The Marx Brothers or The Three Stooges?

Both?

Seriously, I grew up with the Stooges, and I got into the Marx Bros. later. I love them both. Can I just say, neither, also? Cause I actually prefer Charlie Chaplin the most.

I find that the Three Stooges are great in really short, concise doses. They can be quite funny, but I tire of them quickly. I don't have that issue with the Marx Brothers.

Always been a Stooges kinda guy myself.

Stooges

I have never found the Three Stooges funny. Mostly because I find them really unlikable. I can watch Wile E. Coyote get physically abused and laugh because he's such a sad-sack character, you sort of pity him. I WANT to see Moe, Larry and Curly get slapped around.

Moe is their leader!

Little Rascals?

Well, Marxes for me definitely. In high school and colllege, I was lucky enough to live near several good rep houses, so I've seen all their major films on the big screen with an audience laughing hysterically, and that may have something to do with it.

But probably not: there's just so much more going on in a Marx Brothers film. And I've rarely envied anyone the way I envied my grandmother when she found out I had become a fan of the Marxes, and casually mentioned seeing them on Broadway as a young woman.

I could go on and on with favorite bits, and most of them would be pretty obvious (the mirror scene, the stateroom scene, "We're fighting for this woman's honor", "I'd rather have it rusty than missing," "You're a disgrace to our family name of Wagstaff-- if such a thing is possible," "That's nothing-- my alarm clock is set for eight," "I'm Ronald Kornblow-- I stop at nothing," etc.). The one that kills me, even completely out of context, though, is the card game from Animal Crackers, and Chico's "play-by-play": "Ace o'spades... ace o' spades... ace o' spades..."

As for the racism-- if you avoid Day At The Races, you're pretty much past the worst of it, and there are so many PC caveats one has to make about films of that era that I'm not sure the Marxes come off that much worse than most of their contemporaries. Chico's accent, of course, isn't technically racist (more like culturally insensitive), but there's nothing mean or hurtful in it: when matched up against Groucho's verbal facility, Chico's the one that usually comes out on top, so he's not playing it dumb, either.

I do enjoy the Stooges, but I'm far more likely to LISTEN to The Stooges these days than to watch them.

If you get my drift.

Abbott and Costello for me.

Seconded. Like both Marx and Stooges, but A&C rule them both.

Abbott & Costello and the Stooges didn't make anything as good as Duck Soup, imo, although in A&C and the Stooges' defense, I didn't watch their work on shrooms.

"How much do you charge for not rehearsing?"

"You can't afford it."

Stooges all the way. Was never a fan of the Marx Brothers' musical acts.

Go, and never darken my towels again.

The Marx Brothers were hurt by Zeppo and the stupid romantic subplots that were always crammed in. There was little of that BS with the Stooges, just a lot of eye-poking and assault.

EDIT: Still a Marx guy, though.

Those acts bored me to tears as a kid. I'd always fastforward through them. I seriously doubt I'm the only one that did this. Besides, the only real atrocity in this thread is Dickson's post. NO ONE dislikes the Stooges.

EDIT: Everything that Mangy said.

My name is No One.

Hmph, almost the name of a good Henry Fonda movie.

Love the Stooges.

*I've never seen a full Marx brothers movie, but I just added a bunch to the top of my Netflix queue.

No you didn't.

This is greater than anything the Stooges ever did.

(I love the Stooges but nothing compares to the Marx Bros at their best)

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, I don't think any team has been copied more.

Oh and a Google video search of "Marx Bros" provides a few feature films if you want to get started now, AD. Not sure how legit they are though.

I think that Laurel and Hardy (along with Chaplin) suffer a bit for today's audiences because their work was so heavily influential, and relentlessly pillaged. Which doesn't make them any less geniuses, of course.

