Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx (/ˈɡraʊtʃoʊ/; October 2, 1890 – August 19, 1977) was an American comedian, actor, writer, and singer who performed in films and vaudeville on television, radio, and the stage.[1] He is considered one of America's greatest comedians.[2]
Marx made 13 feature films as a team with his brothers, who performed under the name the Marx Brothers, of whom he was the third born. He also had a successful solo career, primarily on radio and television, most notably as the host of the game show You Bet Your Life.[1]
His distinctive appearance, carried over from his days in vaudeville, included quirks such as an exaggerated stooped posture, spectacles, cigar, and a thick greasepaint mustache (later a real mustache) and eyebrows. These exaggerated features resulted in the creation of one of the most recognizable and ubiquitous novelty disguises, known as Groucho glasses: a one-piece mask consisting of horn-rimmed glasses, a large plastic nose, bushy eyebrows and brush mustache.[3]
Early life
Julius Henry Marx was born on October 2, 1890, in Manhattan, New York City.[4] Marx stated that he was born in a room above a butcher's shop on East 78th Street, "Between Lexington and Third", as he told Dick Cavett in a 1969 television interview.[5] The Marx children grew up in a turn-of-the-century building at 179 East 93rd Street off Lexington Avenue in a neighborhood now known as Carnegie Hill on the Upper East Side of the borough of Manhattan. His older brother Harpo, in his memoir Harpo Speaks, called the building "the first real home I knew".[6] It was populated with European immigrants, mostly artisans. Just across the street were the oldest brownstones in the area, owned by people including the well-connected Loew Brothers and William Orth. The Marx family lived there "for about 14 years", Groucho also told Cavett.
The only known photo of all five Marx brothers with their parents in New York City, 1915; from left: Groucho (aged 25), Gummo (aged 22), Minnie (mother), Zeppo (aged 14), Frenchie (father), Chico (aged 28), and Harpo (aged 27)
Marx's family was Jewish.[7] His mother was Miene "Minnie" Schoenberg, whose family came from Dornum in northern Germany when she was 16 years old. His father was Simon "Sam" Marx, who changed his name from Marrix, and was called "Frenchie" by his sons throughout his life, because he and his family came from Alsace in France.[8] Minnie's brother was Al Schoenberg, who shortened his name to Al Shean when he went into show business as half of Gallagher and Shean, a noted vaudeville act of the early 20th century. According to Marx, when Shean visited, he would throw the local waifs a few coins so that when he knocked at the door he would be surrounded by adoring fans. Marx and his brothers respected his opinions and asked him on several occasions to write some material for them.[citation needed]
Minnie Marx did not have an entertainment industry career but had intense ambition for her sons to go on the stage like their uncle. While pushing her second son Leonard (Chico Marx) in piano lessons, she found that Julius had a pleasant soprano voice and the ability to remain on key. Julius's early career goal was to become a doctor, but the family's need for income forced him out of school at the age of twelve. By that time Julius had become a voracious reader, particularly fond of Horatio Alger. Marx continued to overcome his lack of formal education by becoming very well-read.[citation needed]
After a few stabs at entry-level office work and jobs suitable for adolescents, Marx took to the stage as a boy singer with the Gene Leroy Trio, debuting at the Ramona Theatre in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on July 16, 1905.[9] Marx reputedly claimed that he was "hopelessly average" as a vaudevillian, but this was typical Marx, wisecracking in his true form. By 1909, Minnie Marx had assembled her sons into an undistinguished vaudeville singing group billed as "The Four Nightingales". The brothers Julius, Milton (Gummo Marx) and Arthur (originally Adolph, but Harpo Marx from 1911) and another boy singer, Lou Levy, traveled the U.S. vaudeville circuits to little fanfare. After exhausting their prospects in the East, the family moved to La Grange, Illinois, to play the Midwest.[citation needed]
After a particularly dispiriting performance in Nacogdoches, Texas, Julius, Milton, and Arthur began cracking jokes onstage for their own amusement. Much to their surprise, the audience liked them better as comedians than as singers. They modified the then-popular Gus Edwards comedy skit "School Days" and renamed it "Fun In Hi Skule". The Marx Brothers performed variations on this routine for the next seven years.[citation needed]
For a time in Vaudeville, all the brothers performed using ethnic accents. Leonard, the oldest, developed the Italian accent he used as Chico Marx to convince some roving bullies that he was Italian, not Jewish. Arthur, the next oldest, donned a curly red wig and became "Patsy Brannigan", a stereotypical Irish character. His discomfort when speaking on stage led to his uncle Al Shean's suggestion that he stop speaking altogether and play the role in mime. Julius Marx's character from "Fun In Hi Skule" was an ethnic German, so Julius played him with a German accent. After the sinking of the RMSLusitania in 1915, public anti-German sentiment was widespread, and Marx's German character was booed, so he dropped the accent and developed the fast-talking wise-guy character that became his trademark.[citation needed]
