Briggs gives them loaded guns, which they immediately ditch in a bucket of water. Groucho's audacity convinces Briggs to hire him and Zeppo. Groucho dances and romances with Brigg's wife, Lucille ( Thelma Todd), until he is caught and threatened by Briggs. After they scare off Briggs, Big Joe hires Chico and Harpo to be his bodyguards. Chico and Harpo disrupt a chess game and confiscate the board, taking it into the stateroom of racketeer Big Joe Helton ( Rockliffe Fellowes) and his daughter Mary ( Ruth Hall), during a confrontation with rival gangster Alky Briggs ( Harry Woods). The naval officers spend the rest of the voyage chasing and attempting to arrest the stowaways. After singing " Sweet Adeline", they are discovered. He and his partner lost the game.On board an ocean liner, four stowaways ( The Marx Brothers) hide in barrels in the ship's cargo hold. Chico's last public appearance was in 1960, playing cards on the television show Championship Bridge. Groucho said Chico would throw away good cards (with the knowledge of spectators) to make the play "more interesting". Because of his out-of-control gambling, the brothers finally took the money as he earned it and put him on an allowance, on which he stayed until his death.Ĭhico had a reputation as a world-class pinochle player, a game he and Harpo learned from their father. The Marx Brothers' penultimate film, A Night in Casablanca (1946), was made for Chico's benefit since he had filed for bankruptcy a few years prior. That's how much I've lost."Ĭhico's lifelong gambling addiction compelled him to continue in show business long after his brothers had retired in comfort from their Hollywood income, and in the early 1940s he found himself playing in the same small, cheap halls in which he had begun his career 30 years earlier. When an interviewer in the late 1930s asked him how much money he had lost from gambling, he answered, "Find out how much money Harpo's got. His addiction cost him millions of dollars by his own account. His favorite gambling pursuits were card games, horse racing, dog racing, and various sports betting. They married in 1958, three years before his death.Īs well as being a compulsive womanizer, Chico had a lifelong gambling habit. His first marriage was plagued by his infidelity, ending in divorce in 1940 he was very close to his daughter Maxine and gave her acting lessons.Ĭhico's second marriage was to Mary De Vithas. Their union produced one daughter named Maxine (1918–2009). His first marriage was to Betty Karp in 1917. You aren't Gummo, are you?" Groucho is heard in videos pronouncing it "Chicko", as in a Dick Cavett episode with Groucho talking to Dan Rowan.Ĭhico was married twice. A guest on You Bet Your Life told the quizmaster she grew up around Chico (California) and Groucho responded, "I grew up around Chico myself. As late as the 1950s, Groucho was happy to use the wrong pronunciation for comedic effect. Numerous radio recordings from the 1940s exist where announcers and fellow actors mispronounce the nickname, but Chico apparently felt it was unnecessary to correct them. It was changed to Chico but still pronounced "Chick-oh" although those who were unaware of its origin tended to pronounce it "Cheek-oh". His nickname was originally spelled Chicko. "In England now," said Groucho, "they were called 'birds'.") ("Chickens"-later "chicks"-was period slang for women. Leonard became Chico because he was, in the slang of the period, a "chicken chaser". As Fisher dealt each brother a card, he addressed them, for the very first time, by the names they kept for the rest of their lives. The stage names of the brothers (except Zeppo) were coined in 1915 by monologist Art Fisher during a poker game in Galesburg, Illinois, based both on the brothers' personalities and Gus Mager's Sherlocko the Monk, a popular comic strip of the day that included a supporting character named "Groucho". In addition to his work as a performer, he played an important role in the management and development of the act in its early years. Leonard was the oldest of the Marx Brothers to live past early childhood (first-born Manfred Marx had died in infancy). On screen, Chico is often in alliance with Harpo, usually as partners in crime, and is also frequently seen trying to con or outfox Groucho. His persona in the act was that of a charming, uneducated but crafty con artist, seemingly of rural Italian origin, who wore shabby clothes and sported a curly-haired wig and Tyrolean hat. The Incredible Jewel Robbery Leonard Joseph "Chico" Marx was an American comedian, musician, actor and film star.
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