ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) – Long after four letter words in stand-up comedy lost their ability to shock, foul-mouthed comic Lenny Bruce – the pioneer of the trend that turned edgy nightclub comics into millionaires and stars – was posthumously pardoned Tuesday for his 1964 obscenity conviction.
Contemporary Tommy Smothers of The Smothers Brothers said Bruce would likely deadpan: “It’s about time. You finally got it.”
The campaign to win a pardon from Republican Gov. George Pataki for Bruce was supported by his ex-wife and daughter, more than two dozen First Amendment lawyers and entertainers including Robin Williams, the Smothers Brothers and Penn and Teller.
On Tuesday, they said the pardon was a victory for the First Amendment and for the legacy of the pioneering comic who helped transform and ferociously protect his art.
“He was a hero to comedians and to me also, a man who did not change his viewpoints in spite of all the odds against him and never quit fighting for what he believed,” Smothers said. “That is important, probably more than the content, the ability to stand up and fight for the right to express oneself.”
Bruce’s arrest came during a November 1964 performance at Cafe Au Go Go in Greenwich Village. He used more than 100 “obscene” words, according to undercover New York City police detectives who attended the show, and was charged with giving an obscene performance.
He was convicted following a six-month trial and then mishandled his own appeal, refusing to follow the court’s rules. He died with the conviction still on the books, although biographers said the public generally assumed it had been set aside decades ago given that the nightclub owner had his conviction overturned.
Despite Bruce’s frenetic stage presence, carrying the mantle of free speech in the cultural wars of the 1960s wore him down. Facing legal and financial problems, the innovator of modern standup comedy died in 1966 of a drug overdose. He was 40.
“He didn’t choose to be a poster child for free speech,” said Smothers, who lost his network TV show years later over pointed comedy about the Vietnam War and the Catholic Church. “I think he was very uncomfortable with that. He never wanted that.”
“I saw him about six months before he passed away,” Smothers recalled. “He was kind of a broken man. He was absolutely obsessed with his cause … I remember we were at a friend’s house who lived next door and he said, “Hey, man, can you loan me some money?’ and I wrote him a check for 50 bucks. He was broken, but his courage never stopped, but his essence, his joie de vivre, was kind of taken away from him.”
Pataki called the first posthumous pardon in New York state history “a declaration of New York’s commitment to upholding the First Amendment.”
“This shows that First Amendment freedoms are as important today as they were in 1964,” said Ron Collins, co-author of the 2002 book “The Trials of Lenny Bruce” with David Skover and one of those who petitioned for the pardon. “It’s a good omen for artists.”
“I think in the same way that jazz is a purely American art form, so is standup comedy,” said Robert Corn-Revere, the lead attorney for the Bruce forces. “One of the things Lenny did was transform standup comedy from being about mothers-in-law and gag jokes and impressions and he made it topical, he made it relevant. And even though he did so in words that sometimes were impolite to some and offensive to others, he really was something of a phenomena that transformed that art form.”
Corn-Revere praised Pataki for the pardon of Bruce, who spent four months in jail.
“This is the kind of decision that is made for one reason only: The principle. The principle is that people can’t be turned into criminals for speaking words,” Corn-Revere said.
“Obviously, a pardon after a person’s death is necessarily symbolic in nature,” said Floyd Abrams, lawyer, First Amendment expert and member of the campaign to pardon Bruce. “But the symbolism of Governor Pataki’s action is forward-looking, speech-protective and humanity-advancing. I think the decision today is really a major step forward in recognizing the mistreatment of Lenny Bruce personally and of the First Amendment that Bruce defended. It’s a New Year’s gift.”
Bruce’s patrons included television’s Steve Allen, who put Bruce on his show when Bruce was shunned by others.
In 1999, Allen said of Bruce: “Lenny was a social philosopher; he was always making points. A lot of today’s comics just use four-letter words or talk about ladies’ underwear or whatever, for shock or … sleaze value, mainly that’s because that’s all they have to offer.”
Comedian-actor Steve Martin said he grew up listening to Bruce’s albums.
Bruce’s life was the subject of numerous articles, books and documentaries. In 1974, Bob Fosse’s devastating film biography, “Lenny,” brought Dustin Hoffman an Academy Award nomination. In 1999, HBO aired “Lenny Bruce: Swear to Tell the Truth,” a documentary narrated by Robert De Niro and nominated for a documentary feature Oscar.
In a pardon explanation that Bruce might have found tempting fodder for his act, Republican Pataki said: “Freedom of speech is one of the greatest American liberties and I hope this pardon serves as a reminder of the precious freedoms we are fighting to preserve as we continue to wage the war on terror.”
Pataki’s announced Bruce’s pardon as an addendum to a news release headlined: “Governor Pataki Grants Clemency to an Inmate.”
The inmate had been convicted on a drug-possession charge.
AP-ES-12-23-03 1546EST
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