The Marx Brothers became the biggest comedic stars of the Palace Theatre in New York, which billed itself as the "Valhalla of Vaudeville". Brother Chico's deal-making skills resulted in three hit plays on Broadway. No other comedy routine had ever so infected the Broadway circuit. All of this stage work predated their Hollywood career. By the time the Marxes made their first movie, they were already major stars with sharply honed skills; and by the time Groucho was relaunched to stardom in television on You Bet Your Life, he had been performing successfully for half a century.[citation needed]
Career
Vaudeville
Marx started his career in vaudeville in 1905 when he joined up with an act called The Leroy Trio.[10] He answered a newspaper want ad by a man named Robin Leroy who was looking for a boy to join his group as a singer. Marx was hired along with fellow vaudeville actor Johnny Morris. Through this act, Marx got his first taste of life as a vaudeville performer. In 1909, Marx and his brothers had become a group act, at first called The Three Nightingales and later The Four Nightingales.[10] The brothers' mother, Minnie Marx, was the group's manager, putting them together and booking their shows. The group had a rocky start, performing in less than adequate venues and rarely, if ever, being paid for their performances.[10] Eventually brother Milton (Gummo) left the act to serve in World War I and was replaced by Herbert (Zeppo), and the group became known as the Marx Brothers.[10] Their first successful show was Fun In Hi Skule (1910).[10]
Motion pictures
The Marx Brothers in 1931 (from top, Chico, Harpo, Groucho and Zeppo)
Marx made 26 movies, including 13 with his brothers Chico and Harpo.[11] Marx developed a routine as a wisecracking hustler with a distinctive chicken-walking lope, an exaggerated greasepaint mustache and eyebrows and an ever-present cigar, improvising insults to stuffy dowagers (frequently played by Margaret Dumont) and anyone else who stood in his way. As the Marx Brothers, he and his brothers starred in a series of popular stage shows and movies.
Their first movie was a silent film made in 1921 that was only shown once, in the Bronx,[11] and is believed to have been destroyed shortly afterward. A decade later, the team made their last two Broadway shows—The Cocoanuts and Animal Crackers[11]—into movies. Other successful films were Monkey Business, Horse Feathers, Duck Soup and A Night at the Opera.[11] One quip from Marx concerned his response to Sam Wood, the director of A Night at the Opera. Furious with the Marx Brothers' ad-libs and antics on the set, Wood yelled in disgust: "You can't make an actor out of clay." Marx responded, "Nor a director out of Wood."[12]
Marx also worked as a radio comedian and show host. One of his earliest stints was a short-lived series in 1932, Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel, costarring Chico. Though most of the scripts and discs were thought to have been destroyed, all but one of the scripts were found in 1988 in the Library of Congress. In 1947, Marx was asked to host a radio quiz program You Bet Your Life. It was broadcast by ABC and then CBS before moving to NBC. It moved from radio to television on October 5, 1950, and ran for eleven years. It was largely sponsored by DeSoto automobiles and Marx sometimes appeared in the commercials. Filmed before an audience, the show consisted of Marx bantering with the contestants and ad-libbing jokes before briefly quizzing them. The announcer for the show was George Fenneman. The show was responsible for popularizing the phrases "Say the secret word and the duck will come down and give you fifty dollars," "Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?" and "What color is the White House?" (asked to reward a losing contestant a consolation prize).[13]
In public and off-camera, Harpo and Chico were hard to recognize without their wigs and costumes, and it was almost impossible for fans to recognize Groucho without his trademark eyeglasses, fake eyebrows, and mustache.
The greasepaint mustache and eyebrows originated spontaneously prior to a vaudeville performance in the early 1920s when he did not have time to apply the pasted-on mustache he had been using (or, according to his autobiography, simply did not enjoy the removal of the mustache because of the effects of tearing an adhesive bandage off the same patch of skin every night). After applying the greasepaint mustache, a quick glance in the mirror revealed his natural hair eyebrows were too undertoned and did not match the rest of his face, so Marx added the greasepaint to his eyebrows and headed for the stage. The absurdity of the greasepaint was never discussed on-screen, but in a famous scene in Duck Soup, where both Chicolini (Chico) and Pinky (Harpo) disguise themselves as Groucho, they are briefly seen applying the greasepaint, implicitly answering any question a viewer might have had about where he got his mustache and eyebrows.
Marx was asked to apply the greasepaint mustache once more for You Bet Your Life when it came to television, but he refused, opting instead to grow a real one, which he wore for the rest of his life. By this time, his eyesight had weakened enough for him to actually need corrective lenses; before then, his eyeglasses had merely been a stage prop. He debuted this new, and now much-older, appearance in Love Happy, the Marx Brothers's last film as a comedy team.
Marx did paint the old character mustache over his real one on a few rare occasions, including a TV sketch with Jackie Gleason on the latter's variety show in the 1960s (in which they performed a variation on the song "Mister Gallagher and Mister Shean", co-written by Marx's uncle Al Shean) and the 1968 Otto Preminger film Skidoo. In his late 70s at the time, Marx remarked on his appearance: "I looked like I was embalmed." He played a mob boss called "God" and, according to Marx, "both my performance and the film were God-awful!"
