THE PEOPLE VERSUS LENNY BRUCE Comes to 3 West Club This Week

Food For Thought Productions continues celebrating the oft-neglected one-act play and theatre at its best with Award-winning actors, writers and directors, with a unique series set for its 2023 Season. The People Versus Lenny Bruce is the third segment of "All The Court's A Stage," a series of one-act plays that are based on seven of Martin Garbus‘ cases and directed by Antony Marsellis.

Martin Garbus, who has been called “One of the world’s finest trial lawyers”, has represented: Lenny Bruce, Philip Roth, Samuel Beckett, Igor Stravinsky, John Cheever, Daniel Ellsberg, Al Pacino, and Susan Sontag, to name a few! He also smuggled letters from Andrei Sakharov to Jimmy Carter.

 

In April 1964, Lenny Bruce appeared twice at the Cafe Au Go Go in Greenwich Village, with undercover police detectives in the audience. He was arrested along with club owners Howard and Elly Solomon, who were arrested for allowing an obscene performance. On both occasions, Bruce was arrested after leaving the stage. A three-judge panel presided over his widely publicized six-month trial, prosecuted by Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Richard Kuh, with Ephraim London and Martin Garbus as the defense attorneys. Bruce and Howard Solomon were found guilty of obscenity on November 4, 1964. The conviction was announced despite positive testimony and petitions of support from—among other artists, writers and educators—Woody Allen, Bob Dylan, Jules Feiffer, Allen Ginsberg, Norman Mailer, William Styron, and James Baldwin, and Manhattan journalist and television personality Dorothy Kilgallen and sociologist Herbert Gans. Bruce was sentenced to four months in a workhouse; he was set free on bail during the appeals process and died before the appeal was decided. Solomon, the owner of the club where Lenny was arrested, later saw Bruce's conviction overturned

 

The October 3rd, 2:00pm performance (Preceded by luncheon), directed by Antony Marsellis, will be available live via Streaming as well as in-theatre audience. A Q&A will follow the performance with the cast, Playwright/FFTP Founder Susan Charlotte, Directror Antony Marsellis and Martin Garbus himself! The FFT series is presented at 3 West Club. Tickets for the ‘live’ performance are $65, and with discounted code ‘FFTP’ tickets are $45. For additional information and zoom tickets please contact FFTP at: 646-366-9340 or email:  info@foodforthoughtproductions.com

 

FOOD FOR THOUGHT PRODUCTIONS was created by award-winning playwright Susan Charlotte to provide a home for the oft-neglected one-act play. FFTP has presented over a thousand shows with Oscar, Tony and Emmy award winning writers, actors and directors including Arthur Miller, August Wilson, Elaine May, Mary Alice, Elaine Stritch, Marian Seldes, Danny Aiello, Kathleen Turner, Tony Roberts, Carole Shelley, Peter Bogdonovich, Judd Hirsch, Marcia Gay Harden, Mary Bond Davis, Eric Stoltz, Kyra Sedgwick, Rosie Perez, Judith Light, Christine Baranski, Earl Hyman, Rita Moreno and so on. Food For Thought keeps going. As the world keeps changing and the unanswered questions continue to grow it is comforting to know that there is still something people can count on.