Why on earth should anyone have wished to bring back "Hair"? Surely not for any reason as simple as making money. No, I Fear that its producers believed in it and will perhaps not understand why its return amounts to an embarrassment. The novelties that proved attractive almost a decade ago—the easygoing, not to say fugitive, book, the informal relations between audience and cast, and the endearing (and never very erotic) nudity—have lost their power to move us. Except for two or three charming songs, what remains is a sort of cold dregs, which fail to give us even the sorry satisfaction of tasting bitter. It is simply there, poor "Hair,"… all feverishly abustle and all, alas, lifeless.

Brendan Gill, "In the Anteroom," in The New Yorker (© 1977 by The New Yorker Magazine, Inc.), Vol. LIII, No. 35, October 17, 1977, P. 94.