マルクス兄弟

The original five Marx brothers--Leonard (Chico), Adolph (Harpo), Julius (Groucho), Milton (Gummo), and Herbert (Zeppo)--all followed the family tradition by entering show business at an early age. Specializing in musical comedy, the brothers first gained national attention in the zany revue "I'll Say She Is" (1923-25). Although Harpo made a brief film appearance as early as 1925, in the comedy "Too Many Kisses," the team honed their craft as a major theatrical attraction throughout the decade. Their long-running hit, "The Cocoanuts" (1925-28), with a script by George S. Kaufman and music by Irving Berlin, gave the Marxes their first step up to Broadway. (Gummo had by now dropped out of the act.) During the run of the play, the brothers, who had already developed their trademark characterizations, independently produced a silent comedy film. The lost picture, "Humorisk," was made in New York and New Jersey with private financing but never received public release.On the strength of their next Broadway success, "Animal Crackers" (1928-29), the team was signed to a five-picture contract by Paramount, which was scouting talent for its new sound film productions. Both "Cocoanuts (1929) and "Animal Crackers" (1930) were filmed on Paramount's Astoria, New York soundstage. Although the limitations of early sound technology forced the Marxes to subdue their energetic comedy style and penchant for improvised dialogue, the movie public took to the team's brand of comic chaos. Each of the four brothers became identifiable by his unique persona: Grouch, always the leader of the bunch, wore a greasepaint moustache, carried a cigar, and portrayed a tactless social climber who sang and hurled puns, insults, and absurd non sequiturs at every interlocutor; the piano-playing Chico (pronounced "chick-o," after his womanizing) donned a pointy hat with mismatched clothes and spoke in an exaggerated Italian accent; Harpo, with red wig and prop-filled trenchcoat, was the childlike clown who never spoke on film but charmed with his harp solos; and Zeppo was the pitiable stooge of a straight man who only sometimes got the girl. The final three Marx Brothers releases from Paramount--"Monkey Business" (1931), "Horsefeathers" (1932) and "Duck Soup" (1933)--did not perform well at the box office, although they are now regarded as the team's most inspired film comedies. The writing of George Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind was replaced by that of another brilliant humorist, S.J. Perelman. The boys were also being directed by better handlers of comedy, Norman Z. McLeod, and for "Duck Soup," Leo McCarey. The team's Paramount vehicles de-emphasized the usual Hollywood storylines and romantic subplots and simply provided screen space for the Marxes to perform their routines. The nearly plotless "Monkey Business" features four nameless stowaway characters who wreak havoc on a luxury liner, then attempt to disembark by performing four Maurice Chevalier impressions. "Horsefeathers" is a similarly free-form romp through college life, with Professor Wagstaff (Groucho) cueing the mayhem with his anti-establishment anthem "What Ever It Is, I'm Against It." Finally , "Duck Soup," usually considered the team's absurdist masterpiece, is a satire on the politics of war, casting Groucho as the unlikely president of Freedonia who, with the aid of his brothers, runs the country with the musical slogan "Just Wait 'Til I Get Through With It."The financially troubled Paramount released the Marx Brothers following "Duck Soup," but the team (minus Zeppo) was picked up by the glamour studio, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, at the behest of its production chief Irving Thalberg. Thalberg recast the irrepressible team in the MGM mold. Reinserting the usual Hollywood storylines, he set the brothers up as more sympathetic figures and offered love stories to appeal to audiences less enamored of the team's destructive humor. With these elements, plus classier production values the return of Kaufman and Ryskind, better supporting casts, the inclusion of Grouch's grand comic foil Margaret Dumont, and MGM's lengthy pre-testing of material, the two Thalberg films, "A Night at the Opera" (1935) and "A Day at the Races" (1937), revived their popularity. But the death of Hollywood's top producer in 1937 also marked the end of the well-crafted Marx films. After a quick loan-out to RKO (for the substandard "Room Service" 1938), the aging team did three flat comedies at MGM; after the war, apparently out of financial need, they reunited for the undistinguished "A Night in Casablanca" (1946) and "Love Happy" (1949). In the 1950s, each of the three brothers continued to perform independently on radio, TV and film, with Groucho remaining the most successful, due to his long-running radio-television quiz show "You Bet Your Life" (1947-61). All three appeared in separate roles in Irwin Allen's "The Story of Mankind" (1957) and were briefly reunited in a telefilm broadcast, "The Incredible Jewel Robbery" (1959). Even after Chico and Harpo died, Groucho continued to write and appear on TV. He accepted an honorary Oscar for the Marx Brothers in 1974 three years before his death.