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Julius Henry Marx, known as Groucho Marx
(October 2, 1890 – August 19, 1977), was an American comedian, working
both with his siblings, the Marx Brothers, and on his own.
****
Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx
Marx poses for an NBC promotional
photograph
Born October 2, 1890
New York, New York, U.S.A
Died August 19, 1977
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A
****
Biography
Childhood & Pre-Hollywood Successes
The Marx family grew up on the Upper East
Side of New York City, in a small Jewish neighborhood sandwiched between
Irish-German and Italian neighborhoods.
Groucho had a showbusiness uncle: Al Shean
of Gallagher and Shean, a noted vaudeville act of the early 20th
century. According to Groucho, 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 child like adoring fans. Groucho and his brothers
respected his opinions and asked him on several occasions to write some
material for them.
Shean's sister, Minnie Schoenberg Marx, was
Groucho's mother. She didn't have an entertainment industry career, but
she had intense ambition for her sons to go on the stage like their
uncle. While pushing her eldest son Leonard (Chico Marx) in piano
lessons, she found that Julius had a pleasant soprano voice and the
ability to remain on key. Even though Julius' early career goal was to
become a doctor, the family's need for income forced Julius out of
school at the age of twelve. By that time, Julius had become a voracious
reader, particularly fond of Horatio Alger. Throughout the rest of his
life, Groucho would augment his lack of formal education by becoming
very well-read.
After a few comically unsuccessful stabs at
entry-level office work and other jobs suitable for adolescents, Julius
took to the stage as a boy singer in 1905. Though he reputedly claimed
that in the world of vaudeville he enjoyed only "modest success" but was
"hopelessly average," it was merely a wisecrack. By 1909, Minnie Marx
successfully managed to assemble her sons into a low-quality vaudeville
singing group. Billing themselves as 'The Four Nightingales', Julius,
Milton (Gummo Marx), Adolph (Harpo Marx) (later changed to Arthur), 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.
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 singers. They modified
the then-popular Gus Edwards comedy skit, "School Days", and renamed it
"Fun In Hi Skule". The Marx Brothers would perform variations on this
routine for the next seven years.
For a time in vaudeville, all the brothers
performed in ethnic accents; Leonard Marx, the oldest Marx brother,
developed the "Italian" accent he used as "Chico" to convince some
roving bullies that he was Italian, not Jewish. Groucho's character from
"Fun In Hi Skule" was an ethnic German, so Groucho played him with a
German accent. However, after the sinking of the RMS Lusitania in 1915,
public anti-German sentiment was widespread, and Groucho's "German"
character was booed, so he quickly dropped the accent and developed the
fast-talking wise guy character he would make famous.
The Marx Brothers became the biggest
comedic stars of the Palace Theatre, which billed itself as the
"Valhalla of Vaudeville." Brother Chico's deal-making skills resulted in
three hit plays on Broadway. No comedy routine had ever infected the
hallowed Broadway circuit. But reports are unanimous that the Broadway
audiences were just as convulsed with laughter as had been the
vaudeville ones. The Marx Brothers were now more than a vaudeville
sensation; they were a Broadway sensation.
It's important to note, therefore, that all
this predated their Hollywood career. By the time the Marxes made their
first movie, they had already been stars with sharply honed skills; and
when Groucho was relaunched to stardom on "You Bet Your Life," he had
already been performing successfully for a half century.
Career highlights
Groucho developed a routine as a
wise-cracking hustler with a distinctive chicken-walking lope and an
exaggerated greasepaint moustache and eyebrows, improvising insults to
stuffy dowagers (often played by Margaret Dumont) and anyone else who
stood in his way. He and his brothers starred in a series of
extraordinarily popular movies and stage shows, often ad libbing. (See:
Marx Brothers)
The use of greasepaint originated
spontaneously before a vaudeville performance 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 every
night - imagine tearing a bandaid off the same skin every night). The
absurdity of the greasepaint mustache was never discussed on-screen, but
in a famous scene in Duck Soup, where both Chico and Harpo are
disguising themselves as Groucho, they are briefly seen applying the
greasepaint, implicitly answering any question a viewer might have had
about where Groucho got his mustache and eyebrows.