The exaggerated walk, with one hand on the small of his back and his torso bent almost 90 degrees at the waist, was a parody of a fad from the 1880s and 1890s.[citation needed] Fashionable young men of the upper classes would affect a walk with their right hand held fast to the base of their spines, and with a slight lean forward at the waist and a very slight twist toward the right with the left shoulder, allowing the left hand to swing free with the gait. Edmund Morris, in his biography The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, describes a young Roosevelt, newly elected to the State Assembly, walking into the House Chamber for the first time in this trendy, affected gait, somewhat to the amusement of the older and more rural members.[14] Marx exaggerated this fad to a marked degree, and the comedic effect was enhanced by how out of date the fashion was by the 1940s and 1950s.
Personal life
The Marx Brothers (clockwise from bottom: Groucho, Chico, and Harpo) by Yusuf Karsh, 1946
Marx's three marriages ended in divorce. His first wife was chorus girl Ruth Johnson (m. 1920–1942). He was 29 and she was 19 at the time of their wedding. The couple had two children, Arthur Marx and Miriam Marx. His second wife was Kay Marvis (m. 1945–1951), née Catherine Dittig,[15] former wife of Leo Gorcey. Marx was 54 and Kay was 21 at the time of their marriage. They had a daughter, Melinda Marx, whose daughter Jade Berti was formerly married to Dominic Ruiz, brother of Dina Eastwood.[16] His third wife was actress Eden Hartford (m. 1954–1969). He was 64 and she was 24 at the time of their wedding.
Marx was denied membership in an informal symphonietta of friends (including Harpo) organized by Ben Hecht, because he could play only the mandolin. When the group began its first rehearsal at Hecht's home, Marx rushed in and demanded silence from the "lousy amateurs". The musicians discovered him conducting the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra in a performance of the overture to Tannhäuser in Hecht's living room. Marx was allowed to join the symphonietta.[18]
Later in life, Marx would sometimes note to talk show hosts, not entirely jokingly, that he was unable to actually insult anyone, because the target of his comment would assume that it was a Groucho-esque joke, and would laugh.[citation needed]
On the set of You Bet Your Life with daughter Melinda, 1953
Despite his lack of formal education, he wrote many books, including his autobiography, Groucho and Me, (1959) and Memoirs of a Mangy Lover (1963). He was a friend of such literary figures as Booth Tarkington, T. S. Eliot, and Carl Sandburg. Much of his personal correspondence with those and other figures is featured in the book The Groucho Letters (1967) with an introduction and commentary on the letters written by Marx, who donated his letters to the Library of Congress.[19] His daughter Miriam published a collection of his letters to her in 1992 titled Love, Groucho.
In Life with Groucho: A Son's Eye View, Arthur Marx relates that in his latter years, Groucho increasingly referred to himself by the name Hackenbush, referring to the character of that name he played in A Day at the Races.[20]
Marx made serious efforts to learn to play the guitar. In the 1932 film Horse Feathers, he performs the film's love theme "Everyone Says I Love You" for costar Thelma Todd on a Gibson L-5.[21]
In July 1937, an America-vs.-England pro-celebrity tennis doubles match was organized, featuring Marx and Ellsworth Vines playing against Charlie Chaplin and Fred Perry, to open the new clubhouse at the Beverly Hills Tennis Club. Marx appeared on court with twelve rackets and a suitcase, leaving Chaplin—who took tennis seriously—bemused, before he asked what was in it. Marx asked Chaplin what was in his, with Chaplin responding he didn't have one. Marx replied, "What kind of tennis player are you?" After playing only a few games, Marx sat on the court and unpacked an elaborate picnic lunch from his suitcase.[22]
Irving Berlin quipped: "The world would not be in such a snarl, had Marx been Groucho instead of Karl."[23] In his book The Groucho Phile, Marx says "I've been a liberal Democrat all my life", and "I frankly find Democrats a better, more sympathetic crowd.... I'll continue to believe that Democrats have a greater regard for the common man than Republicans do".[24] However, during an episode of Firing Line on July 7, 1967, Marx admitted to voting for Wendell Willkie, the Republican candidate for president in 1940, over Franklin D. Roosevelt, stating that he did not believe that any man should run for more than two terms.[25] Marx mentioned in a television interview that he disliked the women's liberation movement.[citation needed]
Marx's radio career was not as successful as his work on stage and in film, though historians such as Gerald Nachman and Michael Barson suggest that, in the case of the single-season Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel (1932), the failure may have been a combination of a poor time slot and the Marx Brothers' returning to Hollywood to make another film.
In the mid-1940s, he weathered a depressing lull in his career. His radio show Blue Ribbon Town had failed, and he was unable to sell his proposed sitcom The Flotsam Family only to see it become a huge hit as The Life of Riley with William Bendix in the title role. By that time, the Marx Brothers as film performers had officially retired.
Marx was scheduled to appear on a radio show with Bob Hope. Annoyed that he was made to wait in the green room for 40 minutes, he went on the air in a foul mood. Hope started by saying "Why, Groucho Marx! Groucho, what are you doing out here in the desert?" Marx retorted, "Huh, desert, I've been sitting in the dressing room for forty minutes! Some desert alright...". Marx continued to ignore the script, ad-libbing at length, and took it well beyond its allotted time slot.
