Lee Strasberg Britain London New York New Jersey city Oxford show performer Music Lee Strasberg Britain London New York New Jersey city Oxford

James Rado obituary

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Gerome Ragni, who had participated in that off-Broadway ideological maelstrom with Joe Chaikin’s Open Theatre and Ellen Stewart’s La Mama.

Rado was already writing songs and acting in New York – he had appeared on Broadway in 1963 in June Havoc’s play Marathon ’33, about the dance marathons in the Depression era, supervised by the acting guru Lee Strasberg – when, in 1964, he met Ragni as a fellow off-Broadway cast member in the British hit protest revue (about capital punishment) from Oxford University, Hang Down Your Head and Die, devised by David Wright and staged by Braham Murray.

This was not a success, though it had caused a sensation in London. It closed after one performance. But Rado and Ragni always insisted this was the spur to getting on with Hair immediately afterwards as they hunkered down in their apartment in Hoboken, New Jersey.

When they came to London in 1969 to support Murray’s production of a rock musical version of Othello, Catch My Soul, at the Roundhouse, Rado goofed for the cameras, grabbing Murray: “This is the guy who inspired Hair!”In truth, the creative spark for Hair was a meeting with a quiet Canadian, Galt MacDermot, who was introduced to the pair by a music industry colleague.

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