Room service marx brothers
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In their best films, their distinct styles merge into a perfect bouillabaisse of madcap comic anarchy, a spot-on balance of broad and intellectual humor that works for viewers of all ages and experiences. (Zeppo, the handsome youngest brother, only appears in their first five films, and then as a straight man, though a valuable one.) As a result, they're funny on several different levels. In their specific comic personas (honed and perfected over years of vaudeville and stage work-lest we forget, they were all pushing or past 40 by the time of their first film, The Cocoanuts), they offered their audience a little something of everything: Groucho gave them fast-talking wiseguy verbal comedy, Chico was a traditional con man dialect comic, and mute Harpo provided a healthy dose of Chaplin-style pantomime, slapstick, and (particularly in their later films) pathos. Sure, Groucho gets some great one liners and Harpo gets to indulge in a little physical comedy, it’s just hard to get on board with this mediocre version of the brothers when I know how amazing they really can be.In this reviewer's humble opinion, the Marx Brothers are the greatest of all the great comedy teams-better than Laurel & Hardy, better than Abbott & Costello, better than the Stooges.
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Until everything comes crashing down in an hilarious fashion. In true farce fashion, their attempts to finance the musical and pay their ever escalating hotel bill dig them deeper and deeper under cover ups, misunderstandings, lies and deceptions. Seeing them all work together kills a lot of the comedy.
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Which is another weird thing, the best Marx Brothers movies have Groucho’s plans constantly under minded by Chico and Harpo, even when they’re technically his allies. In Room Service, Groucho plays a musical producer who’s been living on credit at his brother in law’s hotel. Although I think the absolutely terrible Love Happy might fall into the same camp).
#Room service marx brothers movie#
In fact, it’s the only Marx Brothers movie not written specifically for them (according to Wikipedia. It was based on a play they had nothing to do with. And it turns out there’s a reason why this didn’t feel like a Marx Brothers movie… Because it’s not a Marx Brothers movie. Even as someone who finds Harpo’s solos to sometimes be like handbrake on Marx Brothers momentum, it still felt like something was missing by not having it there. No real songs (outside of a couple of ironic renditions of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”), no Chico going mental on a piano, no Harpo harp solo. More than once, I found myself thinking this seemed less and less like a Marx Brothers movie. But Room Service takes the staginess to whole new level, filmed almost entirely on one hotel room set. Which is a big call considering their early movies like The Coconuts and Animal Crackers were honed on Broadway before filming. Watching it, I thought it was the most “stage play” like of any Marx Brothers movie I’d ever seen. But unfortunately, I would put Room Service in the category of downward spiral. And The Big Store has a funny set piece on roller skates (I think, I haven’t seen it in a long, long time). Go West has one of their greatest sketches ever with Harpo and Chico grifting Groucho out of “$9 change please” on the train platform. At the Circus has one of the greatest Marx Brothers songs ever in “Lydia the Tattooed Lady”. I am definitely not one of those people who see those as a downward spiral. Post-Zeppo, Room Service comes between the critically acclaimed one-two punch of A Night at the Opera and A Day at the Races, and what many see as the downward spiral of titles like At the Circus, Go West and The Big Store.