Listening in on the show was producer John Guedel, who had a brainstorm. He approached Marx about doing a quiz show, to which Marx derisively retorted, "A quiz show? Only actors who are completely washed up resort to a quiz show!" Undeterred, Guedel proposed that the quiz would be only a backdrop for Marx's interviews of people, and the storm of ad-libbing that they would elicit. Marx replied, "Well, I've had no success in radio, and I can't hold on to a sponsor. At this point, I'll try anything!"[citation needed]
Marx as main host of You Bet Your Life, 1953
You Bet Your Life debuted in October 1947 on ABC radio (which aired it from 1947 to 1949), sponsored by costume jewelry manufacturer Allen Gellman;[26] and then on CBS (1949–50), and finally NBC. The show was on radio only from 1947 to 1950; on both radio and television from 1950 to 1960; and on television only, from 1960 to 1961. The show proved a huge hit, being one of the most popular on television by the mid-1950s, garnering a number one rating in 1953. With George Fenneman as his announcer and straight man, Marx entertained his audiences with rapier wit and improvised conversation with his guests. Since You Bet Your Life was mostly ad-libbed and unscripted — although writers did pre-interview the guests and feed Marx ready-made lines in advance — the producers insisted that the network prerecord it instead of it being broadcast live. There were three reasons for this: prerecording provided Marx with time to fish around for funny exchanges, any intervening dead spots could be edited out; and most importantly to protect the network from what was considered risqué, since Marx was a notorious loose cannon and known to say almost anything. The television show ran for 11 seasons until it was canceled in 1961. Ironically longtime major sponsor, automobile marqueDeSoto went out of business for declining sales that same year. For the DeSoto ads, Marx would sometimes say: "Tell 'em Groucho sent you", or "Try a DeSoto before you decide." In the mid-1970s, episodes of the show were syndicated and rebroadcast as The Best of Groucho.[27]
The program's theme music was an instrumental version of "Hooray for Captain Spaulding," which became increasingly identified as Marx's personal theme song. A recording of the song with Marx and the Ken Lane singers with an orchestra directed by Victor Young was released in 1952. Another recording made by Marx during this period was "The Funniest Song in the World," released on the Young People's Records label in 1949. It was a series of five original children's songs with a connecting narrative about a monkey and his fellow zoo creatures.
One of Marx's most oft-quoted remarks may have occurred during a 1947 radio episode. Marx was interviewing Charlotte Story, who had borne 20 children. When Marx asked why she had chosen to raise such a large family, Mrs. Story is said to have replied, "I love my husband," to which Marx responded, "I love my cigar, but I take it out of my mouth once in a while." The remark was judged too risqué to be aired, according to the anecdote, and was edited out before broadcast.[28] Charlotte Story and her husband Marion, indeed parents of 20 children, were real people who appeared on the program.[29] Audio recordings of the interview exist,[30] and a reference to cigars is made ("With each new kid, do you go around passing out cigars?"), but there is no evidence of the claimed remark. "I get credit all the time for things I never said," Marx told Roger Ebert in 1972. "You know that line in You Bet Your Life? The guy says he has seventeen kids and I say, 'I smoke a cigar, but I take it out of my mouth occasionally'? I never said that."[31] Marx's 1976 memoir recounts the episode as fact,[32] but co-writer Hector Arce relied mostly on sources other than Marx himself—who was by then in his mid eighties, in ill health and mentally compromised—and was probably unaware that Marx had specifically denied making the observation.[33] Head writer Bernie Smith recalled in a 1996 interview that the remark was indeed made—but again, well after the fact.[34]
In 1946, as part of the marketing campaign for the Marx Brothers film A Night in Casablanca, Marx created a storyline that Warner Bros. Pictures threatened to sue him, contending that that title was too similar to their 1942 film Casablanca.[35] Groucho wrote open letters "responding" to the four Warner brothers, including one in which he questions their own use of various words, such as: wondering if "in 1471, Ferdinand Balboa Warner, your great-great-grandfather,... stumbled on the shores of Africa and... named it Casablanca"; suggesting that "[David] Burbank's survivors aren't too happy with the fact that" Warner Bros. Burbank, California studios are called their "Burbank studios"; and even suggesting a Marx Brothers legal action addressing "What about 'Warner Brothers'? ... Professionally, we were brothers long before you were."[36][37]
Other work
On August 5, 1948, Marx's comedy play April Fool premiered at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, California, to mediocre reviews.[38] Penned by Groucho Marx and Norman Krasna, the play was rewritten and retitled Time for Elizabeth, and opened at the Fulton Theatre in New York City on September 27, 1948,[39] where it closed after only eight performances.[40][41]
By the time You Bet Your Life debuted on TV on October 5, 1950, Marx had grown a real mustache (which he had already sported earlier in the films Copacabana and Love Happy).
During a tour of Germany in 1958, accompanied by then-wife Eden, daughter Melinda, Robert Dwan and Dwan's daughter Judith, he climbed a pile of rubble that marked the site of Adolf Hitler's bunker, the site of Hitler's death, and performed a two-minute Charleston.[42] He later remarked to Richard J. Anobile in The Marx Brothers Scrapbook, "Not much satisfaction after he killed six million Jews!"
Another TV show, Tell It to Groucho, premiered January 11, 1962, on CBS, but only lasted five months. On October 1, 1962, Marx, after acting as occasional guest host of The Tonight Show during the six-month interval between Jack Paar and Johnny Carson, introduced Carson as the new host.
