Reminder that there have been people whining about how “you can’t make jokes like in the old days” since before the “old days” they’re talking about. There’s still great comedy, a lot of it raunchier and darker than ever, and people can and do continue to make great comedy using racial humor or jokes regarding sexual orientation or gender identity. What changes is how we address the old bigoted attitudes of the past and how our society’s evolving perspectives shape those jokes. And unless you know comedy better than Groucho Marx, you can keep your disagreements to yourself.
Fun Fact: Groucho's neighbor was none other than legendary shock rocker Alice Cooper, and they were good friends. Whenever Groucho's insomnia was acting up, he'd call up Alice who would come over with a six pack of beer and they'd watch old movies until Groucho fell asleep.
Another error in the film is that Gilbert did not visit the Japanese exhibition until 8 months after he had written the outline for the plot of *The Mikado* and 2 months after finishing Act One.
Today they would be calling him a racist for saying "colored people" you can't win with these victim wallowing people, they will change the goal posts each and everytime
Comedy should be about punching up, not making fun of people struggling. There's a difference between comedy and laughing at people getting bullied. The people calling 'snowflake' are the very first people to complain when they're the punchline.
Pretty enlightened, to think this was recorded in the year of my birth and yet I still remember watching minstrel shows in the UK. And yes, Buckley was an ill-disguised supremacist.
If I remember correctly, there was a scene of blackface in his movie A Day at the Races in 1957. I understand Judy Garland was forced to do blackface when she was a teen but was Groucho's reason in his movie?
Groucho Marx: "Making fun of colored people is wrong, they struggle so much." Karl Marx: "The Negro is indolent and lazy and spends his money on frivolities, whereas the European is forward-looking, organized and intelligent."
He's clearly a very intelligent man who knows that custom and normalcy is relative. Things change as understanding widens, and smart people can change with them.
I respect what Marx is saying and agree with it, but right after he said "Well I like minstrel shows," RU-vid paused to buffer for a solid five seconds and that made me laugh. It was like the internet itself was saying "Hol' up."
The problem with blackface was they would do all-white productions & refuse to hire black ppl but instead have a white person pretend to be black. Thats why its offensive. Theres been blackface thats been genius like Silver Streak when Gene Wilder does blackface but theres context to that scene. He needed to get passed the security checkpoint, so Richard Pryor gives him a disguise thats hilarious Then theres Trading Places, Dan Akroyd pretends to be a Jamaican, it was hilarious Compared to the minstrel shows or most blackface that won’t even have a reasoning behind it.
It’s such a common sense, basic concept so I’m always baffled by folks not understanding this even now. There are 90s comedy that would simply not get made today. I can still laugh at them with the understanding of the times and knowledge that it’s just not okay. No need to cancel the past if we acknowledge, learn, move forward, etc. that being said - all the previous must be done in order to forgive and reconcile.
