For 45 years, a raucous musical revue show in San Francisco has lured locals and tourists alike, including the Queen, Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall.

Beach Blanket Babylon claims to be the longest-running show of its kind in the world. It also features hats of improbable dimensions.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Silver San Francisco Skyline hat, based on Steve Silver’s original sketches and designs, created for the 25th anniversary of Beach Blanket Babylon in 1999. Photograph: Courtesy Beach Blanket Babylon archive

But on Wednesday, producer Jo Schuman Silver, the widow of creator Steve Silver, announced to her team of 85 staffers that the final performance of Beach Blanket Babylon would take place on 31 December.

“Steve always said to me, ‘You will know when the right time is,’” Schuman Silver says. “The show is at the top of its game. He left me the show. He knew I would be able to do it. He said, ‘Jo, you’ll know!’”

These days, the gentrifying and increasingly unaffordable San Francisco is reeling from a spate of closures. Decades-old bars and restaurants are shuttering everywhere, so the end of Beach Blanket Babylon has hit the city hard.

Boasting a longer lifespan than Saturday Night Live, it distills absurd costumes, topical references, and a mildly bawdy sensibility into one unique package. Each show is framed by Snow White’s search for Prince Charming, but Beach Blanket Babylon circumnavigates the globe, encountering figures such as Melania Trump, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and whoever might be in the news that week.

Every costume reveals a more elaborate costume – there are 10 to 12 outfit changes for a 90-minute performance – and every number is a showcase for a vocalist’s chops. And then there are the hats the size of a small European car. They come in the shape of San Francisco landmarks: the Golden Gate Bridge, Coit Tower, the Transamerica Pyramid, a row of Victorians, a Chinatown pagoda.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest An actor plays Kim Kardashian in Steve Silver’s Beach Blanket Babylon at Club Fugazi in San Francisco’s North Beach district. Photograph: Rick Markovich

With barely a moment to catch your breath, the show is designed to be enjoyed and appreciated by the least culturally aware person in the very back row. If audience members don’t recognize the public figure being lampooned on stage, they can squint and probably see their name written on the character’s T-shirt or emblazoned on an oversized button pinned to their lapel.

Steve Silver began Beach Blanket as street theater, and its initial run was only expected to be six weeks. It was bold, though not as assertively pansexual or in-your-face as shorter-lived troupes like the Cockettes. The power broker and former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown famously dismissed it before becoming an outspoken fan, and a 1989 performance at the Oscars was not particularly well received. Disney threatened to sue over the use of Snow White.

Yet over the years, Beach Blanket Babylon became that rare thing: an icon beloved by locals and tourists alike. Undoubtedly, the hats were a key element. Actors who wear them are given particular exercises and regular check-ups, and several examples have become museum pieces. Such is the instantly recognizable power of those hats that an actress wearing one can wordlessly assist at a ribbon-cutting for a tourist attraction at Fisherman’s Wharf, lending legitimacy and cachet just by smiling.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Queen, Mary Martin, Tony Bennett and Steve Silver together in 1983. Photograph: Courtesy of Beach Blanket Babylon

Famous guests have included the prince and duchess, who saw a special performance during their first joint official tour of the US in 2005. The Queen met Steve Silver in 1983, and also saw a performance.

The costume designer Jayne Serpa was hired in 1990 and estimates she has outfitted between 100 and 150 actors. “The quickest turnaround I think was Kate Middleton’s wedding dress,” she says. “I was very grateful that [Middleton] had simple tastes, let’s put it that way.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Washington hat, created and designed by Steve Silver in 1982. Photograph: Courtesy Beach Blanket Babylon archive

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Dish hat, created and designed by Steve Silver in 1978. Photograph: Courtesy Beach Blanket Babylon archive

Some actors have remained with the company for 25 years or more. Paul Hovannes is among the newest principal cast members, having joined last August to play Bill Clinton, Eric Trump and Freddie Mercury – a recent addition – plus a number of background characters and one of the dancing french poodles, which have became a staple of the show.

“When I saw the guys dancing in poodle suits, it was so unlike anything I would ever consider doing on stage myself,” Hovannes says. “But once you get in an actual suit, it’s the most fun. It’s impossible not to smile in those outfits.”

The show is such a fixture that the block of Green Street on which the the 373-seat Club Fugazi, the show’s home, is located was designated Beach Blanket Babylon Boulevard in 1996. Now Club Fugazi will have to fill its seats some other way.

Schuman Silver compares the closure to Jerry Seinfeld’s decision to end his 1990s sitcom after nine seasons, just as it reached No 1 in the ratings. The tightknit crew of alumni have all “been on the phone with each other making plans for New Year’s Eve”, she says.

But that’s still to come. “We have to take care of the show right now and make sure every performance is wonderful,” she says “So that’s not the priority right now. We still have shows to do.”