In 1965, Marx starred in a weekly show for British TV titled Groucho, broadcast on ITV. The program was along similar lines to You Bet Your Life, with Keith Fordyce taking on the Fenneman role. However, it was poorly received and lasted only 11 weeks.
Marx appeared as a gangster named God in the comedy movie Skidoo (1968), directed by Otto Preminger, and starring Jackie Gleason and Carol Channing. It was released by the studio where the Marx Brothers began their film career, Paramount Pictures. The film received almost universally negative reviews. Writer Paul Krassner published a story in the February 1981 issue of High Times, relating how Marx prepared for the LSD-themed movie by taking a dose of the drug in Krassner's company, and had a moving, largely pleasant experience.[43]
Marx developed friendships with rock star Alice Cooper—the two were photographed together for Rolling Stone magazine—and television host Dick Cavett, becoming a frequent guest on Cavett's late-night talk show, even appearing in a one-man, 90-minute interview.[5] When Elton John was visiting California in 1972, he and Marx became friendly. Marx insisted on calling him "John Elton". According to writer Philip Norman, when Elton John was playing the piano at Marx's home, Marx jokingly pointed his index fingers as if holding a pair of six-shooters; John put up his hands and said, "Don't shoot me, I'm only the piano player," thereby giving him the title of the album he had just completed. A film poster for the Marx Bros. film Go West is visible on the album cover photograph as an homage to Marx. Elton John accompanied Marx to a performance of Jesus Christ Superstar. As the lights went down, Marx called out, "Does it have a happy ending?" And during the Crucifixion scene, he declared, "This is sure to offend the Jews."[citation needed]
Marx's previous work regained popularity; new books of transcribed conversations were published by Richard J. Anobile and Charlotte Chandler. In a BBC interview in 1975, Marx called his greatest achievement having a book selected for cultural preservation in the Library of Congress. In a Cavett interview in 1971,[44] Marx said being published in The New Yorker under his own name,[45] Julius Henry Marx, meant more than all the plays he appeared in.[5] As a man who never had formal schooling, to have his writings declared culturally important was a point of great satisfaction.
As he passed his 81st birthday in October, 1971, Marx became increasingly frail, physically and mentally, as a result of a succession of minor strokes and other health issues.[46][47] In 1972, largely at the behest of his companion Erin Fleming, Marx appeared in a live one-man show at Carnegie Hall that was later released as a double album, An Evening with Groucho, on A&M Records. He also made an appearance in 1973 on a short-lived variety show hosted by Bill Cosby. Fleming's influence on Marx was controversial. Some close to Marx believed that she did much to revive his popularity, and the relationship with a younger woman boosted his ego and vitality.[48] Others described her as a Svengali, exploiting an increasingly frail Marx in pursuit of her own acting career. Marx's children, particularly his son Arthur, felt strongly that Fleming was pushing their ailing father beyond his physical and mental limits.[47] Writer Mark Evanier concurred.[49]
On April 2, 1974, at the 46th annual Academy Awards, Jack Lemmon presented Marx with an honorary Oscar to a standing ovation. The award honored Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo as well: "in recognition of his brilliant creativity and for the unequalled achievements of the Marx Brothers in the art of motion picture comedy". Noticeably frail, Marx took a bow for his deceased brothers, saying that "I wish that Harpo and Chico could be here to share with me this great honor." (Zeppo, still alive, was in the audience). He also praised the late Margaret Dumont as a great straight woman who never understood any of his jokes.[5][50] Marx's final appearance was a brief sketch with George Burns in the Bob Hope television special Joys (a parody of the 1975 movie Jaws) in March 1976.[51] His health continued to decline the following year; when his younger brother Gummo died at age 83 on April 21, 1977, Marx was never told for fear of eliciting still further deterioration of his health.[52]
Marx maintained his irrepressible sense of humor to the very end, however. George Fenneman, his radio and TV announcer, good-natured foil, and lifelong friend, often related a story of one of his final visits to Marx's home: When the time came to end the visit, Fenneman lifted Marx from his wheelchair, put his arms around his torso, and began to "walk" the frail comedian backwards across the room towards his bed. As he did, he heard a weak voice in his ear: "Fenneman," whispered Marx, "you always were a lousy dancer."[53] When a nurse approached him with a thermometer during his final hospitalization, explaining that she wanted to see if he had a temperature, he responded, "Don't be silly—everybody has a temperature."[48] Actor Elliott Gould recalled a similar incident: "I recall the last time I saw Groucho, he was in the hospital, and he had tubes in his nose and what have you," he said. "And when he saw me, he was weak, but he was there; and he put his fingers on the tubes and played them like it was a clarinet. Groucho played the tubes for me, which brings me to tears."[54]
Death
Niche at Eden Memorial Park
Marx was hospitalized at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center with pneumonia on June 22, 1977, and died there nearly two months later at the age of 86[55] on August 19, four months after Gummo's death.[1] Media coverage of Groucho's death and legacy was overshadowed by the sudden death of Elvis Presley three days earlier.
