on the Francis J. Greenburger Mainstage
October 30, 2017 at 7pm
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FoxHog Productions presents Barney’s Wall, a feature-length documentary, that probes the psyche of literary bad-boy, Grove Press publisher Barney Rosset, whose legendary censorship battles smashed sexual taboos and blew open American culture and politics to let in avante-garde writers and thinkers. Grove Press and its in-house publication Evergreen Review introduced millions of young intellectuals to the hippest currents in literature, theater, film and revolutionary politics.
“A surreal mural reveals the obsessions behind Barney Rosset’s lifelong rebellion against governmental authority and conventional morality.” – Sandy Gotham Meehan, Producer
Flamboyant, principled and provocative, Barney changed the cultural landscape of America. His defiant publication in the early 1960’s of D.H. Lawrence’s then-banned Lady Chatterly’s Lover, Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer and William Burrough’s Naked Lunch landed him in costly First Amendment battles that led all the way to the Supreme Court. These relentless crusades broke the back of that era’s literary censorship laws, which were abolished in landmark decisions. Grove went on to publish now canonical, then avant-garde, authors ranging from Samuel Beckett and Jean Genet to the Beats and Malcolm X, and – after yet another First Amendment battle – to the distribution of the classic erotic film, “I Am Curious Yellow.” At his death in 2012, every major publication in America lauded Barney Rosset as one of the country’s most effective advocates of the right to read, publish and create without fear of intimidation, retribution or humiliation.
Some of Barney’s ‘RADS’ included: Henry Miller, Williams S. Burroughs, Samuel Beckett,
Malcolm X, Jack Kerouac, Che Guevara, Harold Pinter, David Mamet, Susan Sontag,
The Marquis De Sade, Kenzaburo OE, John Kennedy O’Toole.
The film employs as a portal an unknown late-life 15’x12′ surreal collage-mural, painted by Barney in his late ’80’s in his NYC East Village loft.
Barney’s Wall documents the emotional power of the mural through the commentary of an eclectic cast of avant-garde writers, editors, artists, filmmakers, publishers, actors, musicians, and lifetime friends and family of Barney who were invited after his death by the filmmakers to freely ’riff’ upon his last masterpiece. The cast’s wildly imaginative, and frequently humorous interpretations and free associations are a celebration of the art of self-expression and an affirmation of Thoreau’s observation that it is not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.
Following the screening there will be a panel discussion with John Turturro, Lisa Dwan, Sandy Gotham Meehan, Bill Irwin & Conor and Judy Hegarty Lovett.
Moderated by Dr. Lois Oppenheim.