Released in November 1935, A Night at the Opera is widely considered one of the Marx Brothers’ greatest films and was their first production with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Directed by Sam Wood, it marked a significant shift for the comedy troupe as their first film without Zeppo Marx and their first to feature a more structured, sympathetic narrative under the guidance of producer Irving Thalberg.
The film follows the brothers, Otis B. Driftwood (Groucho), Fiorello (Chico), and Tomasso (Harpo), as they attempt to help two talented but struggling opera singers, Ricardo and Rosa, find success. To do so, they must outwit a pompous opera director and travel from Italy to New York, eventually wreaking havoc on a live performance of Il Trovatore.
A Night at the Opera is famous for several sequences that have become staples of American comedy. Possibly the most famous bit of physical comedy in film history, where an absurdly high number of people (manicurists, stewards, engineers, etc.) cram into Groucho’s tiny ship cabin. The brothers systematically dismantle a high-brow opera performance using pulleys, costume swaps, and a baseball game played in the orchestra pit.
Producer Irving Thalberg insisted the brothers include a “straight” romantic subplot and musical interludes to make the films more appealing to a wider audience. While some fans missed the pure chaos of their earlier work (like Duck Soup), this formula made the film a massive commercial hit.
Before filming, the Marx Brothers took the script’s comedy sketches on a live vaudeville tour to test which jokes got the biggest laughs, ensuring the timing in the film was perfect. In 1993, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
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