Cocoanuts
Before movies being projected in theaters had really started to catch on with the masses, the primary form of entertainment for most people was the world of vaudeville, traveling road productions that were considered variety shows of the highest order and despite all of the singers, jugglers and other novelty acts that comprised these epic events, there were no bigger nor more popular stars on the circuit than The Marx Brothers (Groucho, Chico, Harpo, Zeppo and Gummo) whose specialized forte was that of sketch comedy and other such presentations of comedic material. Whenever a vaudeville show would roll into a town and people saw that The Marx Brothers were on the bill, the shows would be sold out and packed with people every single night that the show was in town. That was considered unusual since normally the crowds would dwindle down to nothing during the last couple of nights of an engagement, but with The Marx Brothers on the bill, the shows would sell out nightly but with the SAME people every night because the word was out that The Brothers would be constantly changing up their onstage schtick on a nightly basis, so while the crowds would politely enjoy the same performances by the singers, jugglers and everybody else, whenever The Marx Brothers would come back out, they would sit up and pay attention just to see what would happen next with them, this time. Because of this and the money that they would draw for just that very reason (even another legend like W.C. Fields hated being on the same bill as them out of fear of being upstaged), The Marx Brothers became by far the highest paid performers on the circuit, working their way up to playing in the biggest shows before starring in their own Broadway production, which built a loose plot and carefully prepared supporting actors around their mostly improvised routines and brilliantly random insanity. That play became the basis of this 1929 film, the first of their run as a movie comedy team and one of the first big budget, heavily promoted sound comedies ever (a godsend for Hollywood since much of what The Marx Brothers could do was built around spoken dialogue while others like Chaplin and Keaton were rather reluctant to actually talk onscreen). As a filmed variety show which included musical numbers mixed in with the comedy bits and threadbare plot, it certainly entertained audiences in its day and became a hit, but for enthusiastic fans of The Marx Brothers, it can be a little bit of a chore to get through the musical numbers themselves just so that they can see The Brothers doing their thing. In fact, when The Brothers were invited to a screening of the finished film, they were reportedly horrified by what they saw, so much so that the story goes that they made a serious offer to the studio to buy the negative of the film so that they could supposedly burn it, although whether or not they were second guessing their own comedic work as something that they could have done better or just found the mixture of singing and dancing blended with their own performances to be an uneasy cocktail for them to swallow is unknown. Luckily, the studio turned down their offer, released the film, made their money and allowed the movie (for the most part) to survive to this day to be if nothing else a historical document featuring the debut of one of the greatest movie comedy teams ever. It’s interesting to watch The Brothers (minus Gummo who quit before they got their movie contract) assume their usual stock roles and characters that they more or less would become known for in the years to come. Groucho (playing the role of a failed hotel manager in a resort town in Florida) is not only the consummate skinflint when it comes to screwing his own employees (he’s shown giving a long winded 5 minute speech to his staff as to why they’re not getting paid and actually selling them on it), but with his trademark black greasepaint moustache and smarmy attitude, he’s also the master of insults both direct and left handed, a bitter yet funny little man who just enjoys bashing everyone and everything. Chico (who joined his brothers in vaudeville later on solely because he needed the money) was known for being a master of dialects growing up and onscreen he became known for his (at the time) stereotypical shady Italian type whose accent was impossible to decipher but he was always in on any kind of a moneymaking scheme the more underhanded the better even as he would occasionally throw in legitimately talented displays of playing the piano in any given movie. Zeppo (said to be the funniest in terms of his own real life personality compared to his brothers) was not only the youngest but also the most conventionally handsome of the siblings, sadly reduced here to the nothing, glorified extra role of the hotel desk clerk who gets to have one exchange onscreen with Groucho and then spends the rest of the time standing in the background smiling even as he is said to have been a fine straight man to his brothers although we don’t see any of that here. But the real revelation here for the uninitiated is Harpo, a bewigged, non talking lunatic (ironic since silent movies were dying at this time and he might have had a career doing them if he had wanted to) whose bits in the film as compared to his siblings not only constituted a real, literal spirit of anarchy (whereas Groucho’s schtick was based more on random, out of left field jokes and comments that weren’t always funny but sometimes could still make you laugh), but also come off as being so hilariously insane that they still hold up even today as seeming fresh (no mean feat for a 1929 performance). With a curly red wig, trench coat, top hat and constantly honking bicycle horn, Harpo with his mute but always grinning routine makes one wonder just why exactly Groucho was the one who was so revered in later years when Harpo was not only funnier, but arguably more influential on comedians in the years to come as well. The film doesn’t so much really has a plot but rather a series of plot threads that comprise the running time, least interestingly of all a romance between a man and a woman (where the male actor is clearly 20 years older than the woman he’s in love with) where the smitten couple break out in romantic singing every once in a while. There’s also Groucho desperately trying to make any kind of moneymaking scheme work out in his favor including clumsily trying to seduce a rich widow (Margaret Dumont who became a legend in her own right for continually playing this type of role opposite Groucho in many more films to come) and holding a scam filled land auction where he tries to recruit Chico as a plant whose job it is to constantly up the bids whenever somebody offers a real one only to get it backwards and wind up not only always bidding first but also always outbidding any of the legitimate buyers because he never had all that good of a grasp on what Groucho’s intentions really were anyway. And then there are the two professional thieves who are planning to steal an extremely valuable necklace and put the blame onto the idiotic Harpo which is just fine with him since he is an out of control kleptomaniac anyway(!), at one point even stealing a cop’s badge off of him and loading up his trenchcoat with all kinds of random items that he has stolen left and right (but in the film’s biggest irony, he winds up being the one who figures out where the stolen necklace is and returning it to the rightful owner). The greatest quality of The Marx Brothers as comedians is in their sheer randomness as one never knows just what any of them are going to say or do next (except Zeppo who barely does anything). Chico’s tendency to butcher the English language with his thick accent which when paired with Groucho trying to have a conversation with him and becoming increasingly exasperated over it is some good stuff, but it’s Harpo from whom we must always expect the unexpected (and with not a hint of malicious intent) and for that we can see this for what it is, the first cinematic foray for The Marx Brothers on their way to legendary status even with the sprinkles of bad acting from some of the supporting players, fake walled sets of Florida beaches when this was filmed on a New York City soundstage and random musical numbers that come across as being far less welcome than the comedic randomness of The Marx Brothers themselves…
5/10