Marx's body was cremated and the ashes are interred in the Eden Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. He was survived by his three children and younger brother Zeppo, who outlived him by two years. His gravestone bears no epitaph but in one of his last interviews he suggested one: "Excuse me, I can't stand up."[56]
Litigation over his estate lasted into the 1980s. Eventually, his three children were awarded the bulk of the estate, while Erin Fleming, his companion during his final years, was ordered to repay $472,000.[57]
Legacy
Marx and John Lennon (a pun on "Marx" and "Lenin") on a 1994 Abkhazia stamp as a way of asserting the former Soviet republic's independence.
Groucho Marx was considered the most recognizable of the Marx Brothers. Groucho-like characters and references have appeared in popular culture both during and after his life, some aimed at audiences who may never have seen a Marx Brothers movie. Marx's trademark eyeglasses, nose, mustache, and cigar have become icons of comedy—glasses with fake noses and mustaches (referred to as "Groucho glasses", "nose-glasses," and other names) are sold by novelty and costume shops around the world.
Nat Perrin, close friend of Groucho Marx and writer of several Marx Brothers films, inspired John Astin's portrayal of Gomez Addams on the 1960s TV series The Addams Family with similarly thick mustache, eyebrows, sardonic remarks, backward logic, and ever-present cigar (pulled from his breast pocket already lit).[59]
A meeting with Elton John led to a press photo of Marx pointing both of his index fingers and thumbs at Elton like revolvers. John's spontaneous response of holding up his hands and replying, "Don't shoot me! I'm only the piano player!" was so amusing that Elton John reused it as the title of a 1973 album. An added Marx homage was that a poster for the Marx Brothers' movie Go West was included on the cover art.[64]
Newspaper ad for Animal Crackers (1930) with Lillian Roth paragraph.
Marx was also known to influence the Warner Bros. cartoon character Bugs Bunny, who recited his famous line "Of course you realize this means war!" in several cartoons including Long-Haired Hare and Bully for Bugs, after his antagonist has offended him.
Two albums by British rock band Queen, A Night at the Opera (1975) and A Day at the Races (1976), are named after Marx Brothers films. In March 1977, Marx invited Queen to visit him in his Los Angeles home; there they performed "'39" a cappella.[65]
A long-running ad campaign for Vlasic Pickles features an animated stork that imitates Marx's mannerisms and voice.[66] On the famous Hollywood Sign in California, one of the "O"s is dedicated to Marx. Alice Cooper contributed over $27,000 to remodel the sign, in memory of his friend.[67]
Actor Frank Ferrante has performed as Groucho Marx on stage since 1986. He continues to tour under rights granted by the Marx family in a show entitled An Evening with Groucho in theaters throughout the United States and Canada with supporting actors and piano accompanist Jim Furmston. In the late 1980s, Ferrante starred as Marx in the off-Broadway and London show Groucho: A Life in Revue, penned by Marx's son Arthur. Ferrante portrayed the comedian from age 15 to 85. The show was later filmed for PBS in 2001. In 1982, Gabe Kaplan filmed a version of the same show, entitled Groucho.[68]
In the Hungarian dubbed version of Woody Allen's film Annie Hall, a famous quotation told by Alvy Singer (Allen) at the beginning of the film is not attributed to Groucho Marx as in the original, but to Buster Keaton. The reason was that in communist Hungary, the name 'Marx' was associated with Karl Marx, and the name was not allowed to be used in such a light, humorous context.[69]
Woody Allen's 1996 musical Everyone Says I Love You, in addition to being named for one of Marx's signature songs, ends with a Groucho-themed New Year's Eve party in Paris, which some of the stars, including Allen and Goldie Hawn, attend in full Groucho costume. The highlight of the scene is an ensemble song-and-dance performance of "Hooray for Captain Spaulding"—done entirely in French.
Dylan Dog and his sidekick Groucho (left). Art by Luca Maresca
In 2008, Minnie's Boys was remounted Off-Broadway with Erik Liberman as Groucho and Pamela Myers as Minnie Marx.[70] Liberman later played Marx in a musical based on Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel called The Most Ridiculous Thing You Ever Hoid (2010) and at the Obama White House.[71][72]
Groucho, a supporting character in the Italian horror comics series Dylan Dog, is a Groucho Marx impersonator whose character became his permanent personality, and he works with Dylan Dog as his professional sidekick. In the English-language version by Dark Horse Comics, to avoid legal complications regarding Groucho Marx's estate, the art was altered so that Groucho no longer sports the Marx brother's signature moustache, and was renamed Felix.[73]
Throughout the M*A*S*H television series, several Groucho homage traits are mirrored in Alan Alda's portrayal of Hawkeye, including the 1972 season one episode "Yankee Doodle Doctor" that had a full Groucho impression complete with nose, moustache and glasses.[74]
Many Happy Returns: An Unofficial Guide to Your Income-Tax Problems Illustrated by Otto Soglow (Simon & Schuster, 1942)
Groucho and Me (B. Geis Associates, 1959)
Memoirs of a Mangy Lover (B. Geis Associates, 1963)
The Groucho Letters: Letters From and To Groucho Marx (Simon & Schuster, 1967, ISBN0-306-80607-X)
The Marx Bros, Scrapbook with Richard Anobile (Darien House/W W Norton, 1973, ISBN0-393-08371-3)
The Secret Word Is Groucho with Hector Arce (Putnam, 1976)
The Groucho Phile: An Illustrated Life by Groucho Marx with Hector Arce (Galahad, 1976, ISBN0-88365-433-4)
Essays and reporting
Marx, Julius H. (April 4, 1925). "Boston again". New York, Etc. The New Yorker. Vol.1, no.7. p.25.