The thing about the Marxes is that so much of their best stuff is tied to their specific characters: the mirror scene is one of the very few great Marx bits that you could imagine working with another set of comedians (and even there, the fact that they are brothers is a bit of metatextual enhancement that takes it from great to genius). Even the stateroom scene owes its punch to Groucho's delivery, and Harpo's innocent "lasciviousness" with the female characters.

But apart from a couple of atypical examples like that, the humor is almost always based on their relationship to each other and the other characters and situations, in a way that's less easy to replicate.

I don't know. I've shown students in my history class Modern Times before and although they're initially hesitant about it being "black and white" and "silent" (even though it's not technically a silent film) Chaplin almost always wins them all over. I think he's timeless. Can't really speak for Laurel and Hardy, The Marx Brothers or the Stooges though.

Oh, and I'm totally a Marx Brothers guy. They're a bit apples and oranges, though.

Chico's daughter tells a great story about going on tour with them one summer. After a few weeks she had seen the show countless times she snuck out and went and caught a movie. When she got back her dad asked her if she noticed. She had to admit that she didn't see the show. Turns out the brothers had all switched roles to see how the audience would react. No one noticed and she's mad because she missed history.

I'd rate not just the brilliance of the Brothers Marx, but Laural and Hardy, Abbot and Costello and Lewis and Martin above the stooges three.

The Stooges suck.

What, no love for Wheeler and Woolsey?

Comparing The Stooges to The Marx Brothers is like comparing Annie Hall to Police Academy. Both make me laugh, that's the common ground.

There are some great gags hidden in the Stooges filmography, but as has been pointed out, it's a small doses thing. Then again, they were made as shorts for a reason. I've never attempted to watch a feature length Stooges move, and that's okay.

never seen Wheeler and Woolsey

My heart says the Stooges, but my head says The Marx Brothers. It may just be due to the fact that I grew up watching the stooges and only discovered the Marx genius after I was an adult, but I'm pretty sure that's a good way to describe their appeal.

Marx. Accept no substitute.

Nothing beats the experience of seeing a Marx Bros movie in a packed theater with everyone laughing their heads off. The fact that they still hold up that well even now is testament to the genius of the Marxes.

"Why, a four year old child could understand this! (quietly) Run out and find me a four year old child, I can't make head or tail of it."

Well, I'll go with The Stooges. I know that what I'll say is blasphemy and all, but what I've seen of the Marxes (not too much, but still...), the wordplay was cool and all at times, but otherwise, not for me. I mean, I saw Duck Soup and I just wasn't as entertained as I expected to be. So, I'll stick with The Stooges and their physical humor, wordplay, commentary (and this doesn't apply to all episodes, but...) as "the common person" often doing workingman stuff like being plumbers, cooks, or janitors, and poking fun at the rich person as a member of the hoi polloi.

I'll have to choose the Three Stooges. I like the Marx Brothers, but I never get tired of watching Curly-era Stooges or Shemp-era Stooges. The less said about the years following Shemp's death, the better.

I'm not casting any value judgments on anyone on these boards at all, but 100% of people I've met who are big Three Stooges fans are the worst people on the planet.

ETA: And I haven't even met Mel Gibson.

Brothers Marx for me, thank you.

This thread is unfair to The Stooges, because as great as they are, they can't come close to the Marx Brothers.

Patrick, you've never met Sam Raimi, right?

Jesus Christ; this. I actively loathe the Stooges. Just outright hate. I feel like my intelligence is being gang raped every time I see anything they ever did. Ugh. To be fair it could come from the fact that my initial exposure to them was that god awful robot Stooges cartoon I vaguely remember hating as a wee kid.

Groucho Marx is a fucking God.
"On account of you I nearly heard the opera!"

I love that the Marx brothers are basically surreal sociopaths. One of my favourite scenes has Harpo launching himself into a room with a pair of scissors cutting ties, cigars and anything else he can get his hands on. Shortly afterwards you see him shovelling books into a fire.

Salvador Dali really wanted to work with them.