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Charlotte Chandler's 1977 book on comic icon Groucho Marx hits book shelves again in commemoration of the thirtieth anniversary of his passing
Nothing short of the thirtieth anniversary of Groucho Marx's death could possibly prompt the re-publication - in glossy new cover, no less! - of Charlotte Chandler's best selling 1977 biography, Hello, I Must Be Going. Better books on this comedy icon have been published since, from Steve Stoliar's interesting Raised Eyebrows to Stefan Kanfer's definitive Groucho. Sadly, however, Chandler's volume appears to be the only re-issue deemed to serve as literary memorial. Loosely Collected TranscriptsWhat we movie-Marxists are forced to settle for, then, is this: a vast, sloppily collected volume of transcriptions of celebrity thrusts-and-parries with the wizened wit, from fellow vaudevillians like Jack Benny and George Burns to then popular TV personalities. The book is crowded with people, yet one essential presence is curiously missing - an editor. The book is abundant with redundancies and well-stocked with empty moments and conversational dead-ends. Most regrettably of all, it is also pregnant with the Great Groucho at his most diminished, his once razor sharp wit dull as a frosting implement. Chez Marx was the Hollywood Hangout Chandler had to do little, it seemed, but to make herself a fixture in the Marx household. It was the era, the 70's, in which the place had become a major Hollywood hang out - brought on by a mass nostalgia for the then dying studio scene, and the open door policy of Marx's controversial caretaker, Erin Fleming. Fleming was also abusing Groucho, of course, who, in his feeble state, had confusedly become a welfare system for her (in a rare case of divine justice, it is rumored that Fleming is today a bag lady on Santa Monica Boulevard.) But Chandler's endless transcripts reveal very little of this, preferring instead to play the nostalgia angle - this despite what the woman surely must have seen. Call it Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man, a long afternoon at the foot of a dying icon, who, when prompted by helpers (often reluctantly), can be made to banter tiredly with aging peers and interject obligingly with moldy witticisms. To paraphrase the great man himself, "I never forget a book - but in this case, I'll make an exception."
The copyright of the article Hello, I Must Be Going in Classic Film Comedies is owned by Dan Lalande. Permission to republish Hello, I Must Be Going in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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