Marxfest begins in one week!

Members of the faculty, faculty members, students of Huxley, and Huxley students,

The Time of Marxfest is nearly upon us! In one week, New York becomes Marx Brothers City.

You may consider this your invitation to THE PARTY OF THE FIRST PART, the festival's opening bash at the Algonquin Hotel, Thursday, May 1, 6:00 - 10:00 pm. In fact, you may consider this anything you like. The Algonquin, writes our fearless leader Kevin C. Fitzpatrick, "is where Harpo hobnobbed with close friends such as Heywood Broun, Dorothy Parker, and Alexander Woollcott. It’s where George S. Kaufman met the Brothers and became one of their greatest collaborators." Meet the Marxfest Committee in the Blue Bar. There has been talk of special guests and even door prizes. If you need a door, stop by.

Just to skim the surface, here are some of the things you'll be doing in May. Remember to save them to your calendar, write them in your book, tattoo them on your friends, and above all, buy tickets!

FROM ANGELS TO ANARCHISTS: THE EVOLUTION OF THE MARX BROTHERS (Friday, May 2, 7:30 pm, Coney Island USA) is Trav S. D.'s exploration of the Brothers' roots as a singing act and their transformation into the comedians we love. The event takes place at beautiful Coney Island, just a few dozen yards from where Harpo made his stage debut. Trav promises, "Along the way there will be performances of some of the act's early material by Sarah Moskowitz, and scatological details about Harpo's debut at Henderson's." WHAT??? Quick, buy tickets now! 

(And don't miss Trav's other talks -- Anarchy in Astoria: The Making of the Marx Brothers' First Two Pictures on May 10, and We're All Mad Here: The Marx Brothers in Context on May 29!)

​Friend-of-the-festival FRANK FERRANTE is well-known to all Marx fans -- after all, he brought his name undying fame, and that is why we say hooray for the man Morrie Ryskind once described as "the only actor aside from Groucho who delivered my lines as they were intended." On Saturday, May 3, see An Evening with Groucho in Freeport -- after the performance, Marxfest will conduct an onstage interview with Frank Ferrante, in which he'll discuss his long association with the role of Groucho, and will answer questions from the audience. Or, catch Frank's May 4 matinee on Staten Island, then stowaway on the ferry, sing a few choruses of "Sweet Adeline," and hightail it to Greenwich Village for the Marx Brothers on Television event. Frank Ferrante and Paul Wesolowski will be in attendance.

Oh, friends, if you miss THE MARX BROTHERS ON TELEVISION (Sunday, May 4, 7:00 pm, The Players Theatre), then I just don't know what to say. My concern is that you'll never bounce back -- that you will wander aimlessly evermore as The One Who Missed The Marx Brothers On Television, Sunday, May 4, 7:00 pm at the Players Theatre. First of all, we've got friend-of-the-festival ROBERT S. BADER, one of the world's foremost Marxists -- editor of Groucho Marx and Other Short Stories and Tall Tales, compiler of the upcoming hotly-anticipated Marx Brothers Television Collection DVD set, and author of a forthcoming comprehensive account of the Brothers' stage career. Then, on top of Mr. Bader -- let me rephrase this -- in addition to Mr. Bader, we've got some kid named DICK CAVETT. They tell me he's one of Groucho's friends. The conversation is guaranteed to sparkle, and the clips -- oh, the clips. This is unquestionably one of our hottest tickets, and if you'll forgive a blunt piece of advice, you really should buy tickets right now.

MARXES IN MANHATTAN (Wednesday, May 7, 8:00 pm, The Players Theatre) is ROBERT S. BADER's multimedia presentation about how the Brothers' hometown shaped their lives and their comedy -- with rarely-seen film clips, live performance, and ephemera from Mr. Bader's collection. Early vaudeville performances will be recreated live on stage -- including one of Julius Henry Marx's first professional jobs, with the Leroy Trio. 

Yes, that's right -- THE RETURN OF THE LEROY TRIO! I bet you weren't expecting THAT! Only at Marxfest! You'd better hurry up and get tickets. And if you want to attend both The Marx Brothers on Television AND Marxes in Manhattan -- and who wouldn't? -- then take advantage of this special package deal!

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Now here's a classy event -- THE MUSIC OF THE MARX BROTHERS (Friday, May 9, 11:00 pm, 54 Below), a tribute in song, performed by some of New York's top talent at Broadway's Supper Club, 54 Below. This is going to be nice, and I've seen the setlist -- it's a lineup that will make any Marx Brothers fan sing. But kindly keep it down, because you're going to want to be able to hear these incredible performers -- Bill Zeffiro, Gelber & Manning, Rebekah Lowin, Tonna Miller, Marissa Mulder, and your host, Dandy Wellington. There will also be special guests. I know people throw that phrase around a lot, but believe me. Special. And all in a spectacular setting that recalls the golden age of Broadway nightlife. Tickets and information here.

