A Day at the Races (film)
| A Day at the Races | |
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theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Sam Wood |
| Produced by |
Sam Wood Irving Thalberg (uncredited) Lawrence Weingarten (uncredited) |
| Written by |
Robert Pirosh George Seaton George Oppenheimer |
| Screenplay by |
Al Boasberg (uncredited) Leon Gordon (uncredited) George S. Kaufman Carey Wilson |
| Starring |
Groucho Marx Harpo Marx Chico Marx Allan Jones Maureen O'Sullivan Margaret Dumont |
| Music by | Walter Jermann Bronislau Kaper Franz Waxman |
| Cinematography | Joseph Ruttenberg |
| Edited by | Frank E. Hull |
| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
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Release date
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Running time
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109 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
A Day at the Races (1937) is the seventh film starring the three Marx Brothers, with Margaret Dumont, Allan Jones, and Maureen O'Sullivan. Like their previous Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer feature A Night at the Opera, this film was a major hit.
Hugo Z. Hackenbush (Groucho Marx) is a veterinarian who is hired as chief of staff for the Standish Sanitarium, owned by Judy Standish (Maureen O'Sullivan), at the insistence of her most important patient, the wealthy Mrs. Emily Upjohn, (Margaret Dumont), who insists on being treated only by Dr. Hackenbush. The Sanitarium has fallen on hard times, and banker J.D. Morgan (Douglas Dumbrille) is attempting to gain control of the sanitarium in order to convert the building into a casino. Judy hopes that Mrs. Upjohn will make a large donation and prevent that from happening.
Meanwhile, Judy's beau, singer Gil Stewart (Allan Jones), who performs in Morgan's nightclub, has spent his life's savings on a racehorse named Hi-Hat. His hope is that the horse, which he purchased from Morgan, will win a big race and the money will allow Judy to save the sanitarium. Unfortunately, he now has no money to pay for the horse's feed, and he and Tony (Chico Marx), who works for the sanitarium, and Stuffy (Harpo Marx), Hi-Hat's jockey, have to resort to trickery to fend off the Sheriff (Robert Middlemass). Tony raises some money by scamming Hackenbush in the "Tutsi Fruitsy Ice Cream" scene, in which Tony gives Hackenbush a tip on a horse, but all in code, so that Hackenbush has to buy book after book from Tony to decipher the code.
At the Sanitarium, Judy's business manager, Whitmore (Leonard Ceeley) – who is also Morgan's stooge – suspects Hackenbush is a fraud and attempts to expose him and rattle Mrs. Upjohn's faith in him by having her discover him in a compromising situation with a blonde floozie (Esther Muir). Hackenbush is saved by Stuffy and Tony, who pose as house detectives and then as paperhangers, who first paste the vamp to the wall behind layers of wallpaper and then hide her under the sofa cushions. Next, Whitmore brings in the eminent Dr. Steinberg (Sig Ruman) from Vienna, whom he hopes will expose Hackenbush as a quack.
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