Its a crying shame that Lenny Bruce died many years before his time. We need someone with his humor more than ever today. Ive heard from so many people that off stage Lenny was just as cool and funny as he was on. An old friend of his, Fred Baker, made a film out of Lenny on and off stage and his many arrests back in the early 70s called Lenny Bruce Without Tears. Now its finally making it to DVD.
Buy Lenny Bruce Without Tears
Daniel Robert Epstein: I didnt realize until I got the DVD that this movie was originally made in 1972.
Fred Baker: Thats right. I was 40 years old when I made it so figure that out.
DRE: So youre 73 years old, hows that going for you?
FB: What, my age?
DRE: Yeah.
FB: It doesnt matter. The only way it matters is the kind of girls that are attracted to you.
DRE: How old are the ones you meet now?
FB: 45 year olds, thats not bad.
DRE: Thats pretty good.
FB: Not bad. At least proportionately you cant say that I was ever attracted to 12 year olds. But I was always attracted to younger, pretty women.
DRE: How did this documentary get started?
FB: I was a friend of Lennys and years ago I wanted Lenny to star in a movie I was going to make called Si Cuba. I was friendly with him around when he got busted at the Go-Go in 1963. He had taken a lot of the persecutions pretty badly because dealing with all the lawyers really broke him. What he was doing was never about shock value or titillation. He was an inventive comedian who did the definitive satirical work. Even though a lot of lawyers came to his aid he felt he could make his points better in court himself. But then he passed in 1966.
Then a few years after he died I said to my wife, Barbara, that we should do something on him. We had some recordings and films of his act and then we started long term research. Then I got a job as a writer/producer in New York at Channel Thirteen, WNET, educational television. My creative consultant at Channel Thirteen kept saying, Why dont we do something on Lenny? So we started in-depth research to see what was available. All of a sudden, stuff started coming in, like from Philadelphia and Chicago from when he was busted for obscenity and drugs. Then I got a myriad amount of the television performances he had done until we had enough stuff to start a proposal to Channel Thirteen. But then Thirteen said We feel youre wasting our time. Were not going to do a show on that because [one of their sponsors] Ford Foundation just wont go for it. Back then even educational television in those days was hampered by what was controversial. That was kind of an epiphany for me because I got fired from Thirteen for proposing that show about Lenny Bruce. Then I said that I wasnt going to leave all that Lenny Bruce material and they said Take it with you. We dont want it. Then I found an editor, Eddie Deitch, and thats the genesis for how the film got started.
DRE: If Lenny was alive today hed be about 80, what do you think hed be doing or do you think he was just destined never to live to 80?
FB: [laughs] Lenny Bruce at 80.
I think he would have been like George Burns except hed still be very incisive about social ills. Hed say devastating things about Bush and about the Iraqi War. Even in Without Tears you can see he started speaking about Vietnam albeit he was rah, rah America. He was not against the system; in fact he kind of believed in the system so much that he believed he would be exonerated in the system.
DRE: Its hard to believe that he was that nave.
FB: What he didnt realize was that the system didnt want you to make fun of the childishness and navet of what people believed in, whether it would be mom, apple pie or religion.
DRE: Was he a fun guy to hang out with?
FB: Hed make you piss in your pants.
I used to be an actor and before I knew Lenny I was acting in a show in Philadelphia called Critics Choice with Henry Fonda. After midnight there was some cafeteria that stayed open and all the show business people would go there and throw one liners at each other. Lenny Bruce was sitting at a table with Buddy Hackett and Fat Jack E. Leonard. They were doing shtick that would make you piss in your pants. So yeah, he was a very funny guy on and off the street.
DRE: What did you think of the documentary Lenny Bruce: Swear to Tell the Truth?
FB: [director] Robert Weide stole 40 minutes of my film, essentially, to make that film. I didnt know who he was in 1991 when he just blatantly came to my office and asked to borrow a print. I was nice enough to give it to him and he never brought it back. When I saw his film in 1998 I almost fell on my face. I saw entire fucking pieces of my movie intact! Then about six years later I got a call from someone saying they had a print of film and that they made a negative of it for someone. I asked who brought it to them and they told me it was from someone who said they worked for me. I went down there and figured out that it was the print Weide stole. He ripped off 40 minutes of my film and made a new film. Its like Lenny used to say, They took my act down, arrested me, sent me to court and then the policemen has to do the act for the judge.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
Buy Lenny Bruce Without Tears
Daniel Robert Epstein: I didnt realize until I got the DVD that this movie was originally made in 1972.