Did you say you were looking for burlesque? Well, we happen to have some right here! Pinchbottom presents four performances of its Marx-inspired burlesque romp THE PINCH BROTHERS IN THE BAWDY HOUSE (May 8, 15, 18, and 22, 8:00 pm, The Players Theatre), hailed by the UK Sunday Telegraph as "daring, funny, imaginative and titillating to all tastes." The show, written and directed by Jonny Porkpie, features a dazzling lineup of the city's burlesque stars, including Tigger!, Scout Durwood, Jonny Porkpie, Bastard Keith, Angie Pontani, Rebecca Hart, Anita Cookie, Little Brooklyn, Peekaboo Pointe, Scott Rayow, Tansy, Donny Vomit, Zoe Ziegfeld, Jo Weldon and more! Now where's that link you can click on to buy tickets immediately?

Still not enough burlesque for you? Well, worldwide phenomenon anti-art school DR. SKETCHY'S (Sunday, May 11, 4:00 pm, The Stonewall Inn) presents a special session featuring the stars of The Bawdy House, plus SketchyNYC's own Lewd Alfred Douglas, modeling for your sketching pleasure -- hosted by Kat Mon Dieu as Marilyn Monroe. And then there's YOU BET YOUR ASS (Saturday, May 17, 10:00 pm, The Cutting Room), a burlesque quiz show hosted by Mr. Murray Hill, with Jonny Porkpie as announcer and performances from Anita Cookie, Lady Scoutington, and Trixie Little & The Evil Hate Monkey. 

And then there's this. I'LL SAY SHE IS, the Brothers' legendary 1924 Broadway debut was never filmed, and has never been revived. Since it closed in 1925, it has been seen only through its profound influence on everything the Marxes did thereafter. This year, ninety years since the original Broadway opening, the lost Marx Brothers musical returns to the stage, in a new adaptation by Noah Diamond, directed by Trav S. D. I'LL SAY SHE IS (May 23 and 25, The Players Theatre) re-premieres at Marxfest, in the form of two staged readings previewing the full production later this year. It stars Melody Jane, Noah Diamond, Seth Shelden, Robert Pinnock, Matthew Curiano, Kathy Biehl, Bob Homeyer, Dan Hermann, Grace Gotham, and Ivory Fox, and if you don't buy tickets right now, there's a chance you could miss out on not only a hilarious evening of classic (but unknown) comedy and a delightful Jazz Age score -- but really one of the most important historical events ever, in the history of human civilization.

And that's not even half of it, folks. We've also got The Barx Brothers Dogwalk. We've got An Elephant in Your Pajamas. We've got Duck Soup screening at MoMA, plus free screenings of Marx Brothers movies all month long. We've got Kevin C. Fitzpatrick's Marx Brothers and Algonquin Round Table Walking Tour, Noah Diamond's presentations of The Marxes of Yorkville and The Love Song of J. Cheever Loophole, and at the end of May, a speakeasy wrap party with Wit's End. And also...more.

And you can keep streaming RadioMarx for free, twenty-four hours a day, as I'm sure you have been.

And you can get the complete schedule and details at marxfest.com.

And follow us on Twitter. And like us on Facebook. We're very needy people.

See you next week!

Yours in Marx,

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Member, Marxfest Committee

Member, Freedonia Chamber of Deputies

The Marxfest Committee: Kevin Fitzpatrick, Kathy Biehl, Noah Diamond, Brett Leveridge, Jonny Porkpie, and Trav S.D.

The GROUCHOVERTURE

I've just seen the set list for Marxfest's Music of the Marx Brothers event at 54 Below on May 9, and although I don't want to give away too many surprises, I do want to assure you that this is a thrilling lineup. You may expect many favorites, but also some inspired choices from left field, some of which I'd be willing to bet you have never heard performed live before. The bill of great performers includes Dandy Wellington, Marissa Mulder, Bill Zeffiro, and Gelber & Manning.

And I'll tell you this: The great Bill Zeffiro is going to play...the Overture.

For those who have spent their lives doing things other than intensely studying the Marx Brothers: The Overture is the medley of Marx Brothers songs, with accents from Beethoven and Gershwin, played by Marvin Hamlisch before Groucho's 1972 Carnegie Hall concert. I call it The Grouchoverture. Hearing Bill play it live is going to be electrifying.

Below is a post from a couple of years ago, dealing with this very piece of music. By a fascinating coincidence, it was published on May 9, 2012 -- exactly two years before Marxfest's Music of the Marx Brothers event at 54 Below. I hope to see you there.