In the 1930s and 1940s Groucho also worked
as a radio comedian and show host. One of his earliest stints was a
short lived series in 1932 entitled Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel,
co-starring Chico, who was the only one of his brothers willing to
appear on the show. Most of the scripts and discs were subsequently
destroyed (except the last shows) only turning up in 1988 in the Library
of Congress. In 1947, Groucho was chosen to host a radio quiz program
entitled You Bet Your Life, which moved over to television in 1950. The
show consisted of Groucho interviewing the contestants and "ad libbing"
jokes. Then they would play a brief quiz. The show was responsible for
the phrases "Say the secret woid [word] and divide $100" (that is, each
contestant would get $50); and "Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?" or "What
color is the White House?" (asked when Groucho felt sorry for a
contestant who had not won anything). It would run 11 years on
television
One quip from Groucho concerned his
response to Sam Wood, the director of the classic film A Night at the
Opera. Wood was furious with the Marx brothers ad-libs and antics on the
set and yelled to all in disgust that he "cannot make actors out of
clay." Without missing a beat, Groucho responded, "Nor can you make a
director out of Wood." A widely reported, but likely apocryphal, ad-lib
is reportedly a response to a female contestant who had almost a dozen
children. Groucho asked why the contestant had so many children, to
which the contestant replied "I love my husband." Groucho responded,
"Lady, I love my cigar, too, but I take it out once in a while." Hertor
Arce inserted the claim into Groucho's autobiography The Secret Word is
Groucho but Groucho himself denied it ever happened. [1]
Throughout his career he introduced a
number of memorable songs in films, including "Hooray for Captain
Spaulding", "Whatever It Is, I'm Against It", "Hello, I Must Be Going",
"Everyone Says I Love You" and "Lydia the Tattooed Lady". Frank Sinatra,
who once quipped that the only thing he could do better than Marx was
sing, made a film with Marx and Jane Russell in 1951 entitled Double
Dynamite.
Personal life
Groucho was married three times, and all of
his marriages ended in divorce. His first wife was chorus girl Ruth
Johnson, by whom he had two children, Arthur and Miriam. He had a
daughter, Melinda, by his second wife, Kay Gorcey, former wife of Leo
Gorcey. His third wife was actress Eden Hartford (married July 17, 1954,
divorced December 4, 1969)[2]. All three wives were alcoholics. Many of
his detractors wondered if he was just attracted to future alcoholics or
if he drove them to it. Unfortunately there is a shred of truth there;
for if anyone was "always on," it was Groucho Marx. Other than the
rarest of occasions, such as parts of his interview with Edward R.
Murrow, Groucho played Groucho everywhere he went and in everything he
did.
Often was the case, for instance, when the
Marxes would arrive at a restaurant and be greeted by an interminable
wait. "Just tell the Maitre d' who we are," his wife would nag. (In his
pre-moustache days, he was rarely recognized in public.) Groucho would
say, "OK, OK. Good evening, sir. My name is Jones. This is Mrs. Jones,
and here are all the little Joneses." Now his wife would be furious and
insist that he tell the Maitre d' the truth. "Oh, all right," said
Groucho. "My name is Smith. This is Mrs. Smith, and here are all the
little Smiths."
Similar anecdotes are corroborated by
Groucho's friends, not one of which went without being publicly
embarrassed by Groucho on at least one occasion. Once, at a restaurant
(the most common location of Groucho's antics), a fan came up to him and
said, "Excuse me, but aren't you Groucho Marx?" "Yes," Groucho answered
annoyedly. "Oh, I'm your biggest fan! Could I ask you a favor?" the man
asked. "Sure, what is it?" asked the even-more annoyed Groucho. "See my
wife sitting over there? She's an even bigger fan of yours than I am!
Would you be willing to insult her?" Groucho replied, "Sir, if my wife
looked like that, I wouldn't need any help thinking of insults." Also,
Groucho's son, Arthur, published a brief account of an incident when
Arthur was a child. The family was going through airport customs, and
while filling out a form, Groucho listed his name as "Julius Henry Marx"
and his occupation as "smuggler." Needless to say, chaos ensued.
Off-stage Groucho was a voracious reader.
