The Cocoanuts is a 1929 pre-Code musical comedy film starring the Marx Brothers (Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Chico Marx, and Zeppo Marx in his first starring role). Produced for Paramount Pictures by Walter Wanger, who is not credited, the film also stars Mary Eaton, Oscar Shaw, Margaret Dumont and Kay Francis. It was the first sound film to credit more than one director (Robert Florey and Joseph Santley), and was adapted to the screen by Morrie Ryskind from the George S. Kaufman Broadway musical play. Five of the film's tunes were composed by Irving Berlin, including "When My Dreams Come True", sung by Oscar Shaw and Mary Eaton.
Plot
The Cocoanuts is set in the Hotel de Cocoanut, a resort hotel, during the Florida land boom of the 1920s. Mr. Hammer runs the hotel, assisted by Jamison. Harpo and Chico arrive with empty luggage, which they apparently plan to fill by robbing and conning the guests. Wealthy Mrs. Potter is one of the few paying customers. Her daughter Polly is in love with struggling young architect Bob Adams. He works to support himself as a clerk at the hotel, but has grand plans for the development of the entire area as Cocoanut Manor. Mrs. Potter wants her daughter to marry Harvey Yates, whom she believes to be of higher social standing than Adams. Yates is actually a confidence man out to steal the dowager's expensive diamond necklace with the help of his partner in crime, Penelope.
Analysis
The somewhat thin plot primarily provides a framework for the running gags of the Marx Brothers to take prominence. The film is, however, notable for its musical production numbers, including cinematic techniques which were soon to become standard, such as overhead shots of dancing girls imitating the patterns of a kaleidoscope. The musical numbers were not pre-recorded, but were shot live on the soundstage with an off-camera orchestra. The main titles are superimposed over a negative image of the "Monkey-Doodle-Do" number photographed from an angle that does not appear in the body of the film.
One of the more famous gag routines in the film involves Chico not knowing what a "viaduct" is, which Groucho keeps mentioning, prompting Chico to ask, "why-a-duck".
In another sequence, while he is acting as auctioneer for some land of possibly questionable value ("You can have any kind of a home you want to; you can even get stucco! Oh, how you can get stuck-oh!"), Groucho has hired Chico to act as a shill to inflate the sale prices by making bogus bids. To Groucho's frustration, Chico keeps outbidding everyone, even himself. During the auction, Mrs. Potter announces that her necklace has been stolen and offers a reward of one thousand dollars, whereupon Chico offers two thousand. Unbeknownst to anyone except the thieves and to Harpo (who intercepted the map drawn by the villains while hiding under their hotel room bed) the jewellery's hiding place is a hollow tree stump adjacent to where the land auction takes place.
Thereupon, Detective Hennessy who entered the plot earlier, decides that the guilty party is Polly's suitor. He is aided by the real villains, who attempt to frame Bob Adams for the crime. However, Harpo, by producing the necklace, and later the note, is able to prove that Bob Adams is innocent of the charges laid against him.
At various points, Harpo and Chico both provide musical solos – Harpo on the harp, and Chico at the piano.
Still another sequence has Groucho, Mrs. Potter and Harvey Yates (the necklace thief) make formal speeches. Harpo repeatedly walks off, with a grimace on his face, to the punch bowl. (His staggering implies that the punch has been spiked with alcohol.) Another highlight is when the cast, already dressed in traditional Spanish garb for a theme party, erupts into an operatic treatment about Hennessy's lost shirt to music from Bizet's Carmen (specifically, Habanera and the Toreador Song). An earlier scene shows Harpo and Chico abusing a cash register while whistling the Anvil Chorus from Il trovatore, a piece also referenced in several other Marx Brothers films.
Immediately following the revelation that an injustice has been done to Polly's original suitor, Bob Adams, Mr. Adams himself comes in saying there's a man outside asking for Mr. Hammer: it's tycoon John W. Berryman, who's about to buy Bob's architectural designs for Cocoanut Manor, and asking if the hotel can accommodate 400 guests for the weekend. The Marxes immediately beat a hasty retreat, and Mrs. Potter declares the wedding will take place "exactly as planned, with the exception of a slight change," announcing that Mr. Robert Adams will be the bridegroom.