Zeppo, Chico, Groucho & Harpo
circa 1924

THE MARX BROTHERS

The Marx Brothers started their careers as a vaudeville musical team, encouraged by their mother, Minnie. Soon after their stage careers began, the fifth brother Gummo dropped out and it was the four Marxes: Chico, Harpo, Groucho and Zeppo who found fame. Audiences flocked to see the brothers in a total of thirteen films and their talent for fast-moving, zany comedy has never been surpassed.

'As far as temperament and their personalaties were concerned, they were capricious, tricky beyond endurance, altogether unreliable, and treacherous to a degree that would make Machiavelli absolutely kneel at their feet ... anybody who ever worked on any picture for the Marx Brothers said he would rather be chained to a gallery oar and lashed at ten-minute intervals until blood spurted from his frame than ever work for these son of bitches again.'

Even allowing for exaggeration, these words came from the famous humorist and writer, S.J. Perelman, who worked on the scripts for Monkey Business (1931) and Horse Feathers (1932), illustrate the gulf between the myth of show-biz personalities, particularly comedians, and the often less attractive reality. Perhaps the inspired lunacy which produces great comedy only grows in the soil of unconventional and difficult natures, and there were few comics more lunatic than Minnie's Boys, as they have come to be known.

Minna Schoenberg was the daughter of immigrant German-Jewish show business parents and sister of the vaudeville artist, Al Shean, of Gallagher and Shean fame. At eighteen she met and married the dapper Sam Marx, another immigrant, who became a not too succesful tailor. Minnie produced five sons, born and raised on New York's lower East Side, all of whom she encouraged and pushed to fame until her death. They were, in order of appearance, Leonard, Arthur, Julius, Milton and Herbert, to become rather better known as Chico, Harpo, Groucho, Gummo and Zeppo. Gummo featured in the shows during their early vaudeville days as a musical team, but dropped out before the boys became well-known. He was replaced by Zeppo, and it was a quartet that the Marxes found fame.

During their childhood, Chico was sent to piano lessons and later developed a unique, skilful and flamboyant manner of pounding out a tune that became integral to his stage and screen character. In turn, he taught Harpo but, appropriately, it was the harp with which Harpo became identified, having taught himself to play it. Meanwhile Groucho began to sing profesionally at the age of eleven, an aspect of his gifts that disappeared, later on to be replaced by his outrageous wisecracking. Zeppo was the misfit - not a comedian, he played a rather wet straight man, usually involved in a twee romantic sub-plot. His departure didn't affect the chemistry since the remaining three carried on much as before, while the movie studios provided other actors to fulfil Zeppo's plot function. Bespactacled, sporting a large thick moustache (which was initially painted on), wearing a frock coat and brandishing a Churchillian cigar, Groucho was always at the center of the action, unashamdly on the make for money - which often involved the farcial courtship of the stately Margot Dumont - and growingly out the famous gag lines. Dumont, whom Groucho once said was 'practically the fifth Marx Brother', was reputed never to have understood the jokes. This might have contributed to her air of calm while everything around her collapsed into chaos. Groucho had the imagination to invent names which are so distinctive and hilarious that they have never been forgotten: Rufus T. Firefly, Hugo Z. Hackenbush, Otis B. Driftwood among the most famous.

A typical Dumnont-Groucho exchange is this one, from Duck Soup (1933), set in the mythical kingdom of Freedonia where Rufus T. Firefly has been appointed dictator by the wealthy Mrs Teasdale:

Dumont: The future of Freedonia rests on you. Promise you follow in my husband's footstep.

Groucho: How do you like that? I haven't been on the job five minutes and already she's making advances to me. Not that I care. Where is your husband?

Dumont: Why, he's dead.

Groucho: I'll bet he's just using that as an excuse.

Dumont: I was with him to the very end.

Groucho: Huh! No wonder he passed away!

Dumont: I held him in my arms and kissed him.

Groucho: Oh, I see. Then it was murder.

The sheer idiocy of this humour was what audiences flocked to enjoy, and what they were given, with varying degrees of success through thirteen films. In private life, too, Groucho's wit was used liberally, not always with such good-natured intent, and he was the originator of the famous utterance which was passed into common usage, 'I don't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member.' The intellectual of the family, he was inclined to tetchiness and known to be mean with money, but he married three times.

Harpo's function in the movies was to chase girls when he wasn't playing the harp or honking an old taxi horn, one of his indispensable props. He wore a wild curly wig and a top hat and looked suitably inane, but above all, he never spoke, carrying on the tradition of silent comedy admidst the verbal and musical chaos created by his brothers. Off the screen, he was a quiet, lovable homebody.

Chico was the grinning fool in the Tyrolean hat who supplied the frenzied musical interludes on his piano and excruciating puns in exchanges with Groucho, which he delivered with an exaggerated Italian accent. In life Chico was the most irresponsible, pursuing twin passions: gambling and women. Always in trouble, there's a story that well illustrates his attitude. Writing a cheque in settlement of a gambling debt, he asked the recipient not to cash it till noon the next day. Instructions were followed but the cheque bounced. When the man complained, Chico asked, 'What time did you cash it?' 'Five minutes past twelve' came the reply. 'Too late,' said Chico.

The Marx Brothers spent many years building up their characters and routines in vaudeville before they were rewarded with stardom. By 1929, they had enjoyed three smash-hits on Broadway, two of which - The Cocoanuts (1929) and Animal Crackers (1930) - became their first two films in a three picture deal with Paramount at $75,000 a throw. These first, filmed at the Astoria studios in New York, were very successful, but it was clear that they needed original screen material rather than static film versions of their stage shows, and they decided to make the move to Hollywood.

