A 31-minute edit of Jerry Lewis' infamous film has surfaced on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/160821734/c055c9bee4
Story here: http://www.masslive.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2016/06/the_day_the_clown_cried_famed.html
My take: While the world might not have been ready in the early '70s for a film that took this kind of a risk, let's not forget that when Roberto Benigni did it, 25 years later, he won the flippin' Oscar.