'Oh! Calcutta!' blocked from Adelaide stage in 1971 by the state's full court; Lance Shilton heads strong opposition

The Oh! Calcutta! revue had already started its runs of thousands of performances in New York and London when it was banned in 19871 from being staged in Adelaide. South Australia attorney general Len King (top right) had his injunction to stop the show rejected by chief justice John Bray (bottom right) but Bray was later outvoted on the state's full court

Adelaide never saw Oh, Calcutta! – touted as the “most controversial show in Broadway history” – after it was blocked by a majority of the South Australian full court in 1971 upholding an injunction against the revue being staged in the city in 1971.

The Kenneth Tynan-created Oh! Calcutta! had opened in New York and London in 1970 for what became thousands of performances. Taking its name from a pun on "O quel cul t'as! " – French for "Oh, what an arse you have!” – the revue featured male and female nudity.

Following his Victorian counterpart’s successful action, Len King, the Catholic attorney general in Don Dunstan’s South Australian Labor government, decided, without a state cabinet decision, to apply for an injunction against Oh! Calcutta! being staged in Adelaide. This was refused by chief justice John Bray.

The writ that forced the injunction to the South Australian full court came from the Moral Action Committee formed by Lance Shilton, high-profile rector of the Holy Trinity Anglican church on North Terrace, Adelaide city, since 1957. Shilton had built a strong media presence, speaking regularly on radio state 5DN’s closing religious Meditations and writing a “Guideline” column for The Advertiser to maintain the momentum of the 1959 Billy Graham Crusade in Adelaide that he strongly supported.

Shilton’s knack for publicity was aided by Helen Caterer, a journalist on the Sunday Mail mewspaper and a member of the Holy Trinity congregation. Shilton was unafraid of wading into social issues such as vigorously opposing the state Labor government’s move to introduce TAB horse betting outlets.

Shilton ignited a major campaign against Oh! Calcutta coming to Adelaide. He presented a petition with more than 15,000 signatures against the revue to the state parliament in April 1971. Shilton convened the Moral Action Committee to rally people against the show and similar secular trends. In response, Adelaide people demonstrated outside the Holy Trinity church on Sunday nights, hostile to criticisms of their claim to enjoy life unfettered by wowsers. Shilton confidently argued his case with them on the footpath, watched by an excited media.

Shilton followed with a strong Sunday Mail piece, “Call us wowsers”, reasserting the right of those concerned with moral standards to make Holy Trinity the place where their voice was heard against the strident claims of libertarians such as Max Harris, bookseller and literateur. Shilton published the hard-hitting book No No Calcutta, with contributors including John Court, university psychology professor and a Holy Trinity church member, on pornography’s effects on ordinary people.

The South Australian full court’s decision to dismiss Oh! Calcutta! promoter Bob Huber’s appeal against a supreme court injunction on the revue caused him to abandon it and the $150,00 investment. In the full court, chief justice Bray differed from justices George Walters and Andrew Wells. Walters believed, and Wells agreed, “the review would involve acts of indecent behaviour in a public place.” Bray argued the limits of theatre entry meant it wasn’t strictly a public place that “I would not have thought the criminal nature of the performance was so conclusively demonstrated” and “I do not think the civil court, for the first time in 600 years, should now enter the new field of attempting to prevent in advance the commission of offences against public morality and decency”.

Promoter Bob Huber said the lack of response to his appeal for help to take his case to the high court of Australia, and the absence of public protest at the full court decision, showed South Australian liberalism hadn’t yet extended to accepting the mix of masturbation, rape, intercourse, homosexuality and sadism in the Oh! Calcutta! sketches, even with the promised theatrical aids of dimmed lights and smoke screens.