OH! CALCUTTA!
Dirs. Jacques Levy & Guillaume Martin Aucoin, 1972
United States. 122 min.
In English.

MONDAY, JUNE 9 – 10 PM
FRIDAY, JUNE 13 – MIDNIGHT

No program of musical theater oddities would be complete without one of the most notorious productions to ever grace Broadway. Originally conceived in 1969 by British theatre critic Kenneth Tynan, and with music & lyrics composed by Peter Schickele (aka PDQ Bach), Robert Dennis, and Stanley Walden, OH! CALCUTTA! consists of a series of risqué sketches about sex and sexual mores, authored by a who’s-who of theatrical heavyweights from Sam Shepard and Samuel Beckett to Edna O’Brien and Jules Feiffer to, for reasons unclear, a newly solo John Lennon.

This 1971 filmed version of the show’s original Broadway iteration keeps much of Jacques Levy’s original direction intact, with co-director Guillaume Martin Aucoin skillfully adapting its sketch format for a more elaborate and visually versatile medium. The filmed version was originally intended to be shown via closed-circuit video projection at local theaters around the country, however plans for that were scrapped when many cities and towns banned its exhibition in the wake of protests over the material. Instead, the film received a short theatrical release in 1972 as the B-movie to Ralph Bakshi’s FRITZ THE CAT before receiving new life on Broadway a few years later via a hugely successful 1976 revival run.

To say that a bawdy, sophomoric, partially-nude musical revue debuting during the Summer of Love was a product of its time would be an understatement. Yet despite the controversies surrounding nearly every one of its releases (including obscenity charges leading up to its 1970 West End debut), the show ultimately lived a long and healthy life on Broadway, running for over 7,000 combined performances between its original run and 1976 revival, briefly holding the record for longest-running show in Broadway history before being swiftly memoryholed once we reached the era of producer-driven big budget megamusicals.