--- title: How To Be A Spy, According to Groucho Marx description: In 1946, Groucho Marx demonstrated his approach to espionage for LIFE Magazine. Suffice it to say it wouldn't have gotten him very far. canonical: https://time.com/3674909/groucho-marx-spy/ author: Eliza Berman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-01-28T14:00:34.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:06:08.089Z og:title: How To Be A Spy, According to Groucho Marx og:description: In 1946, Groucho Marx demonstrated his approach to espionage for LIFE Magazine. Suffice it to say it wouldn't have gotten him very far. og:url: https://time.com/3674909/groucho-marx-spy/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd84b459e2ced3d3f/69877ad106f2c123ca3337e0/150120-groucho-marx-03.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Groucho Marx trains to be a spy, 1946 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How To Be A Spy, According to Groucho Marx twitter:description: In 1946, Groucho Marx demonstrated his approach to espionage for LIFE Magazine. Suffice it to say it wouldn't have gotten him very far. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd84b459e2ced3d3f/69877ad106f2c123ca3337e0/150120-groucho-marx-03.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How To Be A Spy, According to Groucho Marx > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription.  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Jan 28, 2015 2:00 PM UTC  Caption from LIFE. Looking for Footprints: Groucho figures that there are plenty of them nearby. Marx's spying is generally done in pleasant surroundings. Caption from LIFE. Looking for Footprints: Groucho figures that there are plenty of them nearby. Marx's spying is generally done in pleasant surroundings. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Jan 28, 2015 2:00 PM UTC The spy is having a moment in television. Tonight, _The Americans_, the FX show about two KGB spies posing as stars-and-stripes-loving suburban Americans, returns for a third season. Premiering Feb. 5, NBC’s _Allegiance_ will follow the CIA agent son of a former Soviet spy. From _State of Affairs_ to _Homeland_, viewers can’t seem to get enough of the wigs and fake mustaches and regular brushes with death. Tracing TV history back to the 1950s, every decade had its go-to secret agent men (and they were mostly men). In that decade it was _Shadow of the Cloak_’s Peter House and _Biff Baker, U.S.A._’s titular character. In the ’60s and early ‘70s it was Maxwell Smart (_Get Smart)_ and Jim Phelps (_Mission: Impossible_). Ever since the Cold War first captured Americans’ fears, it also captured their imaginations. And as potential spy rings are revealed in present times–just this week [three Russian citizens were charged](http://time.com/3683120/russian-spy-ring-new-york/) with espionage in New York City–the possibility of spies among us is not just old-fashioned paranoia. Some of these shows have taken pains to mimic actual spy tactics as closely as possible. The creator of _The Americans_ and producers of _State of Affairs_ are former CIA officers. Sixty years ago, _I Led 3 Lives_ and _Behind Closed Doors_ based episodes on real cases, _Law and Order_\-style, and received federal approval before airing. Ex-spy advisors and government approval have meant that these shows can, on the one hand, come fairly close to accurate portrayals, while still, on the other hand, refraining from revealing anything too sensitive. Plausibility was not, however, a concern for Groucho Marx, whose commitment to absurdity was as fervent as _Americans_ creator Joe Weisberg’s is to verisimilitude. Appearing in LIFE in April 1946 to promote his forthcoming movie (with brothers Harpo and Chico), _A Night in Casablanca_, Marx offered the only take on espionage that could be expected of him: an utterly facetious one. Pulling the kind of careless stunts that would have _The Americans_’ Philip and Elizabeth shipped back to the motherland for treason, Marx’s “[How to Be a Spy](https://books.google.com/books?id=ElUEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA65&dq=%22how+to+be+a+spy%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=TNvGVKqxLsyzggTZtYCwAQ&ved=0CB8Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22how%20to%20be%20a%20spy%22&f=false)” would have been more honestly titled, “How to Fail Your Country and Give Away All Your National Secrets.” Marx’s modus operandi is one of comfort and leisure: Chewing on a cigar, seducing women, peering through keyholes at half-dressed ladies, his spying, LIFE wrote, “is generally done in pleasant surroundings.” The movie itself, the twelfth of the brothers’ 13 films, focused not on Soviets but on a Nazi war criminal–WWII had ended less than a year before, and it would be another year until President Truman would announce his strategy for the containment of Communism. _A Night in Casablanca_ was meant to spoof the spy genre at large, and its parodic take would become increasingly rare for a period of time as the Red Scare became, to many, increasingly scary. Photographer Bob Landry took the pictures in the spread, but Marx crafted the scenarios and the captions. As LIFE explained: --- > “” --- Safe to assume they respectfully declined. _Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at_ [_@LizabethRonk_](https://twitter.com/LizabethRonk)_._  Caption from LIFE. The chase: the dog is carrying a message, is trailed by British foreign office man, a Nazi, a midget, a red-haired Mata Hari and Groucho. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Watching enemy agents through a keyhole: On seeing him, girl says, "Won't you join me?" Groucho replies, "Why? Are you coming apart?" Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Looking for Footprints: Groucho figures that there are plenty of them nearby. Marx's spying is generally done in pleasant surroundings. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Counterespionage: Groucho turns on the charm and rifles girl's purse for embassy secrets as she picks his pocket. He gets half of her loot. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Cracking the Code: Marx believes it has something to do with the race between big movie companies to make first picture on the atom bomb. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Groucho Marx shows "How to be a Spy." Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Invisible Ink: This is called a weekend message because it will not come to light until girl takes Saturday-night-bath. Spies get cheaper rates that way. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Rifling the Desk: This is considered as infallible by Marx because even if he does not get the papers, he will probably shoot the Nazi. Bob Landry—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. In Hiding: Crawling under a bed is often necessary for the Mother Spy. As a precautionary measure he carries a periscope to see when coast is clear. 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