Nat Perrin admitted that he found his appointment as conservator “too much of an emotional strain,” and he asked to be removed from the post. Bert Granet, Sidney Sheldon, and George Seaton were asked to replace him, but each declined.
An accord was reached between Arthur and Erin and the court, in the person of Judge Edward Rafeedie, with bedside concurrence of Groucho. Andrew Marx, Groucho’s grandson and Arthur’s son, was appointed conservator.
Just before his appointment, Andy reminisced with me about better days with Groucho. “But now,” he commented sadly, “it’s like anybody else’s family.”
While the fame of the living legend grew stronger, Julius Henry Marx grew increasingly frail. But Groucho mustered all his forces to return to the house that meant so much to him. I could hear him saying, “I’ve got the key to my front door.” But Groucho’s return home didn’t last, and he was rushed back for another “brief” hospital stay, which proved to be not brief at all.
Groucho’s brother Gummo died on April 21, 1977, but Groucho was never told.
On August 19, 1977, at Cedar Sinai Medical Center, Groucho died.
Shortly before his death, Erin told the press, “Groucho’s just having a nice little dream now. He’s just going to have a nap and rest his eyes for the next several centuries.”
Despite the full knowledge of Groucho’s rapid decline in health, despite his age, none of Groucho’s friends was really prepared for the finality of his death. You could think you were ready intellectually, but you could never really get ready for it emotionally.
His friends wondered with that feeling of guilt that accompanies the death of a loved person, “What more could I have done for him?” Dick Cavett summed up that feeling, questioning in retrospect, “Why was I ever busy?”
One evening, after dinner with Groucho and Goddard Lieberson, Groucho had talked with Goddard and me about a funeral he was expected to attend. He had referred to his own abhorrence of the ritual of the funeral and admonished us not to come to his:
“It doesn’t do any good. When you’re dead, you’re dead. I don’t want either of you coming to my funeral. I want you to go out and find a Marx Brothers film and laugh a lot.”
A small memorial reception for family and a few friends was held at Arthur’s house on Sunday, August 21, 1977. On the following Monday, there was a temple service for Groucho in Hollywood at Beth-El. Groucho had always said he didn’t want a big funeral and had expressed his preference for cremation. “I don’t want to take up space.”
During the furious court battle between Arthur and Erin, Zeppo had defended Erin’s role in Groucho’s life, saying, “She kept Groucho alive.” Zeppo, the last of the Marx Brothers, was not invited to either the Bel Air service at Arthur’s house or the temple service. He learned of Groucho’s death from press reports.
A separate small memorial reception was held by Erin at her house.
In a will dated September 24, 1974, Groucho left his estate, estimated at between two and six million dollars, in trust to his children, Arthur, Miriam, and Melinda. He left fifty thousand dollars each to Gummo and Zeppo, and five thousand dollars to each of his grandchildren. A twenty-five-thousand-dollar trust fund was established for his former wife, Kay, one hundred dollars a week for life, “or until the money runs out.”
To Erin, he left his Legion of Honor boutonniere and one hundred fifty thousand dollars.
Anyone contesting the will would forfeit his share and, instead, receive one dollar, with the remainder of his or her share going to Jewish charities.
When I learned about Groucho’s death, I had a sudden, strong sensory impression as my hand remembered the doorknob of the front door of his house. I had gone in and out countless times, but as I left for what indeed turned out to be that last time, I hesitated for a moment before closing the door. Milton Berle, who had gone out just ahead of me, asked, “Did you forget something?” “No, I didn’t forget anything,” I answered, as the door clicked shut behind me.
Chronology
“If it gets a laugh, leave it in”
“There’s only one answer to an audience. If they don’t laugh, take it out and try another one. If it gets a laugh, leave it in. If you keep talking long enough, you say something funny.”
This is about as close to an analysis of his own comic style as Groucho ever ventured. The mystery of comedy is ephemeral, and he sensed that it could be dissipated by excessive scrutiny. In a darkened movie theater, watching a film he didn’t find funny, Groucho leaned over and whispered to me above the sound of crunching popcorn around us, “Someone told me this was like the Marx Brothers, but it isn’t. They’re just punching. They don’t have characters. All comedy is based on character.”
