Leonard Marx, known as
Chico, (
March 22, 1887 –
October 11, 1961) was one of the
Marx Brothers.
He was originally nicknamed
Chicko due to his reputation as a ladies man, or a "chicken chaser" in the popular slang of the day. A typesetter accidentally dropped the "k" in his name and it became Chico. It was still pronounced "Chick-o" although those who were unaware of its origin tended to pronounce it "Cheek-o". Radio recordings from the 1940s exist where announcers and fellow actors mispronounce the nickname, but Chico apparently felt it was unnecessary to correct them. As late as the 1950s, even Groucho used the "wrong" pronunciation for comedic effect. A guest on
You Bet Your Life told the quizmaster she came from
Chico, California and Groucho responded that he had a brother named "Cheek-oh." (Chico can sometimes be spotted in cutaways to the studio audience, out of character and costume.)
Marx used an Italian accent for his on-stage character; stereotyped ethnic characters were common with
Vaudeville comedians, and all the Marx brothers sometimes performed "dialect characters" early in their careers, but Chico was the only one to continue this into their films.
The obvious fact that he was not really Italian was referenced twice on film. In their second feature,
Animal Crackers, he recognizes someone he knows to be a shady character, impersonating a respected art collector:
:Chico: "How did you get to be Roscoe W. Chandler?"
:Chandler: "How did
you get to be
Italian?"
:Chico: "Never mind — whose confession is this?"
In
A Night at the Opera, which begins in Italy, his character, Fiorello, claims to not be Italian, eliciting a surprised look from
Groucho:
:Driftwood: "Well, things certainly seem to be getting better around the country."
:Fiorello: "Well I wouldn't know about that, I'm a stranger here myself."
Chico was a talented
pianist. He originally started playing with only his right hand and fake playing with his left, as his teacher did so herself. Chico eventually got a better teacher and learned to play the piano correctly. As a young boy, he would get jobs playing piano to earn money for the Marx family. Sometimes Chico would even get work playing in two places at the same time. He would acquire the job with his piano-playing skills, work for a few nights, and then substitute
Harpo on one of the jobs. (During their boyhood, Chico and Harpo looked so much alike they were often mistaken for each other.)
In the brothers' last film,
Love Happy, Chico plays a piano and
violin duet with "Mr. Lyons" (
Leon Belasco). Lyons plays some ornate riffs on the violin; Chico comments, "Look-a, Mister Lyons, I know you wanna make a good impression, but please--don't-a play better than me!"
In a record album about the Marx Brothers, narrator
Gary Owens stated that "although Chico's technique was limited, his
repertoire was not." The opposite was true of Harpo, who could only play a few tunes on the piano, which typically thwarted Chico's scam and resulted in both brothers being fired.
Groucho Marx one time said that Chico never practiced the pieces he played. Before performances he would soak his fingers in hot water before going on instead. He was known for "shooting" the keys of the piano. As part of the act he would play passages with his thumb up and index finger straight — like a gun (he appears in the film
A Year to Remember (1948) playing an extraordinary "shooting" version of the famous Australian song
Waltzing Matilda to a group of Australian soldiers). Another charming example of his keyboard flamboyance is found in
A Night at the Opera. He captivates a group of children whose faces light up with his digital acrobatics. The looks of glee on their faces is reminiscent of
Alfred Eisenstaedt's "Children at Puppet Theatre", an example of pure childhood pleasure, and suggests that they were not acting.
Chico became manager of the
Marx Brothers after their mother,
Minnie, died. As manager he cut a deal to get the Marx Brothers a percentage of a film's gross receipts — the first of its kind in
Hollywood. Furthermore, it was Chico's connection with
Irving Thalberg of
MGM which led to Thalberg's signing the Brothers when they were in a career slump after
Duck Soup (1933), made at
Paramount Pictures.
For a while in the
1930s and
1940s Chico led a
big band. Singer
Mel Tormé began his professional career singing with the Chico Marx Orchestra.
Chico Marx was a compulsive womanizer, and had a lifelong
gambling habit. His addiction cost him millions of dollars by his own account. When an interviewer asked him how much money he'd lost from gambling, he answered, "Find out how much money Groucho's got. That's how much I've lost." Gummo Marx, in an interview years after Chico's death, said, "Chico's favorite people were actors who gambled, producers who gambled, and women who screwed." Chico'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 40s he found himself playing in the same small, cheap halls he had begun his career in 30 years previously.
The Marx Brothers' second-to-last film,
A Night In Casablanca was made for Chico's benefit. Because of his gambling, the brothers finally took the money as he earned it and put him on an allowance, which he stayed on until he died.
He had a reputation as a world-class
pinochle player. His brother Groucho said Chico would throw away good cards (with the knowledge of spectators) to make the play "more interesting". Chico's last public appearance was playing cards on television show,
Celebrity Bridge. He and his partner lost the game, but it didn't seem to bother him at all.
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