Oh! Calcutta! is a play with music (but not a Musical). Famous mostly for the amount of nudity involved, the play has seen several long running revivals on both Broadway and the West End.
Oh! Calcutta! provides examples of:
- Bilingual Bonus: The play was named after a painting of the same name
. It's a French pun meaning "Oh, what a lovely ass you have!"
- Dream Ballet: Interspersed throughout the play are several trippy interpretive dance numbers, including the opening act where the actors disrobe in time to music.
- Head-Turning Beauty: The nurse in the Doctor's Office sketch.
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Loads and Loads of Writers: Sketches were written by (among others) John Lennon, Sam Shepard and Samuel Beckett. - Long Runner: Oh! Calcutta! was the longest-running revue on Broadway, was the longest running revival and is currently the eighth longest-running play in Broadway history.
- Male Frontal Nudity: All the actors in the play, male and female alike, perform in the nude.
- Mood Whiplash: At the end of the "Jack and Jill" sketch, Jack rapes Jill, leaving her alone and comatose at the top of the hill.
- Popcultural Osmosis: You know of this play as "that naked show" even if you don't know anything else about it.
- Rape as Drama: See Mood Whiplash.
- Sketch Comedy: The show is a series of short skits and musical numbers with not a lot to unify their themes except the idea of sexuality.
- Small Reference Pools: There have been other plays with lots of nudity, but with the possible exception of Hair, this is the most famous (and Hair doesn't have much nudity in it anyway, just a little bit at the end of Act I).