Before doing so, the brothers, travelling with their wives and children (except for then-bachelor Harpo), sailed for Europe and scored a great success with a six-week season at the London Coliseum. Back in the US, preparations started for their first Hollywood-based movie. An account of the chaos, confusion and crises attendant upon achieving the finished product would fill a book, but the result was Monkey Business (1931). Horse Feathers (1932) followed and the brothers made the cover of Time Magazie; then came Duck Soup (1933), which had a mixed reception and marked the end of their Paramount days.

For a time it seemed that their film careers were over. Zeppo left the business to become an agent, while Groucho and Chico broadcasted a radio series called Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel, which was immensly funny and popular. Then, in 1934, the boys met with Irving Thalberg, the 'boy wonder' producer at MGM, and after intense discussion a deal was struck for two pictures. A Night at the Opera (1935), containing the famous stateroom scene, was a huge success and was followed by A Day at the Races (1937), an even bigger smash. In both cases, Thalberg had the brilliant notion of allowing the brothers out on the road to try the gags on stage before the filming started.

In 1938 Zeppo negotiated with RKO on behalf of his now internationally famous brothers to make Room Service, but it was a box-office disaster, and the Marxes were saved from ruin only by the offer of a return engagement at MGM. It was the beginnig of the end. Starting with At the Circus (1939), it began to seem that particular brand of comedy was running out of steam and was out of tune with the changing times. Go West (1949) followed, then The Big Store (1941) and A Night in Casablanca (1946). It was the end of an era. The wonderful puncturing of promposity for which they had been famed had run its course. They were reunited as a team once more in Love Happy (1950) but, otherwise, they continued on their seperate ways.

Chico Marx died in 1961 at the age of 75, and Harpo in 1964 aged 76. Groucho lived the longest and, amazingly, returned to the New York stage in 1972, aged 82, with a one-man show at Carnegie Hall. Sadly, towards the end of his life, he became senile, causing bitter feuds over his estate. He died in 1977 aged 87, outlived only by his baby brother, Zeppo, who survived until 1979 aged 78.

STATS

"Chico" Leonard Marx (born in New York Mar 22, 1891, died in Hollywood Oct 11, 1961)

"Harpo" Arthur Marx (born in New York Nov 23, 1893, died in Hollywood on Sep 28, 1964)

"Groucho" Julius Marx (born in New York Oct 2, 1895, died in New York [?] 1977)

"Gummo" Milton Marx (born in New York)

"Zeppo" Herbert Marx (died in Hollywood [?] 1979)

FILM TITLES

Animal Crackers

Duck Soup

Horse Feathers

Cocoanuts

The Big Store

A Day At The Races

A Night At The Opera

Monkey Business

Room Service

Love Happy

Go West

At The Circus

A Night In Cassablanca

PUBLICATIONS ON/BY THE MARX BROTHERS

Marx, Groucho. Many Happy Returns.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1942.

Krasna, Norman and Groucho Marx. Time for Elizabeth.
New York: Dramatists Play Service, Inc., 1949.

Crichton, Kyle. The Marx Brothers.
Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1950.

Marx, Arthur. Life with Groucho.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954.

Marx, Groucho. Groucho and Me.
New York: Dell Publishing Company, 1960.

Marx, Harpo and Rowland Barber. Harpo Speaks.
New York: Bernard Geis Associates, 1961.

Eyles, Allen. The Marx Brothers: Their World of Comedy.
South Brunswick and New York: A. S. Barnes and Co., Inc., 1966.

Marx, Groucho. The Groucho Letters: Letters From and To Groucho Marx.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1967.

Marx, Arthur. Son of Groucho.
New York: David McKay Company, Inc., 1972.

Adamson, Joe. Groucho, Harpo, Chico,
and Sometimes Zeppo: A Celebration of the Marx Brothers.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973.

Anobile, Richard J., ed. Why a Duck?.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973.

Marx, Groucho and Richard J. Anobile. The Marx Brothers Scrapbook.
New York: Darien House, 1973.

Marx, Groucho. Beds.
Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1976.

Marx, Groucho. The Groucho Phile: An Illustrated Life.
Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1976.

Marx, Groucho with Hector Arce.
The Secret Word is Groucho.
New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1976.

Arce, Hector. Groucho.
New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1979.

Chandler, Charlotte. Hello, I Must Be Going:
Groucho and His Friends.
Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1979.

Marx, Maxine. Growing Up with Chico.
Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1980.

Gehring, Wes D. The Marx Brothers: A Bio-Bibliography.
New York: Garland Publishing, 1987.

Barson, Michael, ed. Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel:
The Marx Brothers Lost Radio Show.
New York: Pantheon Books, 1988.

Marx, Groucho. Memoirs of a Mangy Lover.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989.

Eyles, Allen. The Complete Films of the Marx Brothers.
New York: Citadel Press, 1992.

Bergan, Ronald. The Life and Times of the Marx Brothers.
London: Green Wood Publishing, 1992.

Marx Brothers: Monkey Business, Duck Soup,
and A Day at the Races.
London: Faber and Faber, 1993.

Allen, Miriam Marx: Love, Groucho:
Letters from Groucho Marx to His Daughter Miriam.
Boston: Faber and Faber, 1993.

Bader, Robert S.: Groucho Marx and Other Short Stories
and Tall Tales: Selected Writings of Groucho Marx.
Boston: Faber and Faber, 1993.