Originally posted on May 9, 2012 at Noah's Comedy Palace.

Sunday is the fortieth anniversary of Groucho's 1972 Carnegie Hall concert, preserved on the bittersweet LP An Evening With Groucho. (Actually, the recording draws on two concerts, one at Iowa State University.) Dick Cavett, who introduced the great man at Carnegie Hall, has reflected on the anniversary in his Times online column (read it here) and on All Things Considered (listen to it here). I'm marking the occasion by sharing the first two pages of my forever-in-progress Marx Brothers book. It's a preface about with the medley Marvin Hamlisch played at Carnegie Hall before Dick Cavett introduced Groucho Marx. (An Evening With Groucho is out of print, but available at archive.org, or right here.)

 

THE1972 LP AN EVENING WITH GROUCHO – a sad and joyous document with which all Marxists have struggled – begins with an Overture, performed by Marvin Hamlisch at the piano. Backstage, waiting to be introduced, is an eighty-two-year-old man named Julius Henry Marx. He has been in show business for nearly seventy years, and now he has made it to Carnegie Hall.

Hamlisch, still a few years away from A Chorus Line and his Pulitzer, may be in awe of the venue. Julius is in awe of nothing. With a grand flourish, Hamlisch launches into Beethoven – Allegro con brio, the first movement of Piano Sonata No. 21, the Waldstein. He hammers the insistent opening chords before a momentarily disoriented audience.

The Waldstein twinkles along toward its first release. Through parting clouds emerges a melody so intrinsic to us that we can hear the unsung lyrics: Hooray for Captain Spaulding, the African explorer! Did someone call me schnorrer? Hooray hooray hooray! It takes a moment to register, and then sweet applause. Behind their glasses, eyebrows, and moustaches, people in the audience have begun to cry.

“Hooray for Captain Spaulding” fizzles back into the Waldstein, and then erupts into a second movement, “Alone” from A Night at the Opera. This, too, is lovingly received, even though we will sometimes fast-forward this number, later on, when we watch A Night at the Opera in our living rooms. We will never watch it to hear Allan Jones sing.

Hamlisch slides elegantly back to Kalmar and Ruby. At last we are to meet him, the famous Captain Spaulding! Everyone says I love you.

Sitting in the audience is a very great man, thirty-seven years old, in some ways an heir to the legacy celebrated tonight. He will eventually make a film called Everyone Says I Love You, but that’s ages away. Tonight at Carnegie Hall he is sitting beside a radiant Diane Keaton.

We descend back into A Night at the Opera – “Cosi Cosa,” another lukewarm slab of Allan Jones. But then we catch on: “Cosi Cosa” is delivered this evening with a distinctive technical flourish, and the Carnegie Hall audience bursts into passionate applause, realizing what Hamlisch is doing here: He’s shooting the keys. At’sa fine.

He makes a triumphant return to Captain Spaulding by way of Beethoven, and then a coda: The unmistakable final spasm of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, to break our hearts, and to put the boys in company with the great art of the twentieth century.

The Marx Brothers are the Ghosts of Show Business Past, and some of us are haunted by them every day of our lives. To us, the jokes keep getting funnier, even though it’s been more than a hundred years since Minnie Schoenberg Marx gave birth to kings.

Marxfest Begins in Three Weeks!

Members of the faculty, faculty members, students of Huxley, and Huxley students,

It's hard to believe, but Marxfest begins in just a few weeks. And if you think that's hard to believe, take a look at some of what awaits you in the Marxian Month of May:

From Angels to Anarchists: The Evolution of the Marx Brothers (May 2, Coney Island, 7:30 pm) is Trav S.D.'s look at the boys' early years on stage, presented at Coney Island, where Harpo made his first appearance in the act ("apparently with deleterious results to his underwear," Trav notes). A co-presentation with the Congress of Curious People. And don't even think of missing Mr. S. D.'s other Marxfest talks: Anarchy in Astoria: The Making of the Marx Brothers' First Two Pictures (May 10, Greater Astoria Historical Society) and We're All Mad Here: The Marx Brothers in Context (May 29, Mid-Manhattan Library).

Friend of the festival Frank Ferrante is, in the words of the New York Times, "the greatest living interpreter of Groucho Marx's material." Join us for two performances of his beloved hit An Evening With Groucho, May 3, 8:00 pm (Freeport Concert Association) and May 4, 3:00 pm (College of Staten Island Center for the Arts). As if a chance to see An Evening With Groucho during the Month of Marx were not enough, it can now be announced that following the May 3 performance, Marxfest will conduct an onstage interview with Frank Ferrante, who will discuss his celebrated association with the role of Groucho, and will answer questions from the audience. More details soon about this particularly special Evening!

