Hello, I must be going. I cannot stay, I came to say I must be going to watch the Marx Brothers marathon today on Turner Classic Movies.
I’ll be gorging on Groucho’s great lines: Gee, I thought my razor was dull until I heard that speech… You can have any kind of home you want. You can even get stucco. Oh, how you can get stucco… One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas, I don’t know….
Don’t look now, but there’s one man too many in this room and I think it’s you…
Marx mania starts with “Room Service” at 9:30 a.m., but the brothers best comes later on today.
Groucho guests on the “Dick Cavett Show” (3:30 p.m.), followed by “The Cocoanuts” (4:30 p.m.), “Animal Crackers” with Groucho singing “Hello, I Must Be Going” (6:15 p.m.), “Monkey Business” (8 p.m.), and “Horse Feathers” with the funniest football game ever (9:30 p.m.). The night closes with their classics, “Duck Soup” (10:45 p.m.) and “A Night At The Opera” (midnight).
I crack up every time the opera pit orchestra breaks into “Take Me Out To The Ball Game.” And when Groucho and Chico negotiate a contract with a sanity clause. You can’t fool me! There ain’t no Sanity Claus!
Definitely TCM saved the best for last. The first film, “Room Service,” co-stars young Lucille Ball -- as a dramatic actress. It’s followed by the brothers’ least memorable movies: “At The Circus” (11 a.m.), “Go West” (12:30 p.m.) and “The Big Store” (2 p.m.). They’re all part of TCM’s tribute to Groucho, who died 38 years ago on August 19, 1977.
My wife wants to watch “Love It Or List It” tonight. I’ll want the remote to see “Duck Soup,” when Groucho puts down an attack on the tiny nation of Freedonia – if he can ever get to parliament in Harpo’s motorcycle sidecar. If you run out of gas, get Ethyl. If Ethyl runs out, get Mabel!
Hail, Hail Freedonia! That’s what I want to see on my TV tonight. This means war!
