratulated. I'm gonna skip right ahead to the highlight of the show: Kacie Sheik got up and said she had written a song for her friend's wedding reception but chickened out and hadn't performed it there. Looking into the audience, she spotted the couple and said, "Well, I guess I'm kind of singing it at yours!" I felt like the Grinch with my heart swelliing to three times its size (see, there was an explanation for my opening image!). I'm obsessed with Sheik's voice. She's been trucking along in Hair for about three years now, and she's amazing in her fairly small part, but I can't wait to see her do something new.

None of this really addresses the performance overall which was quite fun. There was a hiccup with one other original song which the cast member (I really can't remember who it was--eeps!) tried to play her grating, Ani-esque song on the guitar and kept losing her place. Another hiccup with Nicholas Belton occasionally (yet adorably) losing the words to the song "Three is a Magic Number." Better off were Caren Lynn Tackett who ripped it up with a song SHE had written (so many multi-talented ladies!) and Allison Guinn who centered on a cover of "Dream On" that was shockingly good. Shocking only in that I didn't think ANYONE could cover that song. The show's leads were present to play guitar but allowed their lesser known castmates take the night's bows. But the night belonged to a pair of women who had flown in from California to get hitched. I may not be 100% supportive of marriage, but I could not have been any happier that those two COULD get married. So oh yes, there were tears.