He unceasingly lamented the fact that he had only a grammar school
education, and to overcompensate he read everything he got his hands on.
His knowledge of literature from all eras was by any standards
extraordinary. Typical of his achievements, this one was discussed only
demurely by Groucho himself. "I think TV is very educational," he once
said. "Every time someone turns on a TV, I go in the other room and
read." His friend Dick Cavett, speaking of Groucho and referencing a
certain philosopher's writing, said "I, with my college education, had
merely heard of the book, but Groucho had actually read it."
Despite this lack of formal education, he
wrote many extraordinarily funny books, including the autobiographical
Groucho and Me (1959) (Da Capo Press, 1995, ISBN 0-306-80666-5) and
Memoirs of a Mangy Lover (1964) (Da Capo Press, 2002, ISBN
0-306-81104-9). And he was personal friends with such literary giants as
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
Groucho.
"You Bet Your Life"
In the mid 1940s, during a depressing lull
in his career, Groucho was scheduled to appear on a radio show with Bob
Hope. Annoyed that he was made to wait in the waiting room for 40
minutes, Groucho went on the air in a foul mood. Hope started by saying,
"Why, it's Groucho Marx, ladies and gentlemen. (applause) Groucho, what
brings you here from the hot desert?" Groucho retorted, "Hot desert my
foot, I've been standing in the cold waiting room for 40 minutes."
Groucho continued to ignore the script, and although Hope was a
formidable ad-libber in his own right, he couldn't begin to keep up with
Groucho, who lengthened the scene well beyond its allotted time slot
with a veritable onslaught of improvised wisecracks.
Listening in on the show was producer John
Guedel, who got a brainstorm. He approached Groucho about doing a quiz
show. "A quiz show? Only actors who are completely washed up resort to a
quiz show." Undeterred, Guedel explained that the quiz would be only a
backdrop for Groucho's interviews of people, and the storm of ad-libbing
that they would elicit. Groucho said, "Well, I've had no success in
radio, and I can't hold on to a sponsor. At this point I'll try
anything."
You Bet Your Life premiered in October 1947
and ran through 1961 (on radio only 1947-1950, on both radio and
television 1950-1956, and on television only 1956-1961). The show was an
utter sensation, one of the most popular in the history of radio and
television. With one of the best announcers and, as it turns out,
straight men in the business, George Fenneman, as his faithful foil,
Groucho slayed his audiences with extraordinary improvised conversation,
usually with the most ordinary of guests. You Bet Your Life ended in May
1961. Another TV show hosted by Groucho, Tell It to Groucho, premiered
11 January 1962 on CBS, but only lasted five months.
Ad-Libbing Controversy: Was it Scripted or
Not?
Groucho's competitors became so livid by
the comedian's unexpected and colossal success that they circulated
rumors that "You Bet Your Life" was completely scripted and Groucho
wasn't ad-libbing at all. They felt vindicated when a photo surfaced,
taken from backstage, showing Groucho looking at a transparent screen.
The critical consensus is that while some
of Groucho's jokes were either "planned" or semi-scripted, most were
ad-libbed. Admittedly, the staff did contain two writers who would
contribute a few jokes. Nonetheless, the truth is that the scripting was
not only minimal, but also more for the contestants' benefit. Groucho
never once had a contestant (except for the famous ones) that he'd met
previously. The staff thus fed Groucho the questions they thought he
should ask these unfamiliar people, but Groucho himself never knew what
the answers would be.
Later years
By the time that You Bet Your Life started
on TV on 5 October 1950, Groucho had grown a real mustache (which he
sported as early as the 1949 film Love Happy), the lack of which had
earlier been an effective means of hiding himself from fans.
In the early 1970s, Groucho made a comeback
of sorts doing a live one-man show, including one recorded at Carnegie
Hall in 1972 and released as a double album, An Evening with Groucho, on
A&M Records. He also made an appearance on a short-lived variety show
hosted by Bill Cosby, who idolized Groucho, in 1973. He also 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. He also met
Elton John when the British singer was staying in California in 1972,
insisting on calling him "John Elton" because "Elton John" was the wrong
way around. According to writer Philip Norman, Groucho jokingly pointed
his index fingers at Elton John as if her were holding a pair of
six-shooters, who mockingly put up his hands and said, "Don't shoot me,
I'm only the piano player," so naming the album he had just completed.
