When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s, the Marx Brothers were still a conspicuous part of popular culture.

The Marx Brothers’ films were frequently shown at odd hours of the day by local TV stations.

Characters influenced by Groucho were also all over the airwaves in prime time and in syndication: Mel Blanc’s Bugs Bunny, John Astin’s Gomez Addams on “The Addams Family,” Alan Alda’s Hawkeye Pierce on “M*A*S*H,” and the animated stork on Vlasic Pickles’ TV commercials.

Why were so many actors inspired to use Groucho as a basis for their work? Because the characters they were being asked to portray were all supposed to embody joie de vivre, flamboyant rule flouting, orchestrated chaos and rollicking devilry.

In the early to mid-20th century, no one exemplified those qualities better than Groucho Marx.

Frank Ferrante, 60, recalls seeing a Marx Brothers film on television for the first time.

“I remember almost gasping,” he said. “It really took my breath away. How wild he was and his brothers were. The flouting of convention, the breaking of rules. It’s something that’s very seductive. We all want to cross over to that side.

“Like so many young people, I was at the mercy of teachers,” Ferrante said. “In my case, nuns. So it really was appealing to me at 10-years-old.”

Most of us who were thus moved by Groucho at 10 years old went to lives in which the comic genius was evoked only occasionally.

But Ferrante went considerably further.

Ferrante’s senior project at USC was a one-man show as Groucho. Groucho’s son, Arthur, was an attendee and so was Morrie Ryskind, a Marx Brothers writer. Morrie told Arthur that Ferrante was the only actor, apart from Groucho, that could deliver his lines as they were intended (by him) to be delivered.

Arthur Marx subsequently invited Ferrante to portray his father in a play he’d written called  “Groucho: A Life in Revue.”

At 23, Ferrante was playing Groucho from age 15 to age 85 at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in New York City.

For more than 35 ensuing years, Ferrante has assayed the role of Groucho in various shows, including the one he will bring to the Eagles Theatre in Wabash on Tuesday: “An Evening With Groucho.”

“An Evening With Groucho” imagines what it might have been like if Marx had taken the time to do a stage show at the height of his cinematic success.

One of the miraculous aspects of Ferrante’s evocation of Marx is that he is able not only to deliver, convincingly, some classic Marx Brothers material, but he can also improvise fresh comedy as Groucho.

Ferrante said the sophistication of his “crowd work” (playing off the audience) grew by leaps and bounds in 1995 and thereafter.

“I got the opportunity to do two weeks at the Herberger Theatre in Phoenix,” he said. “Two weeks as opposed to the usual one-nighter. What I did was I stepped off the stage in Phoenix and started playing with the audience.

“And it was exhilarating,” Ferrante said. “I was like, ‘Wait! I can do this!’ I started kibitzing with the audience and playing with the audience and they loved it. And that became the highlight of the show and that’s what audiences were craving.”

These days, more than one-third of a typical show is “audience-interactive.”

Groucho shows aren’t the only things Ferrante does. He currently plays Forte in the Chicago cirque-style extravaganza “Cabaret ZaZou.” Forte is one of two characters that Ferrante has created for Chicago-based circus arts shows.

But he always returns to Groucho and one of the reasons he does is his friendship with actor Hal Holbrook.

The late Holbrook portrayed Mark Twain on stage for more than 60 years and he told Ferrante to perform as Groucho at least once a year, regardless of whatever else he has going on.

“He sure made it seem like it was important to do,” he said, “and sent me some beautiful correspondences encouraging me to continue to do it. I’ve certainly gone through times when I thought, ‘Maybe I should take a few years or a year off.’ The business does that to you. But I know what he was saying. So I have always had my toe in the role, so to speak.”

Thinking you can get up on stage and “conjure up the spirit of a historical figure” is an audacious act, Ferrante said.

“The audacity of it is massive. I don’t realize how audacious I am, in a way,” he said, laughing. “But I continue to do it. You just hope that people appreciate your interpretation. That’s all it is. You’re filtering it through your own skill.” 2 pm and 7:30 pm Tuesday. Tickets, at $25, are available by calling 260.563.1102. The shows are at the Eagles Theatre, 106 W. Market Street, Wabash.