Go West

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The pages under www.marx-brothers.org/whyaduck/ were originally created by Frank Bland for his site www.whyaduck.com.

Groucho, Harpo, and Chico in a scene from the film
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MGM - 1940

Screenplay by Irving Brecher. Directed by Edward Buzzell. Produced by Jack Cummings. Supporting Cast: John Carroll, Diana Lewis, Eve Wilson, Walter Woolf King, Robert Barrat, June MacCloy.

For the first and last time, the Marxes went back in time for a picture (unless you include Irwin Allen's 1957 picture, The Story Of Mankind, where the three brothers all appeared, but in different scenes). It's 1870 and the boys are trying (for various reasons) to migrate west. After a comical scene where the three are trying to swindle each other for train fare, we find them in the west without any logical explanation as to how they actually got there.

Terry Turner (John Carroll) is in a bind. He wants to marry Eve Wilson (Diana Lewis), but her grandfather won't allow it. It seems that Terry's granddad sold Eve's grandpappy a worthless piece of land some forty years earlier, and he is unwilling to let it slide. Terry tries to smooth things over by talking the New York and Western Railroad into purchasing the land, known as "Dead Man's Gulch," to use as part of the route for their line west.

Unfortunately, Wilson has given the deed to brothers Joe (Chico) and Rusty (Harpo) Panello as security on a 10-dollar loan. Beecher (Robert Barrat) wants to get a hold of this land himself, so he can force the railroad into buying his own land for the same purpose, at his price. Enter S. Quentin Quale (Groucho), who would like to swindle the Panello brothers, but winds up joining with them in trying to thwart Beecher's plans.

Chico livens up the proceedings with one of his most creative piano solos to date, and Harpo entertains us on a makeshift harp, improvised from an Indian's loom.


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The pages under www.marx-brothers.org/whyaduck were originally created by Frank Bland for his site www.whyaduck.com. Frank did kindly give me permission to use the contents of his site.

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