Thursday February 04, 2021
Cocoanuts Redux
The only thing soggy is the paper.
I've got most Marx Brothers movies all but memorized but not The Cocoanuts, which I only saw once or twice in my heyday with the Marx Brotherhood. Just didn't care for it. I put it with Room Service or Love Happy as the disappointments. Yes, it was a big Broadway hit and their first Hollywood movie, but it's so unevenly paced. Paramount put two directors on it and the Brothers didn't think much of either. “One of them didn't understand English,” Groucho said, “and the other one didn't understand comedy.”
Anyway I watched it the other day and it still isn't good but it has its moments. Harpo shines. The auction scene is great. Plus, of course, “Why a duck.” But I missed this great pun right before the “Why a duck?” bit. Groucho is about to auction off lots in the Florida land boom and he wants Chico to bid up the price, and he's explaining to him where the lots are.
Groucho: This is the riverfront. And all along the river, those are all levees.
Chico: That's the Jewish neighborhood.
Groucho: [Gives him a look] Well, we'll pass over that.
As a kid in Minnesota, I probably didn't know levees or Levys (not to mention Passover), which may be why the joke never stuck. But man did I laugh the other day.
Something else that stuck this viewing: During this scene, Groucho also says to Chico, “Look, Einstein...” This was in 1929. It made me wonder about the first ironic usage of an “Einstein.” Is there an earlier recorded example? And did Einstein's friends ever use it on him when he got something wrong? “Nice going, Einstein.”
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