Fools and kings

[scarfman]

In the summer of 1977 I had a summer job between my junior and senior years of high school at an outfit to which was outsourced the answering of phone calls resulting from the running of national tv ads for various products - you know the ones, "Call this 800 number and use your credit card!" We fielded calls for about thirty products, mostly for record albums but a few other things too, the kind that today are "Not available in stores!" (unless you wait two months and go to Walgreens). I'd worked there the previous summer too. There were often quiet spells, when the phones wouldn't be ringing. Until August 17th. Four of the albums we carried were Elvis Presley collections. Some callers ordered all four, even though the ad they'd seen was for only one.

I don't know whether I've ever forgiven society for allowing Elvis' death to so completely overshadow Groucho's the same month. I remember the obit in Newsweek (Elvis was the cover story), and I remember Mark Evanier's obituary some years later in whatever he had at the time that was passing for a pre-internet blog. Prolly the from-the-writer page of DNAgents? DNAgents was Evanier, wunnit? In part Evanier told the story of seeing Groucho in (I guess you could say) concert once during his last years, as on the record album An Evening with Groucho. Groucho wasn't having a good day when Evanier saw him, however - his mind deteriorated in his later years - and he was walked off stage and Duck Soup was shown instead.

I had An Evening with Groucho in the 70s (and still do), which is solely responsible for what Irving Berlin lyrics I know, as well as those of Lydia the Tatooed Lady (that album is also responsible for my being familiar with the name Marvin Hamlisch before it became mainstream with the Oscar success of The Sting). But the bit I seem to remember best is a poem Groucho himself wrote many, many years beforehand in order to cover a scene change during the brothers' vaudeville or Broadway years.

Did you ever sit and wonder as you walk along the Strand
That life's a bitter battle at the best?
And if you only knew him and would lend a helping hand
Then every man could meet the final test.

The world is but a stage, my friend, and life is but a game,
And how you play is all that matters in the end;
For, whether a man is right or wrong, a woman takes the blame,
And your mother is your dog's best friend.

Comments

[purpleranger.livejournal.com]

Same month? It was the same week!

[hergrace.livejournal.com]

/me loves Paul for bringing back this memory

YES!! I was totally pissed with the world for ignoring Groucho's death. I was still mourning Harpo (I'd only discovered in 1973 that he'd died back in 1964, but then, I'd only really discovered the Marx Bros in 1973...) I also remember being furious at Groucho's daughter for saying (in essence), "oh, it was so embarrassing for us. He made a fool of himself up there on stage." Meanwhile totally ignoring the fact that those people in the audience were *loving* seeing him, no matter what his condition, and were incredibly lucky to be in on his final public performances.

Now...Marvin Hamlisch is another matter (I was already familiar with him and cross with him for totally overshadowing Max Morath [the main person performing Joplin before "The Sting" came out] and Joshua Rifkin). I found his cutesy chatting during Groucho's performance intrusive. (Judging for some of Groucho's comments, so did he.) Hamlisch always seemed to me one of those guys with an Ego the size of a planet. He made his fame off other people's music (his own being mostly forgettable).

Ah well..now I'm ranting. Thanks for this!