Remember the good name of Phelps

.
So at last, Grover has got what he wanted.
Tommy Rogers is no more.

What this means for the future of the Phelps department store is uncertain, but I do know what it means for the list of surviving Marx Brothers male leads.
Tony Martin was the last one.

Martin had a bigger career outside of the Marxiverse than most of them, and a longer lasting one too. This is reflected by his sharing above the title billing with them.
Unfortunately, though, he doesn't make much of an impression in The Big Store, and for many fans is among the least cherishable of all the smoothie support turns.
Even more unfortunately, I've just used the word 'Marxiverse'.
I'm very sorry and I'll try not to any more.

The chief bone of contention is the 'Tenement Symphony'.
Most of you, if you are to be believed, hate it with grand operatic fervour. But I've spoken to enough fans on the sly to know that it has a certain underground following.
It's certainly got its share of lyrical bathos, and some rhymes so contrived they make your brain sting. (The opening couplet about Schubert and Gershwin rivals Groucho's own "and this birdie goes with Verdi").
But personally, I can't help liking it and Martin both.
I like the way Tommy is Chico's mate, and that he warms to Flywheel from the first time they meet (leading to that weird sequence where they come close to sexually flirting with each other). I love the way the shop has got that machine that enables him to make a unique recording of his song If It's You for that dear old lady. ("If it's you, then I'll rush across the floor.")
And in the Symphony, I just love the bit where Chico and Harpo come in.

The Campbells come tumbling down the stairs.
Doodely-ah, Doodely-ah, Doodely-ah...

My friend Richard had a lovely idea once. Like the way At the Circus ends with that splendid shot of the orchestra drifting out to sea, The Big Store should close by cutting to the old lady that bought Tommy's record, whom we have not seen or thought about since, putting it on the gramophone in her parlour, only to find it is unplayable. The music sounds tinny and distant, it slurs, and all is distorted by crackle and ambient noise. Then either she should pluck it from the machine and smash it in disgust (cue jolly fade out music) or perhaps the camera should simply close in on the gramophone, and The End should be superimposed over the shot, still to the accompaniment of the record making this godawful noise.

Anyway, I'm wandering from the point, which is farewell to Tony Martin.
So farewell to Tony Martin.

Maxine Marx, RIP

Another link to the Brothers is broken: Chico's daughter Maxine Marx passed away last week at the ripe age of 91.

.

Maxine was the author of Growing Up With Chico, a hugely enjoyable memoir and - I believe I'm correct in saying - the only book to date devoted solely to the great Leonard Marx. (Whereas books solely on the subject of brother Julius currently stand somewhere in the higher squillions.)

.

In the book, she recalls that one of the last things her father said to her before his death was:

"Remember, honey, don't forget what I told you. Put in my coffin a deck of cards, a mashie niblick, and a pretty blonde."

.

Maxine Marx, hail and farewell!

.

(Thanks to Jennifer at Flappers and Flickers and Silent Stanzas for the tip-off.)

Don't put off till tomorrow what you can do today...

Ever get an idea in your head that it would be fun to do something and then never get around to it?
Well, stop wasting time.
Get around to it.

Below is a invoice from Blackwell's, the famous Oxford bookseller, for one copy of Richard Anobile's book Why a Duck?
I found it tucked inside my copy when I bought it second hand on Charing Cross Road many years ago. It is dated 24th May 1973, just under a month before I was born, and addressed to Dr D. S. Parsons of Merton College, Oxford.
It seemed so right, somehow, for a doctor at Merton College to have ordered such a book, and so sad that he should have sold it on, with the invoice still carefully preserved inside.
.
As soon as I saw it, it struck me that it might be amusing to write to Merton College, to ask if by any chance Dr Parsons was still on the staff, and if so to find out how it came about that he lost possession of the book he ordered and paid £2.50 for back in 1973.
Marx Brothers fans, I've generally found, like meeting each other. A certain kinship is automatically assumed when a shared love of the Marxes is discovered: I'm sure it helped me to my own place at London University when I noticed that the man interviewing me had a picture of them on his office wall, and I named the film from which it was taken.
Needless to say, however, my Dr Parsons idea remained just that.
Years passed, and some fool invented the internet, and the idea occurred to me again. Now it would be so much easier.
So just over a year ago I looked up the staff of Merton College and found to my amazement that Dr Parsons was still a fellow of the college.
And again I put it off.
Finally, last week, with this site as impetus, I looked up the college again, but this time his name wasn't there. Perhaps he'd finally retired. So I wrote to ask if they could forward his contact details to me.
A few days ago I received this email from Matt Bowdler, Development Office, Merton College:

Dear Matthew,
I am afraid I have to be the bearer of bad news, Dr Parsons passed away last July. If there is any other information that I might be able to provide for you, do let me know.

So, Dr Parsons, I'll never know why you parted with your copy of Why a Duck? I'll never find out what your favourite movie was. I'll never share with you any reminiscence of that unique species of happiness that only the Marx Brothers can provide. I hope you exited laughing.
Hail and farewell.