Although the Marx Brothers’ success grew out of their own characters and playing themselves (“with ourselves,” Groucho always corrected me), their years in small-time vaudeville, trying out lines and routines and developing their stage personalities, were not wasted. As “Nightingales” and as “Mascots,” they were mired in the mediocrity of the lower echelons of vaudeville, though it is unlikely that they would have languished there long.
As Groucho put it, “One day a mule inspired us to horse around. We started insulting the audience, and they laughed.”
From then on, though there were peaks and dips, audiences never really stopped laughing. Groucho said, “If you have a lot of lucky breaks, it isn’t just an accident,” and lucky as it might have seemed, the school act was the most appropriate vehicle for the Marx Brothers’ first comedy routines. What better place for disrupting vested authority than in a school? From Fun in Hi Skule to Horse Feathers and in virtually everything they did afterward, the Marx Brothers displayed the frenetic energy of boys from an apartment on East Ninety-third Street in the artificially restrained atmosphere of a classroom. Even You Bet Your Life is a classroom situation, but with the teacher instead of the students providing the disruptive influence.
Fortunately, records of what two of the Marx Brothers’ stage successes were like survive in their films, The Cocoanuts and Animal Crackers. But the characters were already formed, and the lines and routines already tested, so there is relatively little change between the Groucho, Harpo, and Chico of The Cocoanuts and The Incredible Jewel Robbery more than three decades later. Some critics have attributed an important role in the formation of the film characters of the Marx Brothers to their writers. The one cinematic record of the Marx Brothers before The Cocoanuts has been lost. Groucho said there is no hope that a print still exists, and he reinforced his total conviction by saying, “I’d give fifty thousand dollars for a print.” Even if Humorisk did miraculously emerge from a rusty film can in somebody’s basement, it would give us only a limited view of what the Marx Brothers were like in 1921. Not only would it be silent, but it would also present the four Marx Brothers quite differently, since they didn’t play their usual characters. The same is true of the silent film Harpo appeared in, Too Many Kisses, in 1925. So, without any sound or silent record of the pre-Cocoanuts Marx Brothers, it was only possible to speculate on what they were like based on what they themselves have told us and on other firsthand accounts.
A rare print displaying what the Marx Brothers were like as early as 1921 has recently been discovered. It became available to me through the late Henri Langlois of the Cinémathèque Française. In 1931, when the Marx Brothers arrived in Hollywood, Paramount had asked them to do a promotional trailer which could be distributed to exhibitors in advance of their next picture, Monkey Business. Because Monkey Business wasn’t ready yet, they had to use one of their acts—one that would be simple to film yet hadn’t been used before either in The Cocoanuts or Animal Crackers. They chose the opening scene from their first Broadway success, I’ll Say She Is. Since this had also been the opening scene in On the Mezzanine Floor, it is possible to go back to 1921 and see what the Marx Brothers were like before George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind appeared in their careers.
In
this promotional trailer, the characters of the Marx Brothers are quite recognizable, except that Zeppo’s part is bigger and more important than it ever was in the feature films. Instead of being “the fourth man through the door,” he is the Marx Brothers’ interpreter in the worlds they invade. He is neither totally a straight man nor totally a comedian, but combines elements of both, as did Margaret Dumont. Zeppo’s importance to the Marx Brothers’ initial success was as a Marx Brother who could “pass” as a normal person. None of the Zeppo replacements (Allan Jones, Kenny Baker, and others) could assume this character as convincingly as Zeppo because they were actors, and Zeppo was the real thing, cast to type. Significantly, when Zeppo left the act, Chico’s straight-man status became more important. In the promotional trailer, Zeppo and the straight man (who plays a similar role in the Monkey Business version of this scene) maintain continuity by establishing a believable yet funny norm from which Groucho, Harpo, and Chico can deviate. The Marx Brothers are more or less as they always were, with a few minor differences. One of these is Chico’s accent, which is thicker than usual when he enters, then inexplicably dropped during the remainder of the scene. Groucho has a smaller part than usual, but he gets a chance to use his coy smile and bobbing eyebrows on the bad joke that he so obviously likes. Although he seldom gets credit for it, Groucho was as graceful as a dancer, and as Lee Strasberg told me, “The way he moved greatly enhanced his character.” Groucho’s reactions can be as important as his actions, and he is expert in backing up his brothers when they are center stage. When Harpo enters, Groucho can usually be heard in the background making appropriate comments during Harpo’s pantomime, or during any faint lull in the pandemonium.
