Movies You Might Have Missed: Bob Weide's The Marx Brothers in a Nutshell

Screen legend Gene Kelly narrates this documentary which should be compulsory viewing for anyone with an interest in the genesis of modern screen comedy

Brass act: Groucho, Chico and Harpo made 13 films between 1929 and 1949

Groucho Marx passed away just a few days after Elvis Presley in August of 1977. Iconic performers who changed entertainment beyond recognition, both are universally known by a single name, some indication of their beloved status. The Marx Brothers in a Nutshell, a passion project Bob Weide started working on at the age of 18 and completed four years later, illustrates the genius of Groucho and his siblings with its collection of highlights from their films accompanied by interview segments with collaborators and fans including Woody Allen, Robert Klein and David Steinberg.

Weide, who has directed a compelling documentary about Allen in recent years and an abundance of Curb Your Enthusiasm episodes, clearly recognises that modern comedy, from Saturday Night Live to Monty Python, would have been unimaginable without the Marx Brothers. Indeed, even Curb, with Larry David’s insistence on saying the unsayable, has its roots in Groucho and the boys’ anarchic disrespect for any semblance of order. When the student revolution occurred in Paris in 1968, the graffiti in the streets read, “Je suis Marxiste, tendance Groucho,” – “I am a Marxist of the Groucho variety.” With that in mind, consider this film the Marxist manifesto.

When the documentary was first broadcast on PBS in 1982, it was one of the highest rated programmes in the history of the network and it’s not hard to see why. The film combines rarely seen footage with classic scenes from Duck Soup et al to give a sense of how a family act consisting of the children of immigrants came to conquer the silver screen. Each brother is shown to have a personality on film that is merely an exaggeration of their actual character; a method one senses might have influenced Curb.

Richard Patterson was credited as director at the time of film’s original airing but this was largely so that PBS would entrust money to a man barely out of his teens who’d failed to gain entry to film school on three separate occasions. Charles Joffe, legendary producer of masterpieces like Annie Hall and Manhattan, put in calls to friends at the major studios and helped Weide secure the clips he needed to showcase the best of the Marxes. The first cut was so comprehensive that it came in at 17 hours but, aided by editor and co-writer Joe Adamson, Weide ensured The Marx Brothers in a Nutshell eventually lived up to its title and it should be compulsory viewing for anyone with an interest in the genesis of modern screen comedy.