9 Wacky Facts about the Marx Brothers

From Harpo's ridiculous croquet uniform to Groucho's penchant for Heavy Metal, Will and Mango uncover 9 facts you probably don't know about the Marx Brothers.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I guess what Will? What's that mango? So I know
you're avidly following the Australian Open right now, but it
reminded me of this great Groucho Marks. Fact. Did you
know that Groucho Marks's son was an acclaimed tennis player? No?
I didn't. Yeah, he was ranked in the US and
it took a young Bobby Riggs five sets to beat him. Wow.
You might know Riggs from winning Wilbledon at one or

(00:20):
more famously for challenging and losing to Billy Jean King
in the Battle of the Sexes you know, many years later,
of course. Yeah, but Groucher's son was actually the real deal.
That is crazy. I did not know that. And uh,
tennis wasn't his only skill. He later wrote screenplays for
Bob Hope and penn scripts for sitcoms like On the Family, Maud,
The Jefferson's. And that's just first of nine facts about

(00:42):
the Marx Brothers. Let's dive in a their podcast. Listeners,

(01:04):
welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as
always I'm joined by my good friend Mangesha Ticketer and
on the other side of the soundproof glass, sipping from
a big bowl of duck soup. That's our friend and
producer Tristan McNeil. Now, usually we'd have our researcher Gabe
Louisier on the line as well, but things have been
a little different this week. There's been yet another snowstorm
in Atlanta. Now I'm in New York this week, so

(01:26):
I'm I'm actually not dealing with a snowstorm, Howard things
in Atlanta. I go. You and Tristan, I think are
the only ones in the office now right, I know
it's a totally empty except for us. In these nine facts. Wow,
real troopers. Okay, well, I'm guessing that you can do
better than a fact about Groucho Marx's tennis playing son.
I mean, that was awesome. But do you want to

(01:46):
take a take the next one as well? Yeah, definitely.
So I'm gonna stick with the sports theme here. And
here's one about Harpo. Did you know he was in
the Croquet Hall of Fame? I didn't. So this is
the description from the U. S Croquet Association on his game,
and it's pretty great. So quote usually clad only in
the briefest of trunks, even when others were in flannels,

(02:08):
Harpo would just bound around the court, laughing and stretching
mouthful of an entire pack of gum. But apparently he
was really serious about it, Like he used to store
his croquet tools and just like cold room in his house,
and it was especially built just to keep the humidity
out so it didn't warp his mallets. That's so strange,
all right. Well, speaking of Harpo and strangeness, that did

(02:29):
you know that he used to practice the harp for
two to three hours every day and he would do
this in every room in the house. In fact, according
to Harpo's son Bill, his dad quote maybe the first
multitasker ever. He even had a harp in the bathroom
so he could play when he sat on the toilet.
I love the idea of a toilet harp. So I

(02:51):
know we've talked about T. S. Eliott's friendship with Graucho
Marks in the past, but here's what I'd never heard before.
So Alice Cooper and Groucho Marks were actually really good friends.
And apparently they started their friendship when Groucho told Alice
Cooper at a party that his onstage theatrics were total vaudeville,
and Alice Cooper agreed, and their friendships really interesting. So

(03:13):
Grocho Marks was this total insomniac and late in the
night he'd call Alice over and they drink Budweiser, smoked
cigars and watch all movies late into the nine until
Groucho passed out. And also Groucho used to take his
friends to Alice Cooper shows, So this is totally true.
George Burns and Fred Astaire have seen Alice Cooper and concert.

(03:33):
That's pretty crazy. Yeah, But but the friendship wasn't just
one way. When Alice Cooper paid to restore one of
the o's in the old Hollywood sign, he dedicated it
to Groucho Marks. Actually, you know, there's another friendship that
I didn't realize. So Groucho was good pals with Elton John.
In fact, he used to kid him that his name
was reversed, that it should be John Elton and I

(03:53):
happen to agree with him on this one. But one
night he ribbed him so much that John finally threw
his hands up in exasperation and joke, don't shoot me,
I'm only the piano player, which of course became the
name for his next album, That's Funny. So here's one
about Zeppe Marks, A K. Herbert, who was actually an
incredible inventor. So after leaving show business, he invented a

(04:14):
wristwatch that could sense heart attacks, which he did by
monitoring your pulse, and he had a number of other
inventions too. He developed a new type of heating pad.
He even started a company that made clamps for the
war effort, and supposedly it was his company's clamps that
secured the fat Men and Little Boy bombs in place. Well,
if you're ever wondering about the power of comedy, Groucho
Marks once halted trading at the New York Stock Exchange.

(04:36):
Apparently he spied the mic on stage and couldn't help himself.
He started performing songs and telling jokes and went on
for something like fifteen minutes as the traders just stopped
and watched him. It only stopped when he joked that
they were all dallying too much and that they should
start working before they ruined some important person's finances. M So,

(04:57):
I know this isn't about one of the Marx brothers,
but it is about a Marx, Karl Marx, and I
had to include it because it was so stupid. Did
you know that Karl Marx named all four of his
daughters Jenny. They had they had different middle names, but
he doled out the first names equally. There's Jenny, Caroline, Jenny, Laura, Jenny,
Evelyn Francis, and Jenny Julia Eleanor and they all got

(05:20):
to be Jenny Marx's. Wow. All right, Well, here's what
I know you're going to love. Did you know that
there was a Marx Brothers movie that almost got made
in the nineteen sixties, and it was going to be
about the Marx brothers visiting the United Nations. Apparently Billy Wilder,
who made all these great comedies, who was staying at
the u N during some political craziness and thought all

(05:41):
the chaos would make for a great setting. He dreamed
of this movie about Groucho as a mob boss trying
to rob Tiffany's while all the city's cops were protecting
a delegation at the u N. And even though the
Marx Brothers hadn't made a movie since the nineteen forties,
they were all on board. It is until health problems
slowed them down and kept them from actually filming the movie.

(06:01):
That's really interesting and actually, while I'd love to see
that movie. I think that's a great fact I'm worth
keeping around, So I think you get the trophy for
this week. All right, Well, thank you and thank you
guys for listening. We'll be back with a full length
episode tomorrow y