Born on March 21st, 1887 in New York City, Leonard was the first child of Sam and Minnie Marx. It would seem that he played the traditional role of favourite first son to the full, and by all accounts could do no wrong in his adoring mother's eyes.

Leonard left school early, after graduating from the sixth grade, and according to his daughter, Maxine : "...by the time he was eleven, he was staying out all night with a tough neighbourhood gang, spending his time hustling pool and getting into fights."

He started his first job at the age of twelve, looking after the employment records at a local lace factory. Unfortunately, this didn't last long, as he was sacked after being found running a crap game on the premises. Not that his wage packet lasted long anyway - he would invariably find some way of losing most of his money on the short journey home from work.

He was as regular a visitor to the pawn shop as to the pool hall, hocking anything he could lay his hands on around his parents' house to refill his depleted stakepot.

In short, according to Joe Adamson, Leonard's childhood was "a series of hairbreadth escapes and escapades revolving around his frantic unceasing search for some sort of action." Adulthood brought merely more of the same, with bigger stakes.

According to Irving Brecher, a screenwriter on At the Circus : "Chico was a delightful character who could never remember his lines and was more interested in what horse was going to lose that day, so he could get his money on it." He would blithely lose $10,000 dollars in a day, and equally blithely win it back the next (or not as the case may be). In his own words : "If I lose today, I can look forward to winning tomorrow, and if I win today, I can expect to lose tomorrow. A sure thing is no fun. Groucho and Harpo like sure things, but there's no fun in security."

This carefree attitude carries over to a large extent to his screen persona (particularly pre A Night at the Opera). The early Chico is, by and large, completely amoral. Chico is the musician who charges extortionate amounts of money for not turning up (and even more for not rehearsing). Chico is the War Minister of Freedonia, working for Sylvania for better money, but eating in the Freedonian trenches because the food is better. Chico is a shyster, a crook, but we love him because he genuinely fails to see anything remotely wrong in his actions.

And we do love him. He urges us to. This is probably the defining characteristic of Chico. He is often seen as the lesser of the three Marx brothers (sorry Zeppo!), but the films would be inconceivable without him. Irving Brecher again, on the effect of the brothers on a live theatre audience : "Harpo was off on a cloud somewhere, he appealed most to the children. Groucho was the Enemy of the Republic, he appealed to the sophisticates - but there aren't many of those. The favourite was always Chico."

Leonard/Chico never changed until the day he died. Still gambling. Still womanising. Still utterly carefree. As Groucho said shortly before Chico's death : "That's his life. He can't change it. Our mother and father couldn't change it. If he made ten thousand dollars a day, he'd spend ten thousand dollars a day. It's better he doesn't make so much, then he won't wear himself out spending it. He's always happy. In fact, he sleeps better than I do."

Chico died in 1961. A rabbi (who had surely never met him) said : "He did not have an evil or a mischievous thought in his soul." Well maybe not an evil one.

Sources :

Groucho, Harpo, Chico and sometimes Zeppo, Joe Adamson

Monkey Business - the lives and legends of the Marx Brothers, Simon Louvish