Pull My Daisy

A short 1959 film that typifies the "Beat Generation". Directed by Robert Frank and Alfred Leslie, Daisy was adapted by Jack Kerouac from the third act of a never-completed stage play entitled Beat Generation. Kerouac also provided improvised narration. It starred Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, Larry Rivers, Peter Orlovsky, David Amram, Richard Bellamy, Alice Neel, Sally Gross, Delphine Seyrig and Pablo Frank, Robert Frank's then-infant son. Based on an incident in the life of Neal Cassady and his wife Carolyn, Daisy tells the story of a railway brakeman whose painter wife invites a respectable bishop over for dinner. However, the brakeman's bohemian friends crash the party, with comic results. Originally intended to be called "The Beat Generation" the title "Pull My Daisy" was taken from the poem of the same name written by Kerouac, Ginsberg and Neal Cassady over the 40's and 50's. Part of the original poem was used as a lyric in David Amram's jazz composition that opens the film.

Pull My Daisy: A Bebop Revolution