Harpo Marx office boy. In January 1910, Harpo joined two of his brothers, Julius (later "Groucho") and Milton (later "Gummo"), to form "The Three Nightingales", later changed to simply "The Marx Brothers". Multiple stories—most unsubstantiated—exist to explain Harpo's evolution as the "silent" character in the brothers' act. In his memoir, Groucho wrote that Harpo simply wasn't very good at memorizing dialogue, and thus was ideal for the role of the "dunce who couldn't speak", a common character in vaudeville acts of the time. Harpo gained his stage name during a card game at the Orpheum Theatre in Galesburg, Illinois. The dealer (Art
Chico Marx a rendition of "The Beer Barrel Polka". Chico became the unofficial manager of the Marx Brothers after their mother, Minnie, died in 1929. As manager, he cut a deal to get the brothers a percentage of a film's gross receipts—the first of its kind in Hollywood. Furthermore, it was Chico's connection with Irving Thalberg of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that led to Thalberg's signing the Brothers when they were in a career slump after "Duck Soup" (1933), the last of their films for Paramount. For a while in the 1930s and 1940s, Chico led a big band. Singer Mel Tormé began his professional