Elton John accompanied Groucho and the family hosting him in California
to a performance of Jesus Christ Superstar, where Groucho offered two
witticisms. As the lights went down in the theater, Groucho called out,
"Does it have a happy ending?" During the Crucifixion scene, he
declared, "This is sure to offend the Jews."
Groucho's previous works once again became
popular and were accompanied by new books of interviews and other
transcribed conversations by Richard J. Anobile and Charlotte Chandler.
He had become quite frail by this time and his last few years were
accompanied by descent into senility[3][4] and a controversy over a
companionship he had developed with Erin Fleming, which consequently
raised disputes over his estate. He also accepted an honorary Oscar in
1974, in his final major public appearance. He then took a bow for all
the Marx Brothers.
Senility and death
Groucho's children, particularly his son
Arthur, felt strongly that Fleming was pushing his weak father beyond
his physical and mental limits. Writer Mark Evanier concurs with
this.[5][6]
Groucho Marx died of pneumonia on August
19, 1977.
He was cremated, and the ashes were
interred in the Eden Memorial Park Cemetery in Mission Hills, Los
Angeles, California. (He had jokingly expressed desire to be buried
above Marilyn Monroe.) Aged 86 at death, Groucho was the longest-lived
of all the Marx brothers, although his younger brother Zeppo outlived
him by two years. His death undoubtedly would have received more
attention at the time had it not occurred three days after that of Elvis
Presley. In an interview, he jokingly suggested his epitaph read "Excuse
me, I can't stand up", but his mausoleum marker bears only his stage
name and years of birth and death.
Groucho's legacy
Various Groucho-like characters and Groucho
references have appeared in popular culture, some long after Marx's
death, a testament to the character's lasting appeal.
Dave Sim, in his controversial comic book
Cerebus the Aardvark, cast Groucho as the slippery, wisecracking but
indomitable Lord Julius, Grandlord of the bureaucrat-ridden City-state
of Palnu.
Bugs Bunny dresses as Groucho for the
cartoon Slick Hare (1947), where he's trying to hide in plain sight in
the Mocrumbo restaurant. (Meanwhile, Elmer Fudd dresses as Harpo
Marx.)Bugs again befuddles Elmer Fudd memorably in "Wideo Wabbit" (1956)
by imitating the mustachioed comedian in a You Bet Your Life parody
called You Beat Your Wife. Later he imitates Art Carney and slaps
comical glasses on Elmer, admonishing "Gee, what a Groucho!"
In The Way We Were (1973), Barbra Streisand
and Robert Redford attend a party where everyone dresses as one of the
Marx Brothers.
Alan Alda often vamped as Groucho on
M*A*S*H and a minor semi-recurring character in the series (played by
Loudon Wainwright III) was named Captain Calvin Spalding in a nod
towards Groucho's character in Animal Crackers, Captain Geoffrey T.
Spaulding.
On Pokémon, Dr. Quackenpoker (a parody of
Dr. Hackenbush from A Day at the Races) meets up with Ash & Company. He
sounds and acts like Groucho (sans the cigar). A joke includes, "One
day, I shot a Magikarp in my pajamas. How it got into my pajamas, I'll
never know."
In Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968), Grandpa
Potts (Lionel Jeffries) tells a variation of the "elephant in my
pajamas" joke.
Sir Isaiah Berlin also had a quatrain
stating, "The world wouldn’t be /In such a snarl /If Marx had been
Groucho /Instead of Karl".
In the Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers musical
Swing Time (1936), Astaire sings "Never Gonna Dance" by Jerome Kern and
Dorothy Fields, which includes the lines: "To Groucho Marx I give my
cravat/To Harpo goes my shiny silk hat."
Gabe Kaplan portrayed Marx in the
biographical Groucho (1982) which was originally produced on Broadway.
Kaplan also impersonated Groucho, his hero, in his television series
Welcome Back Kotter, and in WhatzUp Magazine recalled that he had even
approached Groucho to make a cameo on the show but Groucho's care-giver,
Erin Fleming, would not allow it. (According to Mark Evanier, Marx did
visit the set with Fleming, but was not well enough to perform.)
