The Cocoanuts

A land boom is on in Florida. Hammer runs a hotel; there are no guests, the staff are unpaid and it is about to go under. He plans to sell the plots nearby at auction. A wealthy guest's necklace is stolen and the blame is put on someone else. Meanwhile there are two other men in the hotel who do nothing but create chaos. Robert Florey and Joseph Santley direct. The Marx Brothers take the leads. The songs are by Irving Berlin. It is the Marx Brothers' first feature; the source is the Broadway musical they had performed themselves. It was shot at a studio near New York and the brothers filmed by day while appearing on stage at night. The production belongs to the first years of sound and its technical limits show; the camera cannot move, and because the microphones could not suppress the rustle of paper, the papers in the scenes were soaked. The narrative rests on verbal jokes rather than plot and some sections are carried over directly from the stage. Its best known section is the auction and the wordplay between two of the brothers. The romantic strand and the songs are now considered its weakest parts. Who it is for: anyone curious about the history of classic comedy and the Marx Brothers. Who it is not for: the technical quality is very old, the pace low, and the songs stop the narrative.