The Haircut
An authoritarian father’s attempt to masculinize his son with a new haircut takes an unexpected turn.
Ah, life and its myriad twists and turns! Plans often don’t turn out as one expects them to. It was Scottish Poet Robert Burns who put it most eloquently (as a poet, that’s no surprise): “The best laid plans of Mice and Men often go awry.”
Such is true of Marine Dad Robert’s plans in Sarah Kennedy’s “The Haircut”. And – needless to say – taking advice from poets isn’t modern day Robert’s “thing”.
As the tale opens, ripped and buzzed Robert’s almost literally dragging son Robby into Charlene’s unisex hair salon.
A slender kid of 16 with shoulder length hair, Robby doesn’t seem like he needs – or wants - a trim, let alone a cut. A woman whose very profession revolves around how hair accentuates personality, Charlene herself balks when she gets an earful of Robert’s no-nonsense “order”:
ROBERT
Shave it off. The hair’s going.
CHARLENE
(to Robby)
All of it?
Robby halfheartedly nods “yes.”
Charlene reluctantly puts the scissors down and picks up clippers.
CHARLENE
(softly)
You sure about this, hon? You have the most gorgeous
head of hair I ever seen. It--it suits you.
But dad Robert’s got Robby cowed. And ultimately, the customer’s always right – fashion sense failures aside. Within minutes, Robby’s wonderful mane is a pile of discarded trash on the floor.
As for the poor boy himself? Despite his dad’s pleasure at the transformation, a shorn Robby now resembles a drone.
Yet, this isn’t the end of Robby’s journey. In fact, it’s just the start.
Two days later, Robby arrives at school in his new “condition.” Various classmates react - some with derision. Others in empathetic shock.
As Robby slinks along with a guitar case, one bully sneers:
BULLY
Where’d you leave the head lice?
Followed by:
BULLY
The little girl turned into a boy!
That last crack elicits laughter from the mean crowd. So the Bully pushes his luck still further – manhandling Robby in a headlock, which the mortified teen flails against and barely escapes.
After Robby breaks free, a fellow band student catches up.
BAND STUDENT
Why’d you do that to your hair?
Robby keeps walking.
ROBBY
It was the guitar or the hair.
One had to go.
BAND STUDENT
Oh... that sucks.
To be honest, there’s a LOT that sucks in Robby’s life right now. Sure, hair can grow back. But domineering fathers who smother individuality are harder to correct.
And then there’s that Bully. The way he eyes Robby across the hallway indicates he’s not done yet.
Marine Dad’s goal in cutting Robby’s hair may have been to make him “more of a man”. But it’s also made Robby a target. And… may take his life in directions Dad neither wanted nor could predict.
A slice of life observation of how life can branch off in unexpected ways, Sarah Kennedy’s thoughtful and somewhat disturbing “Haircut” is a dramatic, limited location gem which – with the right direction and casting – will leave audience contemplating their own “best laid plans” for some time!