In the Tiny Toon Adventures episode "A
Night in Kokomo", Groucho and his brothers have been re-assembled. This
is noteworthy because most of the target audience of this show most
likely never watched their movies. In Tiziano Sclavi's comic book series
Dylan Dog, the hero's sidekick and assistant is called and looks like
Groucho Marx. His moustache was removed in the US version of the series.
Rob Zombie uses several Groucho Marx
character names (Captain Spaulding from Animal Crackers, Otis Driftwood
from A Night at the Opera, Rufus T. Firefly from Duck Soup, Hugo Z.
Hackenbush from A Day at the Races, S. Quentin Quale from Go West, and
Wolf J. Flywheel from The Big Store) for his movies, House of 1000
Corpses & The Devil's Rejects.
At the end of the basketball episode of
Clone High where Joan reveals that she dressed up as a man to play on
the team, Principal Scudworth calls out for everyone else wearing a fake
moustache to please leave. A man with a fake moustache walks by,
followed by a goose wearing a similar moustache, followed by Groucho
Marx (or the clone thereof).
In an episode of the Spanish sitcom Aquí no
hay quien viva, Paco (Guillermo Ortega) does an impression of Marx in
costume, sporting the fake moustache and eyebrows, glasses and a cigar,
imitating Marx's high-pitched fast-talking voice while speaking in
Spanish.
The cover of Elton John's Don't Shoot Me,
I'm Only the Piano Player features a movie theater with a poster for the
Marx Brothers movie Go West.
Two of Queen's albums, A Night at the Opera
(1975) and A Day at the Races (1976) are named after two of the Marx
Brothers' films. Queen were Marx Brothers fans and decided to use these
titles for their fourth and fifth albums after watching the films. (From
"The Making Of A Night At The Opera")
In character as Mike Stivic, Rob Reiner
imitated Groucho Marx on a few occasions on the 1970s sitcom All in the
Family, including a few scenes in a 1974 episode in which Mike Stivic
and his wife Gloria (Sally Struthers) get ready to go to a Marx Brothers
film festival; Mike, dressed as Groucho, does a number of imitations.
Gloria is dressed as Harpo Marx.
Robin Williams's Genie in Aladdin briefly
impersonates Groucho while enumerating the conditions of wishes at the
beginning. He appears for a few seconds in black and white and is even
followed by a duck dropping from the ceiling (a reference to You Bet
Your Life). Doubtless, this in-joke was intended for the adult audience
of the film. Also, in the second sequel of the film, Aladdin and the
King of Thieves, the genie briefly morphes into three of the Marx
brothers at once when trying to cheer up Princess Jasmine.
The Vlasic Pickles stork mascot is clearly
a homage to Groucho, holding the pickle like a cigar and having a very
similar voice.
In the animated series Animaniacs, the
character Yakko acts similarly to Groucho quite often.
MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch included an
episode in which a deathmatch pitted Groucho against John Wayne, in
which Harpo and Chico also make appearances during the fight. Roger
Jackson provided the voice of Groucho, and Jimmy St. Cleve voiced Chico.
In a tribute to Groucho, the BBC remade the
radio sitcom Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel, with contemporary actors
playing the parts of the original cast. The series is currently being
repeated on digital radio station BBC7.
In the Cartoon Network series Foster's Home
for Imaginary Friends, a character named Rubber Chicken wears Groucho
glasses and talks like him and makes jokes like him. Also, in the
episode "Imposter's Home for Make-em-ups", when Frankie dresses in a
costume and calls herself "Goof-Goof", she talks to herself about her
plan in a Groucho voice and does his eyebrow raising face.
In a Sesame Street movie promo for Lowe's
Theaters, Elmo is seen dressed as Groucho, with Telly as Harpo and Herry
Monster as Chico.
In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode
"Scaredy Pants", Patrick Star disguises himself as Groucho when he goes
trick-or-treating with SpongeBob.
Groucho is mentioned in the song "Fly on a
Windshield" by progressive rock band Genesis featured in their album The
Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.
