Chico Marx

A Night at the Opera

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A Night at the Opera. Metro Goldwyn Meyer 1935.
A Night at the Opera. Metro Goldwyn Meyer 1935.

Before watching the movie:

I was a little confused by the box description of the Marx Brothers skewering the “schemes” of a pompous opera singer when an arts patron is already going to pay him the exorbitant amounts just because he’s such a big star and great singer. It makes a lot more sense to think about it more like a feature-length Bugs Bunny cartoon, with the Marx Brothers skewering the powerful to empower the lowly.

This is widely regarded as the best Marx Brothers movie, but I don’t remember it being on the same list of great comedies that brought Duck Soup to my attention. A spot of research shows that it’s on there, I just didn’t remember it.

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Duck Soup

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Duck Soup. Paramount Pictures 1933.

Before watching the movie:

This was a consideration for May’s classics theme, and probably would have been a better fit than one of them. I was actually planning to include it before I realized that May might have had five Thursdays (the day I write on), but only four Fridays (the day I publish).

Anyway, here’s the Marx brothers doing political satire. On what? I don’t recall, but I think it’s about contemporary US foreign policy.

I had fun keeping up a theme for a month. I’m thinking about doing another themed month soon, but it won’t be July.

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