— (April 11, 1925). "Vaudeville talk". New York, Etc. The New Yorker. Vol.1, no.8. p.25.
Related Research Articles
The Marx Brothers were an American family comedy act that was successful in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in 14 motion pictures from 1905 to 1949. Five of the Marx Brothers' fourteen feature films were selected by the American Film Institute (AFI) as among the top 100 comedy films, with two of them, Duck Soup (1933) and A Night at the Opera (1935), in the top fifteen. They are widely considered by critics, scholars and fans to be among the greatest and most influential comedians of the 20th century. The brothers were included in AFI's 100 Years...100 Stars list of the 25 greatest male stars of Classical Hollywood cinema, the only performers to be included collectively.
Animal Crackers is a 1930 American pre-Code Marx Brothers comedy film directed by Victor Heerman. The film stars the Marx Brothers,, with Lillian Roth and Margaret Dumont, based on the Marxes’ Broadway musical of the same name. Mayhem and zaniness ensue during a weekend party in honor of famed African explorer Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding. A critical and commercial success upon its initial release, Animal Crackers was shot at Paramount's Astoria Studios in Astoria, Queens, the second film the Brothers would make in New York City.
Duck Soup is a 1933 American pre-Code musical black comedy film written by Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby and directed by Leo McCarey. Released by Paramount Pictures on November 17, 1933, it stars the four Marx Brothers and also features Margaret Dumont, Louis Calhern, Raquel Torres and Edgar Kennedy. Duck Soup was the last of the five Marx Brothers films released by Paramount Pictures. In the film, Groucho portrays the newly installed president of the fictional country of Freedonia. Zeppo is his secretary, while Chico and Harpo are spies for the neighboring country of Sylvania. Relations between Firefly and the Sylvanian ambassador (Calhern) deteriorate during the film, eventually leading the two countries to war.
A Night at the Opera is a 1935 American comedy film starring the Marx Brothers, and featuring Kitty Carlisle, Allan Jones, Margaret Dumont, Sig Ruman, and Walter Woolf King. It was the first of five films the Marx Brothers made under contract for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer after their departure from Paramount Pictures, and the first after Zeppo left the act. The film was written by George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind from a story by James Kevin McGuinness, with additional uncredited dialogue by Al Boasberg. The film was directed by Sam Wood.
Arthur "Harpo" Marx was an American comedian, actor, mime artist, and harpist, and the second-oldest of the Marx Brothers. In contrast to the mainly verbal comedy of his brothers Groucho and Chico, Harpo's comic style was visual, being an example of vaudeville, clown and pantomime traditions. In all of his movie appearances, he wore a curly reddish blonde wig and did not speak, instead blowing a horn or whistling to communicate. Marx frequently employed props such as a horn cane constructed from a lead pipe, tape, and a bulbhorn.
Leonard Joseph "Chico" Marx was an American comedian, actor and pianist. He was the oldest brother in the Marx Brothers comedy troupe, alongside his brothers Arthur ("Harpo"), Julius ("Groucho"), Milton ("Gummo") and Herbert ("Zeppo"). His persona in the act was that of a charming, uneducated but crafty con artist, seemingly of rural Italian origin, who wore shabby clothes and sported a curly-haired wig and Tyrolean hat. On screen, Chico is often in alliance with Harpo, usually as partners in crime, and is also frequently seen trying to con or outfox Groucho. Leonard was the oldest of the Marx Brothers to live past early childhood, the first-born being Manfred Marx who had died in infancy. In addition to his work as a performer, he played an important role in the management and development of the act in its early years.
Herbert Manfred "Zeppo" Marx was an American comedic actor. He was the youngest, and last survivor, of the five Marx Brothers. He appeared in the first five Marx Brothers feature films from 1929 to 1933, and then left the act for careers as an engineer and theatrical agent.
Susan Alva Fleming was an American actress and the wife of comic actor Harpo Marx and sister in law to Groucho, Chico, Zeppo and Gummo. Fleming was known as the "Girl with the Million Dollar Legs" for a role she played in the W. C. Fields film Million Dollar Legs (1932). Her big stage break, which led to her Hollywood career, was as a Ziegfeld girl, performing in Rio Rita.
At the Circus is a 1939 comedy film starring the Marx Brothers released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in which they help save a circus from bankruptcy. The film contains Groucho Marx's classic rendition of "Lydia the Tattooed Lady". The supporting cast includes Florence Rice, Kenny Baker, Margaret Dumont, and Eve Arden. The songs, including "Lydia the Tattooed Lady", "Two Blind Loves", and "Step Up and Take a Bow", were written by the team of Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg, who'd recently furnished the songs for another MGM film that same year, The Wizard of Oz.
Minnie Marx was the mother and manager of the Marx Brothers, a family of top-billed vaudevillians, top Broadway stars and, finally, film stars. She was also the sister of comedian and vaudeville star Al Shean.
