The Fugs, a group of poet-musicians, were virtually conceived and developed on the off-Broadway stage. They performed first at the Bridge Theater. After a run of a full two weeks, Ed Sanders, poet, editor, owner of the fabled Peace Eye Book Store and leader of the group, decided the show was ready for a cross-country tour. In a borrowed Volkswagen bus, the Fugs stormed suprised academies from the Kinsey Institute in Bloomington, Indiana to the University of Kansas and on to Berkeley.

The Fugs satirized everything from political involvement and patriotism to rock and roll, from war and hate to super-abundant love. The Fugs performed about 15 of their 110 songs per show and presented 12 shows a week during their theater runs. Rather than object to the rigor of the long run, they became more and more intrigued by the possibibilities of the theater through constantly changing and adding to their repertoire. The Fugs were an ever-evolving improvisational review.

The Fugs consisted of three members: Tuli Kupferberg, native New Yorker and "one of the leading Anarchist theorists of our time," Ken Weaver, humorist and poet, and Ed Sanders, poet and leader of the group.