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Groucho Marx (born Julius Henry Marx) was a legendary comedian/actor from the 1920s to the 1960s. He and his three brothers started on the stage (Groucho, Gummo, Harpo, and Chico). Youngest brother Zeppo joined, so for a brief time there were five Marx Brothers, but Gummo soon left the act to join the army. The remaining four performed on stage and signed with Paramount Pictures and made a number of memorable movies there. Zeppo then left the act, and the remaining three signed with MGM, where they had two of their best remembered movies: A Night at the Opera and A Day at the Races. In the 1950s, the brothers separated, and Groucho had a very memorable TV game show called "You Bet Your Life". In his later years, he was a frequent guest on TV talk shows. Groucho passed away in 1977 at the age of 86. To learn much more about him, read the fine biography "Raised Eyebrows" by Steve Stoliar (available as an audio book narrated by Mr. Stoliar, who was Groucho's secretary and lived with him for a number of years).

Important Added Info: Note that this REPRODUCTION has been personally autographed (signed) by Groucho Marx! Also note that this still measures 8 1/4" x 10" [21 x 25 cm].

Note that this autographed 8x10 is part of a remarkable new collection we have been consigned, and we are auctioning nearly 500 items from this collection in this set of auctions (we will have more from this collection in our next few sets of autograph auctions).
     In the 1970s, our consignor was a high school teacher who taught a film class, and one day a week (and all through the summer) he ran the local movie theater (and he saved all the presskits and one-sheets from the movies the theater showed).
     Starting in the late 1970s, but increasingly greatly in the early 1980s, he hit on the idea of writing to famous celebrities, and enclosing an 8x10 from his collection, and he wrote a literate personalized letter, talking about his work as a film teacher, and discussing his favorite movie by that star.
     He often was able to locate an 8x10 still from his collection that was from a really good movie from that star, or one that had a really good image of that star. In a relatively small number of cases, he did not have a still in his collection to send, so he bought a reproduction from a photo shop, and sent that instead, which is why some of the items that have this notation on them are reproductions.
     He received signed photos back from a good percentage of the people he wrote to, and if the people simply sent him a stock photo back, he did not save it, but if he felt the autograph was genuine, and if they added a personalized note, then he did save them.
     In the late 1980s, he pretty much stopped sending letters and photos, simply because he was just too busy. So this photo (and the vast majority of the other photos we are auctioning for this consignor) were obtained in the mid-1980s, through personal correspondence with this star. This is of course excellent, because back at that time celebrities were not selling their signatures nearly as much, and many of the stars were pretty forgotten and were happy to get letters from people like our consignor!
     He of course does not have any "Certificates of Authenticity", but he only kept ones he felt were surely authentic, and those are the ones we are auctioning. However, bidders can certainly compare the signatures to known examples on the internet to judge for themselves.

As is true of all the signed items we are currently auctioning, we give every buyer 30 days in which to review what they purchased and they can return any item as long as it is within 30 days of the end of the auction. On non-signed items, we give a "lifetime guarantee" on everything we auction, but on signed items, we give the above modified guarantee of 30 days after the auction closes.

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Bruce Hershenson,
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