You Bet Your Life is an American comedy quiz series that has aired on both radio and television. The original version was hosted by Groucho Marx of the Marx Brothers, with announcer and sidekick George Fenneman. The show debuted on ABC Radio on October 27, 1947, moved to CBS Radio debuting October 5, 1949, and went to NBC-TV and NBC Radio on October 4, 1950. Because of its simple format, it was possible to broadcast the show on both radio and television but not simultaneously. Many of the laughs on the television show were evoked by Groucho's facial reactions and other visual gimmicks. So the two versions were slightly different. The last episode in a radio format aired on June 10, 1960. The series continued on television for another year, recording the last season, beginning on September 22, 1960, with a new title, The Groucho Show.
Abraham Elieser Adolph Schönberg, known as Al Shean, was a comedian and vaudeville performer. Other sources give his birth name variously as Adolf Schönberg, Albert Schönberg, or Alfred Schönberg. He is most remembered for being half of the vaudeville team Gallagher and Shean, and as the uncle of the Marx Brothers.
George Watt Fenneman was an American radio and television announcer. Fenneman is best remembered as the show announcer and straight man on Groucho Marx's You Bet Your Life. Marx, said of Fenneman in 1976, "There never was a comedian who was any good unless he had a good straight man, and George was straight on all four sides". Fenneman, born in Peking (Beijing), China, died from respiratory failure in Los Angeles, California, on May 29, 1997, at the age of 77.
Monkey Business is a 1931 American pre-Code comedy film. It is the third of the Marx Brothers' released movies, and the first with an original screenplay rather than an adaptation of one of their Broadway shows. The film also features Thelma Todd, Harry Woods and Ruth Hall and Rockliffe Fellowes. It is directed by Norman Z. McLeod with screenplay by S. J. Perelman and Will B. Johnstone.
Love Happy is a 1949 American musical comedy film, released by United Artists, directed by David Miller and starring the Marx Brothers in their 13th and final feature film, as well as a memorable walk-on by a relatively unknown Marilyn Monroe.
"The Incredible Jewel Robbery" was an episode of General Electric Theater, broadcast by CBS on March 8, 1959. It was the first appearance of the three Marx Brothers together in the same scene since A Night in Casablanca in 1946. They had previously appeared in individual scenes in The Story of Mankind in 1957, and in pairs in Love Happy in 1949. "Jewel Robbery" would be their last joint TV appearance.
Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel is a situation comedy radio show starring two of the Marx Brothers, Groucho and Chico, and written primarily by Nat Perrin and Arthur Sheekman. The series was originally broadcast in the United States on the National Broadcasting Company's Blue Network, beginning on November 28, 1932, and ending on May 22, 1933. Sponsored by the Standard Oil Companies of New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Louisiana and the Colonial Beacon Oil Company, it was the Monday night installment of the Five-Star Theater, an old-time radio variety series that offered a different program each weeknight. Episodes were broadcast live from NBC's WJZ station in New York City and later from a sound stage at RKO Pictures in Los Angeles, California, before returning to WJZ for the final episodes.
I'll Say She Is (1924) is a musical comedy revue written by brothers Will B. Johnstone and Tom Johnstone (music). It was the Broadway debut of the Marx Brothers. The initial production premiered in June 1923 at Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania before its national tour.
Minnie's Boys is a musical with a book by Arthur Marx and Robert Fisher, music by Larry Grossman, and lyrics by Hal Hackady.
Samuel Simon Marx was the father of the American entertainers known as the Marx Brothers, stars of vaudeville, Broadway and film, and the husband of Minnie Marx, who served as the group's manager.
↑ Billboard Magazine May 4, 1974, pg 35: "Groucho Marx was the best comedian this country ever produced – Woody Allen"
↑ Giddins, Gary (2001). The New York Times Book Reviews 2000, volume 1. Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers. ISBN1-57958-058-0. "The most enduring masks of the 20th century—likely to take their place alongside Comedy and Tragedy or Pulcinella and Pierrot"
↑ The WWI draft registration of 1917 as Julius Henry Marx in Chicago, Illinois uses October 2, 1890. The 1900 census has him born in October 1890.
↑ Bader, Robert S. (2016). Four of the Three Musketeers: The Marx Brothers on Stage. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. p.31. ISBN9780810134164.
1 2 3 4 5 DesRochers, Rick (2014). The New Humor in the Progressive Era. New York, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. pp.83, 84, 85. ISBN978-1-137-35742-7.
↑ Friedrich, Otto (1997). "Ingatherings (1940)". City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s (reprinted.). Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. p.43. ISBN0520209494.
↑ "Gummo Marx, Managed Comedians". The New York Times. Palm Springs, California, April 21, 2007 (Reuters) Gummo Marks, an original member of the Marx brothers' comedy team, died here today. He was 84 years old.
↑ "Groucho Marx Dies at 86 After Two-Month Illness". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. August 20, 1977. Officials at Cedar-Sinai Medical Center, where Marx had been hospitalized for the past two months with a respiratory ailment, said he died at 7:25 p.m. PDT of pneumonia
↑ Groucho the Great. legacy.com. Retrieved April 20, 2015.
↑ Los Angeles Times, April 15, 2011, Obituary of Arthur Marx, "In his father's declining years, Marx became a central figure behind a successful legal battle to wrest back control of Groucho's affairs from his late-in-life companion, Erin Fleming."
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