Fugs Film!
PhilaMoca
531 N 12th St.
Philadelphia
Nov. 11, 2026
The artistic and political revolution of the 1960s is often characterized as a complete rupture in American popular culture. While young people did use music, art, protest, direct action, drugs and even sex to introduce new ways of thinking and being into the zeitgeist, these upheavals were not without precedent. If anything, the youth revolution of the '60s was a continuation of the rebellions launched by the leftists of the 1930s, the beboppers and beatniks of the 1940s, and the rock n’ rollers of the 50s. The psychedelic “Summer of Love” may have put American youth rebellion on the mainstream’s radar, but like most great things, it did not come out of nowhere.
One of the most important and influential bands to prefigure psychedelia and the rise of the American counterculture were The Fugs. Formed in 1964 (the same year comedian Lenny Bruce was arrested for “obscenity” on stage), they combined folk and rock n' roll with sexually explicit humor and experimental poetry. The Fugs were avatars of the mid-'60s underground; still, they won over famous fans like Bob Dylan, Robert Crumb and Paul McCarney. Crude yet insightful, raw yet complex and punk before punk, The Fugs have been aptly described by musician Jeffrey Lewis as “one of the strangest and most incredible bands of the ‘60s.” On Wednesday, Nov. 11, PhilaMoca hosted a screening of Chuck Smith’s 2025 documentary on the iconoclastic band. Fugs Film! mixes new interviews and animation with beautiful archival footage to dive deep into the band’s story against the backdrop of the turbulent and revelatory ‘60s.
The film opens with footage of a conservative speaker condemning the supposed widespread perversion infiltrating American youth culture. This footage is quickly interrupted with the Fugs' song “Boobs a Lot,” and the image of a man being motorboated. This kind of irreverent, subversive spirit is the heart of the band and this definitive documentary on them. Wild, profound and perpetually horny, the band framed its crassness as part of an assault on prudishness and conservative mores of American society. In addition to documenting the band’s rise and inner workings, the film does a fantastic job of illustrating the rich scene that produced The Fugs. The band was formed at Peace Eye book store on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where artists and poets published explicit and avant-garde art and poetry zines. The band was also influenced by the Beat poets, Manhattan’s folk scene and the burgeoning anti-war movement. This unique cultural gumbo formed the bones of The Fugs and made them attractive to listeners. From there, the film covers the ups, downs, philosophy and significant career beats of the bands. An allstar cast of admirers like Lewis, Robert and Aline Crumb and Lenny Kaye show up to give the band their due. The film closes with a lovely moment from 2022 when the band’s surviving members reunited to record a new song based around a recording of deceased member, Naphtali "Tuli" Kupferberg. Although The Fugs only lasted five years, their influence on psychedelic rock, poetry, punk and freak-folk cannot be overstated. In an era when the weirdos, freaks and revolutionaries stepped to the forefront, The Fugs stood out as true exemplars of outcasts who are willing to fight the good fight.
