“The Lord Chamberlain’s Final Cut”
Posted by Jack on September 29, 2007
I will be giving a seminar paper entitled “HAIR, London, 1968: The Lord Chamberlain’s Final Cut” this Thursday, 4th October, at 5pm in room 3.16 of the Arts building at Queen Mary, University of London, Mile End Road, E1 4NS.
Although this is part of the QMUL History Department Postgraduate Seminar Series, anyone, working under any disciplinary label – or none – is very welcome to come along. In keeping with the tone of the paper (which covers just a small part of my PhD research), I aim to make the atmosphere slightly less formal than usual. This is an attempt at just a hint of a 1960s ‘happening’. To that end, there will be much wine available. Whether that results in the degeneration of some into a tediously squiffy state – with entirely predictable consequences – is largely beyond my control (although, while the chroniclers of the Counter-Culture rarely mention it, I suppose that must have happened at ‘happenings’ too. Or maybe they truly were more ‘enlightened’ than the dominant twenty-first century London culture?) My hope is, rather, that everyone will enter into a positive, ludic, ‘Aquarian’ spirit.
I scheduled this, however, before I discovered that I have a rather intense teaching schedule on a Thursday, and that last week and next are without doubt the two most stressful and downright unpleasant I’ve had to endure since I returned to Academia. I therefore suspect I’ll need to draw heavily on all my years of Dr Footlights to physically get through it. That may mean resorting to my drugs of choice in such situations: Berocca, four-star caffeine, cigarettes, bananas and intravenous Lucozade. But the show must go on because, as some of my more senior, eh, ‘colleagues’ realise (admirably), to a large extent (when it comes to delivery, at least) ‘it’s all acting, isn’t it?’ (Maybe I should have taken them along to that casting I declined last week – because the gig clashed with my teaching – to show them what that is really all about.)
Image: http://www.michaelbutler.com/hair/
4 Responses to ““The Lord Chamberlain’s Final Cut””
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Jack said
Despite being very tired, this seemed to go reasonably well; or so I was told by several of the very pleasant, responsive audience members, who asked some thought-provoking questions.
But I must record a new phrase which I coined, on the hoof, in a moment of ‘Late Review’-style verbal abandon. Someone asked where and how the Rock Operas fitted into the history of The Musical. I stressed, as I always do, that I see them (Hair, above all) as a hybrid form which skilfully subverted conventional Musical Theatre through a form of ‘entryism’. I pointed out that, while a great deal of interesting research is now being done on the history of Musical Theatre, that isn’t, on the whole, a form which particularly appeals to me. Nor am I examining the Rock Operas as theatre works per se; I’m more interested in them as cultural, historical texts through which we can examine the wider social and political issues of the time. To that end, I found myself telling the audience that I have little interest in “the teleology of jazz hands”. I know what I mean by that line (although I have no idea where it sprang from) – even if I nearly corpsed myself by saying it.
Alice said
It did go well.
It also higlighted what I love so much about History; the printed texts that survive tell us so much more about the author(s) than the subject(s). This can be seen in the Mass Observations of the 30′s as well as in the witchcraft trials/texts of the Early Modern period.
Don Henschel said
Jack, it went so well, we want you back again! I’m bringing another load of Texas Theatre Students, and this time, we get not only to talk about “Hair,” but we get to experience it! We’ll be at Queen Mary at Mile End all July. I hope you will be able to find an hour or two to talk with us. I haven’t gotten the schedule solidified, but I’ve asked Peter C. if he might contact you. Then, googling Hair, I ran into your post here. Wonderful to read your words as I recall them from a couple of years back.
Hope to see you soon! – Don
Jack said
Hi Don,
After a bit of a delay (on my part) I’m now trying to get things organised with Peter, so I hope I will see you some time in July.
Best – Jack