I was rereading Edmund Wilson’s 1930s journals last night (because they’re delicious and he was an original American philo-Semite) and came on stuff about the Marx Brothers. The incidents were related to Wilson by the writer S.J. Perelman. To wit:
New York, 1932-33:
Groucho Marx’s idea of himself wasn’t any you’d ever think: he wanted to be an English country squire, keep beagles and wear tweeds–always trying to start serious discussions… Marxes and Eddie Cantor very exhibitionistic: in New York at a bridge game at the Whist Club somebody had said to Zeppo, You haven’t got anything! and he said that’s a lie and took out his privates and put them on the table–they fired him out of the club. Harpo, being photographed on shipboard, put a dice box over his cock and then took it off just before the picture was taken–….
Exhibitionism of Marxes, etc. Harpo told [Nathanael] West and his sister to come into the dressing room, asking, Are you decent? when he didn’t have a stitch on. –They “took physical advantage” of people–Groucho terribly tiresome to talk to, gagging all the time, terrific vanity–Perelman finally had a showdown with him, said, That’s not very funny! about one of his gags–Groucho said, Oh, so you don’t think that’s very funny, and gave him to damn well understand that he’d better think it was funny. Then Perelman took a job with Metro-Goldwyn–Perelman had accepted it as a matter of course, but Groucho had said when he saw him, So you’re independent now!–sore because he hadn’t told him about it. Cantor pissed in somebody’s new hat–put his cock in a girl’s hand and then said, I hope you’re not unfriendly!–they had to take it and pretend to laugh. –All that shocked Perelman.
