(Groucho Returns plays at ACT Theatre Thursdays through Saturdays. It closes on August 22nd.)
- Groucho and couch-oh.
At the beginning of Groucho Returns, actor Frank Ferrante introduces himself to the audience as a former painfully shy kid who learned how to open up to the world by watching A Day at the Races. As he slathers black greasepaint on his eyebrows and upper lip, Ferrante explains that Groucho Marx provided him with a template for confidence, a persona he could adopt to relate to the world. Speaking as someone who fell in love with the Marx brothers as an awkward teen, I can certainly attest to the power of Groucho as a role model: When you’re Groucho, the whole world is your straight man and you’re the spinning funnel of gleeful chaos at the middle of everything.
Ferrante grabbed hold of Groucho and never let go; Groucho’s son, Arthur, hired him out of college to star as his father in a biographical revue. Ferrante has been playing Groucho ever since, for three decades now. And for the third summer in a row, he’s come to ACT Theatre with Groucho Returns, a cabaret-style one-man show starring Ferrante doing his time-tested Groucho impersonation.
The show follows three threads. First, Ferrante relates Groucho’s life in a series of anecdotes—the way his mother decimated his self-esteem to coax him on to fame and fortune, the way the Marx Brothers got their nicknames, and so on. Second, Ferrante performs a greatest-hits medley of Groucho songs (“Whatever It Is, I’m Against It,” “Lydia the Tattooed Lady”) and routines from Marx Brothers movies. Third, Ferrante riffs with the audience in character as Groucho; he keeps it witty and light, but if interactive theater gives you hives, you’ll want to keep far away from this show...
