"I'll Say She Is" Is Energetic, Expensive Hodge-Podge -- May 19, 2024

New York Daily News, 19-May-1924

100 years ago tonight, on 19-May-1924, at the Casino Theater on Broadway at West 39th Street, the Marx Brothers opened their "Laughing Revue," I'll Say She Is. This marked the brothers' transition from vaudeville to the legitimate theater.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 16-November-1924

Brooklyn Eagle theater critic Arthur Pollock had some interesting comments. I'm not sure he liked it. 

The New Plays by Arthur Pollock

"I'll Say She Is." The Marx Brothers, the customary four, brash funny fellows, are the featured players in a elaborately dressed-up burlesque show that came to the Casino Theater in Manhattan last night. Perhaps it isn't fair to brand "I'll Say She Is" burlesque show, since it has long been difficult to tell the difference between a burlesque show and a revue anyhow. But the moment the curtain rises and a group of chorus ladies dash on and let loose their voices and their legs "I'll Say She Is" defines itself. these girls have the burlesque air and the burlesque manner and, they have had, evidently, burlesque tutoring. They are noisy and lively. Thereafter the Marx Brothers let it be known that there is a girl in the cast who wants a thrill. The scenes that follow are designed to give it to her. Regular burlesque stuff! The difference is that the scenery and costumes cost a great deal of money and the girls are beautiful. "I'll Say She Is" offers some of the best legs of the season. It is a boisterous show, full of heavily emphasized humor and lots of it. It ought to provide fun for Manhattan audiences all summer. Of the four Marx Brothers three made hits last night. Julius offered, among other things a loud burlesque of Napolean and his reactions to the philanderings of Josephine, which kept the audience happy for a good half hour. In the same burlesque, Leonard Marx exhibited skill and certain comic gifts at the piano and Arthur Marx did stunts with a harp. Arthur is the funniest of the brothers, a clever pantomimist, deft and economical with his effects, a fine recruit for the variety stage. There is a variety of color and song in the show, most of it aimless, all of it loud in one way or another but all of it, also vigorous and healthy. There was a Chinatown scene, of course, in which Cecile D'Andrea and Harry Walters dance a "Chinese Apache Dance." This proved striking and it is just possible that it will strike the police as indecent. Miss D'Andrea is a pretty girl, hardly indecent, even when her clothes begin to fall. It might be mentioned that the book and lyrics are by Will B. Johnstone, though he appears to have written only what the Marx brothers could not think of for themselves, and his writing is dull. Tom Johnstone wrote the music, much of it, that is, as is not borrowed from the works of more famous and meritorious composers. No one of the songs sounded last night as if it was destined to be a hit. "I'll Say She Is" is energetic, expensive hodge-podge.

Brooklyn Standard-Union, 20-May-1924