1958- Lenny Bruce debuts at queer SF club

To the Bay Area Reporter:

A question for queerstorians:
What does Lenny Bruce have to do with SF queerdom?


Hint: According to BENEATH THE DIAMOND SKY, "The acerbic comic Lenny Bruce had his first major club engagement at Ann's 440 in January 1958...." (p. 25).
And according to WIDE OPEN TOWN, Ann's 440 was a queer venue, from 1952 to 1962, in North Beach.


This doomed rebel was the most controversial of a new breed of critical "comedians", who try to do more than amuse. North Beach, as bohemia and "sin zone", was a cultural womb for this culturally subversive trend; tho straight venues usually get the credit.


Could experts please shed more light on the role of Bay Area queers,
if any, in nurturing avant-garde performers of the Fifties and Sixties?


Tortuga Bi LIBERTY
San Francisco

Couch Potato Day
(Sunday, 6 February 2005)