In Woody Allen's film Everyone Says I Love
You there's a Groucho based musical number in French.
In the final Tintin album Tintin and the
Picaros a giant mask representing Groucho is seen in the crowd
celebrating carnival.
A puppet representing his image features on
the cover art of Have You Fed the Fish? by singer song writer Badly
Drawn Boy.
Cult TV series Mystery Science Theater 3000
often featured Crow T. Robot doing an impersonation of Groucho when
mocking a movie. One particularly memorable quip featured Crow saying
"Say the secret woid and Bill Cosby rips off your series" (or words to
that effect); this was a direct reference to the Cosby-hosted,
short-lived revival of You Bet Your Life. It should be noted that Cosby
and Groucho were personal friends, and Groucho considered the original
idea for the revival (with Cosby) at the helm to be a good one.
In the Marx Brothers-inspired comedy Brain
Donors (Paramount Pictures 1992), John Turturro plays a contemporary
Groucho Marx as the character Roland T. Flakfizer.
In the 1977 Best Picture-winning Woody
Allen film, Annie Hall, Woody opens the movie with a famous quotation,
which he attributed to Groucho: "I refuse to belong to any club that
will accept me as a member." The quotation was the end of an anecdote in
Groucho's autobiography, "Groucho and Me."
In the comedy role-playing game, Kingdom of
Loathing, there is a Groucho disguise available for players' pet rocks.
The item refers to Animal Crackers and Horse Feathers.
The video game Mother (known as Earthbound
Zero in the English version) features an enemy named Groucho who
resembles Groucho Marx. It is solely composed of a pair of eyes, a big
nose, and a large moustache.
In a 2005 poll, The Comedian's Comedian,
Groucho was voted the 5th greatest comedy act ever by fellow comedians
and comedy insiders. His glasses, nose, and moustache have become icons
of comedy—to this day, glasses with fake noses and moustaches (referred
to as "Groucho glasses," "nose-glasses," and other names) resembling
Groucho are still sold by novelty and costume shops, and worn by young
people, some of whom may not understand their origin.
"Marx and Lennon"
The liberal political views of Groucho Marx
and singer John Lennon were not lost on satirists, who capitalized on
the coincidence of their surnames' similarity to Karl Marx and Vladimir
Lenin:
A book called 'Marx & Lennon: The Parallel
Sayings' was published in 2005. As the title implies, it recorded the
parallel sayings between Groucho Marx and John Lennon.
In 1994 the Republic of Abkhazia (an
unrecognized state that is officially part of Georgia) issued two
postage stamps featuring John Lennon and Groucho Marx, spoofing
Abkhazia's communist past.
The cover art for The Firesign Theatre's
1969 album How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You're Not Anywhere
at All featured a Communist icon banner with pictures of the two
enjoining "All Hail Marx Lennon" printed in pseudo-Russian lettering.
In his book It All Started With Columbus,
first printed in the mid-1950s, humorist Richard Armour discussed Karl
Marx and referred to him as "the funniest of the Marx Brothers".
In the comedy role-playing game Paranoia,
the Communist faction carries pictures of Groucho Marx and sing John
Lennon songs due to a lack of knowledge of communism itself.
Fans of the Marx Brothers sometimes
describe themselves as "Marxists of the Groucho kind".
Quotations about Groucho Marx
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations
related to:
Groucho Marx"Groucho Marx was the best
comedian this country ever produced. [...] He is simply unique in the
same way that Picasso or Stravinsky are." —Woody Allen
A famous French witticism (often attributed
to Jean-Luc Godard) was, "Je suis Marxiste, tendance Groucho," i.e. "I'm
a Marxist of the Groucho variety". This line was notably heard in the
1972 comedy by Claude Lelouch "L'aventure c'est l'aventure", (starring
Lino Ventura, Aldo Maccione, Jacques Brel, Johnny Hallyday and Charles
Denner) where the would-be heroes get involved with a central-American
guerilla; it spread to other nations as well in the 1960s and 1970s. The
Youth International Party, a 1960s-1970s ad-hoc political group of
Anarcho-Marxists known for street theatre and pranks, were denounced in
a Communist newspaper editorial as "Groucho Marxists".
****
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