Fred Baker: Thats right. I was 40 years old when I made it so figure that out.
DRE: So youre 73 years old, hows that going for you?
FB: What, my age?
DRE: Yeah.
FB: It doesnt matter. The only way it matters is the kind of girls that are attracted to you.
DRE: How old are the ones you meet now?
FB: 45 year olds, thats not bad.
DRE: Thats pretty good.
FB: Not bad. At least proportionately you cant say that I was ever attracted to 12 year olds. But I was always attracted to younger, pretty women.
DRE: How did this documentary get started?
FB: I was a friend of Lennys and years ago I wanted Lenny to star in a movie I was going to make called Si Cuba. I was friendly with him around when he got busted at the Go-Go in 1963. He had taken a lot of the persecutions pretty badly because dealing with all the lawyers really broke him. What he was doing was never about shock value or titillation. He was an inventive comedian who did the definitive satirical work. Even though a lot of lawyers came to his aid he felt he could make his points better in court himself. But then he passed in 1966.
Then a few years after he died I said to my wife, Barbara, that we should do something on him. We had some recordings and films of his act and then we started long term research. Then I got a job as a writer/producer in New York at Channel Thirteen, WNET, educational television. My creative consultant at Channel Thirteen kept saying, Why dont we do something on Lenny? So we started in-depth research to see what was available. All of a sudden, stuff started coming in, like from Philadelphia and Chicago from when he was busted for obscenity and drugs. Then I got a myriad amount of the television performances he had done until we had enough stuff to start a proposal to Channel Thirteen. But then Thirteen said We feel youre wasting our time. Were not going to do a show on that because [one of their sponsors] Ford Foundation just wont go for it. Back then even educational television in those days was hampered by what was controversial. That was kind of an epiphany for me because I got fired from Thirteen for proposing that show about Lenny Bruce. Then I said that I wasnt going to leave all that Lenny Bruce material and they said Take it with you. We dont want it. Then I found an editor, Eddie Deitch, and thats the genesis for how the film got started.
DRE: If Lenny was alive today hed be about 80, what do you think hed be doing or do you think he was just destined never to live to 80?
FB: [laughs] Lenny Bruce at 80.
I think he would have been like George Burns except hed still be very incisive about social ills. Hed say devastating things about Bush and about the Iraqi War. Even in Without Tears you can see he started speaking about Vietnam albeit he was rah, rah America. He was not against the system; in fact he kind of believed in the system so much that he believed he would be exonerated in the system.
DRE: Its hard to believe that he was that nave.
FB: What he didnt realize was that the system didnt want you to make fun of the childishness and navet of what people believed in, whether it would be mom, apple pie or religion.
DRE: Was he a fun guy to hang out with?
FB: Hed make you piss in your pants.
I used to be an actor and before I knew Lenny I was acting in a show in Philadelphia called Critics Choice with Henry Fonda. After midnight there was some cafeteria that stayed open and all the show business people would go there and throw one liners at each other. Lenny Bruce was sitting at a table with Buddy Hackett and Fat Jack E. Leonard. They were doing shtick that would make you piss in your pants. So yeah, he was a very funny guy on and off the street.
DRE: What did you think of the documentary Lenny Bruce: Swear to Tell the Truth?
FB: [director] Robert Weide stole 40 minutes of my film, essentially, to make that film. I didnt know who he was in 1991 when he just blatantly came to my office and asked to borrow a print. I was nice enough to give it to him and he never brought it back. When I saw his film in 1998 I almost fell on my face. I saw entire fucking pieces of my movie intact! Then about six years later I got a call from someone saying they had a print of film and that they made a negative of it for someone. I asked who brought it to them and they told me it was from someone who said they worked for me. I went down there and figured out that it was the print Weide stole. He ripped off 40 minutes of my film and made a new film. Its like Lenny used to say, They took my act down, arrested me, sent me to court and then the policemen has to do the act for the judge.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
VIEW 6 of 6 COMMENTS
"I feel terrible about Bruce. We drove him into poverty and bankruptcy and then murdered him. I watched him gradually fall apart. It's the only thing I did in Hogan's office that I'm really ashamed of. We all knew what we were doing. We used the law to kill him."
Great site for trial info. Another DVD of one of his last performances has also been just released.