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Full Description
An updated paperback version of the book heralded as "a new benchmark in Marx scholarship" by the Los Angeles Times
Before film made them international comedy legends, the Marx Brothers developed their comic skills on stage for twenty-five years. In Four of the Three Musketeers: The Marx Brothers on Stage, Robert S. Bader offers the first comprehensive history of the foursome's hardscrabble early years honing their act in front of live audiences.
From Groucho's debut in 1905 to their final live performances of scenes from A Night in Casablanca in 1945, the brothers' stage career shows how their characters and routines evolved before their arrival in Hollywood. Four of the Three Musketeers draws on an unmatched array of sources, many not referenced elsewhere. Bader's detailed portrait of the struggling young actors both brings to vivid life a typical night on the road for the Marx Brothers and illuminates the inner workings of the vaudeville business, especially during its peak in the 1920s.
As Bader traces the origins of the characters that would later come to be beloved by filmgoers, he also skillfully scrapes away the accretion of rumors and mythology perpetuated not only by fans and writers but by the Marx Brothers themselves. Revealing, vital, and entertaining, Four of the Three Musketeers has taken its place as an essential reference for this legendary American act. Now, the updated edition adds newly discovered performances—some submitted by readers—and additional information provided by descendants of long-departed vaudevillians mentioned in the book.
Contents
Introduction
Prologue - The Old Country
I. THE MARXIAN PREHISTORIC
1. The House on 93rd Street
2. Uncle Al, Gene Leroy and Johnnie Morris
3. On the Road with Master Julius Marx
II. THE NIGHTINGALES, ALMA SCHANG AND THE UBO
4. Ned Wayburn's Nightingales
5. A Nightingale Sang in Coney Island
6. Four Nightingales and Six Mascots
III. THE BUMPY ROAD TO THE BIG-TIME
7. The Metamorphosis: The Three Marx Bros. & Company in Fun in High School
8. Pantages, the White Rats and "Peasie Weasie"
9. Changing Partners: Gordon, Shean and Lee
IV. AND THEN THERE WERE FOUR
10. The Four Marx Bros. & Company in Mr. Green's Reception
11. The Sex Lives of the Marx Brothers and Other Catastrophes of 1913
12. Chicago's Only Lady Producer of Vaudeville Attractions
13. Home Again and Broken Hearts
V. THE BUMPIER ROAD TO BROADWAY
14. Home Again...And Again, and Again, and Again
15. The Five Marx Brothers and How They Became a Quartet...Again
16. A Show By Any Other Name
17. On The Mezzanine Floor with a Smudge of Grease Paint
18. On the Balcony, the Mauritania, and Albee's Blacklist
VI. FROM THE ASHES TO THE TALKIES
19. I'll Say She Is
20. The Toast Of Broadway
21. The Cocoanuts
22. Talkies, Animal Crackers and the Death of Vaudeville
VII. THE END OF THE ROAD
23. The Last of Minnie and the Crash of '29
24. The Four Marx Brothers And How They Became A Trio... Again
Epilogue - The End of a Dream Come True
Appendix -The Marx Brothers Stage Chronology (1905-1945)
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
