"One morning, I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know."
Captain Jefferey T. Spalding
Animal Crackers is the second
Marx Brothers comedy film and directed by
Victor Heerman in 1930. The
play that the movie is based upon, in which the Marx Brothers played on
Broadway, was written by
George S. Kaufman,
Morrie Ryskind,
Bert Kalmar, and
Harry Ruby. The adaption to the movie screen was done by
Morrie Ryskind. The film is in black and white and runs for 97 minutes.
This is one of my favorite
Marx Brothers films. Animal Crackers starts with the famous African explorer, Captain Jefferey T. Spalding, returning to America. A rather wealthy woman, Mrs. Rittenhouse, is commerating a party to Spalding with a public viewing of a rather rare painting. However, a couple of thefts are planned by different groups and madcap comedy follows in the attempts to find the thieves.
The movie was actually unseen from 1930 to 1974 due to copyright problems with
MCA/
Univeral, the owner of the film, and
Paramount Pictures, who produced it.
Groucho Marx, with groups of film students, campaigned to have it released to the public audience. It finally was released on prime television.
Songs Featured:
Cast
Groucho Marx - Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding
Harpo Marx - The Professor
Chico Marx - Signor Emanuel Ravelli
Zeppo Marx - Horatio Jamison
Lillian Roth - Arabella Rittenhouse
Margaret Dumont - Mrs. Rittenhouse
Louis Sorin - Roscoe Chandler
Hal Thompson - John Parker
Margaret Irving - Mrs. Whitehead
Kathryn Reece - Grace Carpenter
Robert Greig - Hives, the Butler
Edward Metcalf - Inspector Hennessy
Robert Allen - Extra (uncredited)
Donald MacBride - Bit Part
Ann Roth - Girl (uncredited)
Sources:
IMDB -
http://www.imdb.com.