Monkey Business (1931)

While I was watching Monkey Business last night I slowly became aware that it is not the Marx brothers’ movie I was thinking about when I wrote my Top Ten off the Top of My Head List a while back. Boy oh boy do I feel foolish.

Not only does Monkey Business not contain the lemonade scene I mentioned before; it also does not have the peanut stand scene or the really lengthy immigrants on deck singing scene that (I thought) made the movie memorable to me. But because it is a Marx brothers’ movie and it is set on a ship I somehow mixed it up with the mystery movie I so happily called my favorite.

I wasn’t at all disappointed that this was not the movie I was thinking of, however. This one had its share of hilarity and gags, with plenty of slapstick and racy humor thrown in. If you have never watched any Marx brothers I would suggest starting with this one. It has a fairly logical storyline and plenty of still relevant and fresh jokes.

I later discovered, via Google and Youtube, that the lemonade and peanut stand scene I was thinking of came from Duck Soup, but I’m still not sure if the immigrant singing on deck scene came from that one or a different one. The most likely scenario is that I am taking many funny scenes from different movies and somehow irrationally trying to convince myself that they are all from the same movie.

Awesomely, what this confusion means is that I’ll just have to re-watch all the Marx brothers’ classics to try figure it out!