New Doc Explores Friendship Between TV Host Dick Cavett And Comedian Groucho Marx

A new documentary about the decades-long friendship between Dick Cavett, the Emmy Award-winning TV host, and comedian Groucho Marx airs tonight on PBS’s American Masters series.

The film features footage of Groucho visiting The Dick Cavett Show as well as interviews with Woody Allen, George Burns, Truman Capote, Yip Harburg, Phyllis Newman, Jack Paar, Dan Rowan and Shelly Winters.

According to American Masters, Cavett “was writing for Jack Paar on The Tonight Show when he met Groucho Marx at the funeral of playwright George S. Kaufman in 1961. It was the beginning of a friendship that lasted until Groucho’s death in 1977. When Cavett made the transition from writer to comedian in 1965, he was encouraged and mentored by Groucho. When Cavett became the host of his own talk show in 1968, Groucho quickly became a frequent guest. Groucho’s appearances on The Dick Cavett Show captured what Cavett calls, ‘the last of Groucho’s greatness.’”

Cavett’s early professional years “coincided with a slowdown in Groucho’s professional activity, and it was during this time that their friendship blossomed. In much the same way that Groucho’s television quiz-show You Bet Your Life had provided the perfect vehicle for him after his movie career ended, The Dick Cavett Show allowed Groucho to be Groucho one more time.”

In an interview this week, Cavett called Marx “the greatest wit of our time,” comparing him to Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw.

“He was a genius, he could almost not help being funny,” he explained.

Marx, he added, “has a medicinal effect, he’s so laugh-rich, so loaded with laughter.”

Cavett said a recent screening of the documentary at a film festival was “one of the few times I’ve seen an audience go out quite happy. It was a chance to see probably the greatest wit of our time in prime form.”

He also said that any time he feels “blue and (needs) pepping up, a spiritual lift, I look at a letter I got from his daughter, Miriam Marx, that said, ‘My father thought the world of you.’”