The Marx Brothers on Television (May 4, 7:00 pm) is a must-see event featuring Robert S. Bader (editor of Groucho Marx and Other Short Stories and Tall Tales, and author of an upcoming chronicle of the Brothers' stage career) and comedy legend Dick Cavett. They'll discuss Cavett's friendship with Groucho, and the television career of the Marx Brothers. They'll also be showing video clips you won't want to miss, including the best of Groucho on The Dick Cavett Show, and a sneak peek at some of the footage Mr. Bader curated for the highly-anticipated DVD set The Marx Brothers TV Collection, to be released by Shout Factory in August. Some of this material had been considered lost, and has not been widely seen in decades. Then, on May 7, join us for Marxes in Manhattan, Mr. Bader's multimedia exploration of the Brothers' relationship with their hometown.

For those who like their laughs a bit more...bawdy, we proudly offer The Pinch Brothers in The Bawdy House (May 8, 15, 18, & 22, 8:00 pm). Written by Jonny Porkpie and produced by Pinchbottom Burlesque, this adults-only tribute stars Tigger!, Scout Durwood, Jonny Porkpie, and Bastard Keith, plus Angie Pontani, Rebecca Hart, Anita Cookie, Little Brooklyn, Peekaboo Pointe, Scott Rayow, Tansy, Donny Vomit, pickup artist Zoe Ziegfeld, a special appearance by Jo Weldon, and even more not yet announced! Tell Aunt Minnie to send up a bigger room, willya?

The Music of the Marx Brothers takes place on May 9. Think about this for a moment -- at this point in the festival, we have already communed with our Brothers by way of Trav S.D., Frank Ferrante, Robert Bader, Dick Cavett, and an entire burlesque show. And it's only May 9. We'll be here all month, folks, and it's best if you don't make any non-Marxfest plans at all in May. Certainly not on May 9 at 11:00 pm, when Bill Zeffiro, Gelber & Manning, Marissa Mulder, Rebekah Lowin, and more special guests pay tribute to the music of the Marxes at 54 Below, Broadway's Supper Club.

One might hesitate to call I'll Say She Is (May 23, 8:00 pm & May 25, 5:00 pm) an historic event of monumental importance -- but we wouldn't. The Marx Brothers' career-making 1924 Broadway debut has not been seen since the original production closed. But it will be seen in the fall of 2014, and these two special, semi-produced readings at Marxfest will be your first chance to see and hear the work. Drawn from multiple sources, Noah Diamond's adaptation of I'll Say She Is reconstructs, refines, embellishes, and otherwise grapples with this enigmatic entry in the Marx Brothers canon. Starring Melody Jane, Noah Diamond, Robert Pinnock, Seth Shelden, Matthew Curiano, Kathy Biehl, Bob Homeyer, and Dan Hermann. Musical direction by Sarah Malinda Engelke. Produced and directed by Trav S. D.

Just confirmed: Marxes in Manhattan (May 7), Anarchy in Astoria (May 10) Dr. Sketchy's MarxFest (May 11), and You Bet Your Ass (May 17). But do you think we're satisfied? No, we're still planning and adding more events to the Marxfest schedule, just to make sure there's something for everybody.  

Here's the part where we say that none of this would be possible without you: None of this would be possible without you! Thanks to the good people of Freedonia, the Marxfest Kickstarter campaign is now 80% funded! With only five days left in the campaign, this is our final push to raise the last $983. If you haven't chipped in yet, please consider making a small donation -- every smidgen helps, and our Kickstarter page reveals some of the precious rewards you can reap by becoming a Marxfest supporter.

Take a look at our latest fundraising video, starring Marxfest Commitee member and Top Strategist to the Freedonia Chamber of Deputies Kathy Biehl:

That's all for now, friends. The festival is just around the corner, and you can keep tabs on us, and get all the latest updates as they happen, by liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter, and sitting in parked cars outside our homes and offices.

See you in May!

Yours in Marx,

Member, Marxfest Committee

Member, Freedonia Chamber of Deputies

The Marxfest Committee: Kevin Fitzpatrick, Kathy Biehl, Noah Diamond, Brett Leveridge, Jonny Porkpie, and Trav S.D.

Join the Marxfest mailing list here.

Humor Risk?

Via Travalanche:

"Just got the exciting news from the folks at Marxfest that a 23 second fragment of the lost silent Marx Brothers film HUMOR RISK, self-financed by the team in 1921, was discovered earlier this month and is now in the hands of a private archive. Previously thought destroyed in its entirety, this small portion of the film was found in the garage of the former Great Neck, NY estate of Groucho Marx. The clip is short on plot, but you can already see the beginnings of the magic that would make their later sound pictures so popular."