The “plot” is simple: the four Marx Brothers enter a theatrical agency, one by one, and try out. All of them happen to have the same act—a bad imitation of Maurice Chevalier singing “You Brought a New Kind of Love to Me” from Paramount’s The Big Pond. In I’ll Say She Is they had imitated Joe Frisco, a popular dancer of that time, but Chevalier was substituted in the promotional trailer because he was then under contract to Paramount. Mr. Lee, owner of the agency, tells them, “Don’t slam the door when you leave,” almost as soon as they start singing, but since they are Marx Brothers, this is only an invitation to stay.
Lee’s Theatrical Agency. Mr. Lee is sitting at his desk working when a knock is heard at the door.
MR. LEE
Come in. Come in. (Zeppo enters)
ZEPPO
My name is Sammy Brown, and I just came into town. Saw your ad, you’re Mr. Lee. Say, you can make a mint on me.
MR. LEE
What do you do?
ZEPPO
Dance, sing.
MR. LEE
Play a role?
ZEPPO
Anything. Say, I’m a find for guys like you, ’cause there’s nothing I can’t do.
MR. LEE
Tell me, where did you work before?
ZEPPO
In a department store.
MR. LEE
Who told you you could dance and sing?
ZEPPO
Say, for money I’ll do anything. Why don’t you try me? You might as well.
MR. LEE
You might be great.
ZEPPO
Who can tell?
MR. LEE
What do you call your specialty?
ZEPPO
You mean my big sensation? I knock ’em cold when I pull off my Chevalier imitation. (Singing) “If a nightingale could sing like you, they’d sing much better than they do, ’cause you brought a new kind of love to me…” Well, what do you think?
MR. LEE
When you go out, don’t slam the door. It’s a wonderful imitation you gave of Ethel Barrymore. (Knock on door, Chico enters, Zeppo sits down)
CHICO
I’m glad you see me.
MR. LEE
Step right in.
CHICO
Are you Mr. Lee?
ZEPPO
My name is Sammy Brown…
MR. LEE
Come in. Do you want to talk to me?
CHICO
I wanta to talka to Mr. Lee.
MR. LEE
I’m Mr. Lee.
ZEPPO
That’s him.
CHICO
I see. You wanta a good act?
MR. LEE
Yes.
CHICO
Well, I’m the guy you wanta get. I no speak very good English, but I’m full of the pep and got the ambish.
MR. LEE
What do you do?
CHICO
Acrobats.
MR. LEE
What’s your name?
CHICO
Amalia. But the best thing I do is give imitations of Chevalier. (Sings) “When the nightingale, they look like you…”
MR. LEE
That’s enough!
ZEPPO
When you go out don’t slam the door.
CHICO
Well, what do you think?
MR. LEE
I need a drink.
CHICO
All right, I take-a the drink.
MR. LEE
You’ll take the air.
ZEPPO
The air he cries!
CHICO
I no like-a the air. It’s too cold outside.
MR. LEE
Will you please keep quiet.
CHICO
I no saya the word. (Chico sits down)
MR. LEE
Not an “and,” a “but,” or an “if.” Not a word from you ’til you’re spoken to.
CHICO
All right, you great big stiff. (Mr. Lee starts to react, but another knock at the door distracts him, Groucho enters)
GROUCHO
(In a heavy Russian accent) I vant to speak to Mr. Lee. I’m a dramatic actor.
MR. LEE
So I see. I’m Mr. Lee.
GROUCHO
Well, lend an ear to me.
MR. LEE
Can you play a role?
GROUCHO
(Dropping accent) Can I play a role? Do you know who you’re looking at?
MR. LEE
No.
GROUCHO
Caesar’s ghost. I play any kind of a role.
MR. LEE
You will?
GROUCHO
I eat it up like that. I played a part in Ben-Hur once.
MR. LEE
What part did you play, sir?
GROUCHO
A girl, she played the part of Ben.
MR. LEE
And you?
