A Night at the Opera ***** (1935, Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Margaret Dumont, Sig Ruman, Allan Jones, Kitty Carlisle) – Classic Movie Review 3061

Otis B Driftwood: ‘It’s all right, that’s in every contract. That’s what they call a sanity clause.’ Fiorello: ‘You can’t fool me! There ain’t no Santay Claus!’

Director Sam Wood’s hilarious 1935 Marx Brothers comedy A Night at the Opera features the three Marxes –  Groucho as Otis B Driftwood, Chico as Fiorello and Harpo as Tomasso (Zeppo had retired) – who make their mark on an opera company in one of their most brilliantly funny movies.

The overcrowded stateroom in A Night at the Opera.

It comes complete with one of their most inventive and hysterical sequences when they tell most of the crew of a ship to pack into a single cabin of the hilariously overcrowded stateroom. Admittedly, the musical interludes sung by Kitty Carlisle and Allan Jones are pretty awful – although they do get to sing one decent  hit, ‘Alone’ (music by Nacio Herb Brown, lyrics by Arthur Freed). But the Thirties public lapped Carlisle and Jones up and they helped this to be the Marx Brothers’ biggest hit.

So it’s hooray for the wonderful Margaret Dumont, who happily has lots to do as Mrs Claypool, and the irrepressible Sig Ruman as Herman Gottlieb. And, with lots of funny gags for Groucho as Otis B Driftwood (‘I saw Mrs Claypool first, of course, her mother really saw her first but there’s no point in bringing the Civil War into this’) and a lavish MGM production, it’s a winner.

The hilarious screenplay is by George S Kaufman, Morrie Ryskind, Al Boasberg, Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby, and Buster Keaton (uncredited), based on a story by James Kevin McGuinness, and the jokes were enterprisingly and rather sensibly tried out in a stage tour before filming started.

Along with Duck Soup (1933), Horse Feathers (1932) and Monkey Business (1931), A Night at the Opera is the very best of the Marx Brothers on film.

Also in the cast are Walter Woolf King, Edward Keane, Robert Emmett O’Connor, Stanley Blystone, Al Bridge, Gino Corrado, Otto Fries, Billy Gilbert, William Gould, George Guhl, Jonathan Hale, Rodolfo Hoyos Jr, George Irving, Selmer Jackson, Wilbur Mack, Fred Malatesta, Inez Palange, Purnell Pratt, Hal Price, Rolfe Sedan, Phillips Smalley, Harry Tyler, Elinor Vanderveer, Zuke Welch, Leo White, James J Wolf, Frank Yaconelli, Claude Payton and Jerry Mandy.

A Night at the Opera runs 96 minutes, is an MGM release, is shot in black and white by Merritt B Gerstad, is produced by Irving Thalberg, is scored by Herbert Stothart, Nacio Herb Brown and Bronislau Kaper, and is designed by Cedric Gibbons.

http://derekwinnert.com/duck-soup-1933-marx-brothers-classic-movie-review-1405/

http://derekwinnert.com/horse-feathers-1932-groucho-marx-chico-marx-harpo-marx-zeppo-marx-thelma-todd-classic-movie-review-3060/

http://derekwinnert.com/monkey-business-1931-marx-brothers-thelma-todd-ruth-hall-classic-movie-review-2156/

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 3061

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com