No cuts to nude revue – 50 years ago in The Stage

Kenneth Tynan’s revue Oh! Calcutta! opened at the Roundhouse 50 years ago and was greeted with controversy due to its extended scenes of nudity. We reported on unsuccessful attempts to have the show shut down:

“No proceedings are to be taken over Oh! Calcutta!’, the revue at the Roundhouse that features nude sketches, a statement from the Law Officers’ department said after the matter had been considered in a consultation between the attorney-general and the director of public prosecutions as to whether to authorise criminal proceedings over the show. The only provision under which proceedings could be brought was in section two of the 1968 Theatres Act. This said that a performance could be considered obscene if ‘taken as a whole its effect was such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who were likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to attend it.’

“The Law Officers’ department statement said: ‘On the evidence placed before him concerning this production, the Attorney General has formed the opinion that there is no likelihood that a prosecution would be successful. Accordingly he has decided that no proceedings should be taken.

“A complaint about the show was laid by Greater London Councillor Frank Smith, his wife Ida, and Lady Birdwood. Smith, who claimed that he was getting letters of support from people ‘all over the country’, said he hoped to close the show. Oh! Calcutta! received mixed, and on the whole, not good notices from the press, though no critic condemned it on moral grounds.”

For more from The Stage Archive, visit thestage.co.uk/archive