You might not recognize her name, but you would definitely recognize her; or at least the type of character she played. Margaret Dumont was born Daisy Baker in 1882. She took singing lessons as a young girl, training to become an opera singer. In the pre-movie era, she would tour the country, performing on stages in the United States and Europe. She married a wealthy heir and retired from acting in 1910. After her husband prematurely passed away, she re-entered the world of entertainment, this time on Broadway where she joined up with the famed Marx Brothers and eventually followed them to Hollywood.
Margaret Dumont’s role was typically as the society matron who witnesses crude behavior by the Marx Brothers. “Well I never!” was typically shouted at this point. Ms. Dumont’s shocked reaction was often the punchline. While some (including Groucho in his later years) seemed to suggest that Margaret was not in on the jokes, she definitely was, bringing her sense of comic timing to make the scene even funnier. In many cases, her stunned reactions and shouted exclamations were not scripted; the Marx Brothers trusted her to ad-lib something appropriately hilarious.
The Hollywood stereotype of the upper crust society dame constantly enduring crude jokes and indignities didn’t exist before Ms. Dumont. She not only invented the trope, she perfected it.
