McClure's play The Beard debuted at the Actor’s Workshop Theatre in San Francisco on the December 18, 1965. A second performance followed at Bill Graham’s Fillmore Auditorium on the July 24, 1966. With the Fillmore’s high profile, the play attracted an audience of 700. After success at the Fillmore, the following month the play opened at The Committee, a theatre nightclub in the North Beach area of the city, where it was hoped it would enjoy a lengthy run.
Now aware of the play’s subject matter, the San Francisco Police Department secretly tape-recorded the first two performances and secretly filmed the third performance. Having failed in their attempts to successfully censor Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, the performances of Lenny Bruce and the San Francisco Mime Troupe, the police department was intent to succeed this time.
At the end of that third performance on August 8, 1966—only the fifth time the play had been performed in public—the SFPD raided the venue and arrested actors Billie Dixon (Jean) and Richard Bright (Billy). Under Penal Code Section 647(a) the pair were initially charged with “obscenity”, then “conspiracy to commit a felony” and ultimately with “lewd or dissolute conduct in a public place.”
The American Civil Liberties Union took the case and represented the actors. Twelve days after the arrests, the play was performed at The Florence Schwimley Little Theatre, in Berkeley. The audience included more than a hundred ACLU-invited expert witnesses, including political activists, academics, writers and even members of the clergy. Seven members of the Berkeley Police Department and the District Attorney’s office were also present. Five days later, the city of Berkeley brought its own charges of “lewd or dissolute conduct” against the play. It became a theatrical cause célèbre, until finally, after months of legal deliberation, Judge Joseph Karesh of the San Francisco Superior Court ruled that while the play did contain material of a troublesome nature, it was not appropriate to prosecute such work under the law. All the charges were dropped and the subsequent appeal lost.
Unable to perform in the San Francisco area, the play moved to Los Angeles where the play's attempt at a run was disrupted by the arrest of both Dixon and Bright at curtain down of fourteen consecutive performances. McClure recalls, “The actor and the actress actually got two standing ovations, one at the end of the play and the second when the police hauled them out of the door and into the waiting wagon and took them off to book them.”
The Beard eventually transferred to New York where in the 1967–1968 Obie Theatre Awards, it won Best Director and Best Actress. It has since played successfully all over the world and is a favorite with American university drama groups. It is interesting to note that the play has enjoyed particular success in London, having been produced there twice. In 1968, actor Rip Torn directed a notable production at The Royal Court Theatre and it has most recently been revived at a smaller venue, the Old Red Lion Theatre in 2006 under the direction of Nic Saunders with new music by Terry Riley. The play is currently out of print in both the US and UK. Saunders would collaborate with McClure a second time in 2008 on the award-winning short film Curses and Sermons which would mark the first time McClure had authorised a filmed adaptation of one of his poems.
Read more about this topic: Michael McClure