GROUCHO
I played her. (Lifting his eyebrows and smiling coyly)
CHICO
When you go out, take a slam at the door.
GROUCHO
You’re kidding me, aren’t you not?
MR. LEE
Kidding, you say? I’ve been here all day. Now show me what you’ve got.
GROUCHO
(Resuming accent and chanting) I vant to play a dramatic part, the kind that toucha a woman’s heart, to make her cry for me to die…
CHICO
Did you ever get hit with a cocoanuts pie?
GROUCHO
(Dropping accent) There’s my argument. Restrict immigration. I think I’ll recite.
MR. LEE
Let it go. All right.
GROUCHO
I’ll give you a recitation. Or would you prefer to see me give my Chevalier imitation? (Singing) “When a nightingale could sing like you, they sing much sweeter than they do, ’cause you brought a new kind of love to me…” Well, what do you think?
MR. LEE
Get me a brick!
GROUCHO
Here’s a brick. I always carry one for this imitation.
MR. LEE
Say, I ought to lay this on your head!
GROUCHO
You can’t do that. You don’t belong to the bricklayer’s union.
ALL
/> (Knock on door, Harpo enters and the brothers are overjoyed to see him) Ahhhhh!
GROUCHO
Poop-poop-a-doo! Poop-poop-a-doopie! (Harpo walks through the crowd with his hand extended, as if to shake hands, but his misses everyone’s extended hand, except for Mr. Lee’s, in whose outstretched hand he deposits his horn-cane. When he reaches Chico, they slap hands hard and do a “first-up” routine, treating each other as a baseball bat they’re trying to get top grip on. Mr. Lee, outraged by such flagrant horseplay in his office, pulls Harpo away from Chico. As he does, Harpo takes a hot dog out of his pocket with a flourish and hands it to Mr. Lee.)
MR. LEE
Hey, what do you think you are…
GROUCHO
Hey, wait a minute, wait a minute. You know who this is?
MR. LEE
No.
GROUCHO
He sells frankfurters. That’s the Merchant of Wieners.
MR. LEE
Well, what do you want? (With a flourish, Harpo whips a card out of his pocket and hands it to Mr. Lee, who reads it aloud) “My name is What-Do-You-Care. My home is anywhere. People say I’m awful dumb, so I thought to you I’d come…” Say, listen…what is this?!
GROUCHO
Now just a moment. Wait a minute. He might be crazy. Wait, I’ll find out. (To Harpo) You want to go on the stage? (Harpo nods affirmatively) Crazy.
MR. LEE
Say, listen, you tell me what you want or I’ll throw you out…(Harpo rests his leg on Mr. Lee’s hand) Never mind that or I’ll give you a…
CHICO
Now wait, take your time. This fella’s a good dancer. (To Harpo) Dance for him.
MR. LEE
Say, thank heaven there’s no Chevalier imitation.
HARPO
(Puts his hat on desk and takes Mr. Lee’s straw hat off his head, putting it on his own head. He dances and whistles a few bars of the Chevalier song the others have been singing.)
GROUCHO
What do you think of him?
MR. LEE
I wouldn’t give him a dollar a week.
CHICO
Not so loud. He’ll take it.
ZEPPO
Now listen, you’re making a big mistake. These fellas are very clever. They’re funny fellas, and I’ve got a play that I’ve written that I’d like to explain to you. (Harpo, standing between Zeppo and Mr. Lee, continues his leg-in-hand routine, first with Mr. Lee, and then with Zeppo) I’d like to read this manuscript for you. It’s a wonderful play, and these fellas would fit in it. (When Harpo gets tired of having his leg rejected, he climbs up on their shoulders) Now if you’ll sit down with me for a minute, I’ll explain the whole thing to you. (They push Harpo off their shoulders and move over to the desk, Mr. Lee sitting behind the desk, and Zeppo in a chair to the side; Chico and Groucho sit on the other side of the desk, pulling the desk over to them; Mr. Lee pulls it back) Now this is not Monkey Business or is it Pineapples. (By this time everyone is talking, and Zeppo has to shout to make himself heard) I want to explain the whole thing to you. Now, the first scene takes place in a beautiful home. This is really a magnificent home. A mansion. When I say a mansion, I mean a mansion.
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