Word: groucho
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Room Service is corny, contrived, and very funny. Most of the fun comes from the Marx Brothers who, although they are not at their best in this 1938 classic, are still great. Even the most sophisticated viewer will laugh at the subtle commentaries of Groucho's moustache and eyebrows. Harpo's silent humor is pantomime comparable to Chaplin's and Chico is always lovable and sometimes hilarious...
Only the Marx Brothers could have produced genuine humor from so superficial and ridiculous a plot. The story, when salvaged from moose heads, flying turkeys, and the like, centers about the attempts of Groucho's penniless producer, to get enough money for food and theatrical costs before he is evicted from his hotel room. "The show must go on" antics provide the entire plot, the rest being elaboration. As a result, the film sometimes drags and the jokes become tedious, but the movie closes with scenes so hilarions that Martin and Lewis seem low-ranking amateurs by comparison...
Other quiz-show producers have decided that money isn't everything, and are putting their chips down on funnymen whose questions to contestants are incidental to their jokes. Groucho Marx has a commanding lead in this division. His closest rivals are the venerable What's My Line?, I've Got a Secret (offering three comics: Garry Moore, Bill Cullen, Henry Morgan), and Two for the Money, which depends on the synthetic Hoosierisms of Herb Shriner...
...comedy staple, The $64,000 Question, with a skillfully built parody of a member of the studio audience determinedly prompting Contestant Walker all the way to the summit question. NBC's Sid Caesar showed hopeful flashes of his old form with a rousing, doubletalk version of Pagliacci. Neither Groucho Marx, flourishing his cigar and convivial sneer, nor Jimmy Durante, with his patented songs and spotlighted exit, saw any reason for changing the formulas that have kept them among the leaders for years...
Ignorance of Harvard's age cost one unfortunate radio contestant $1500 last night. To the question, "which is the oldest college in the United States?" the contestant answered, "Columbia," on Groucho Marx's nationally broadcast give away, "you but your life...