Monkey Business (1931 film) Monkey Business (1931 film) Monkey Business is a 1931 American Pre-Code comedy film. It is the third of the Marx Brothers' released movies, and the first with an original screenplay rather than an adaptation of one of their Broadway shows. The film also stars Thelma Todd. It is directed by Norman Z. McLeod with screenplay by S. J. Perelman and Will B. Johnstone. Much of the story takes place in on an ocean liner crossing the Atlantic Ocean. On board an ocean liner to America, four stowaways are involuntarily pressed into service as toughs for a pair of feuding gangsters
Marx Brothers and Harpo on the show. In Woody Allen's film "Hannah and Her Sisters" (1986), Woody's character, after a suicide attempt, is inspired to go on living after seeing a revival showing of "Duck Soup". In "Manhattan" (1979), he names the Marx Brothers as something that makes life worth living. In an episode of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" Murray calls the new station owner at home late at night to complain when the song "Hooray for Captain Spaulding" is cut from a showing of "Animal Crackers" because of the new owners' policy to cut more and more from shows to