I can only hope there are classes in institutions of higher knowledge about the historical significance of characters like SpongeBob SquarePants and The Three Stooges!
If not, then society is obviously doomed for eternity!
It's damn near Hallowe'en, and what better time for a spooky but stoogey tale!?
I bought a Three Stooges DVD at Albertsons a few years ago that had "Shivering Sherlocks," "Spook Louder," and "The Ghost Talks on it! Somehow after two features, it mysteriously vanished never to be seen again! Lucky for me and you, stuff like this is readily available on the internet today for free!
In some ways, life has never been sweeter!
How much simpler can you get than three 50 year old guys who act like pre-pubescent juveniles crammed into a garbage can?
You either love The Three Stooges or you hate them! There is no middle ground!
In this tall tale titled "Shivering Sherlocks," The Stooges are accused of robbing an armored car, a ridiculous proposition at best!
Here's a great shot of some awesome high tech equipment from the 1940's!
The boys need to help out there gal pal Christine McIntyre as Gladys Harmon! Christine was in almost as many Three Stooges episodes as the stooges themselves!
When's the last time you had a good fifteen cent muzzle?
Wow! What you used to be able to get away with in the name of comedy! Shemp pours some boiling water through a chicken carcass to make some instant chicken soup!
Salmonella City! Gross!!
This shot of Moe losing the battle to his clam chowder is for Paul from down under!!
They've obviously identified the wrong guys, but I like this shot!
Man, here's a couple of sleazy weasels for you!
As a kid, I always preferred slapstick Curly to Shemp, but I think as you get older, you gain more appreciation for Shemp's performances! He's still an idiot, but just a little more suave!
Charles Everest Sinsabaugh AKA stunt man Duke York has the role of the monster hunchback dude named Angel! Pretty creepy, really!
Now this looks like a shot from a classic pre-code comic, and that's difficult to pull off!
The rest of the show is the guys going in circles with Angel in not always such hot pursuit! Most of the time they don't even know he's there until he is directly in their faces!
Classic Stooges!!!
It's really crazy how much enjoyment The Three Stooges have brought to the public over decades while at the same time, a lot of the people who participated in the making of these films didn't have such happy lives at all! Duke York is a perfect example! Sadly, after some 172 acting credits, Duke committed suicide in 1952 with a gunshot wound to the head!
Yingie Yangie! What goes up, must come around!
If you'd like to read a whole sordid list of people associated with The Stooges who either committed suicide or died way before their time by stabbing or health problems, then by all means Check out this list! It's quite informative, but it's not exactly uplifting, that's for sure!
And stop running red lights, you're really starting to piss me off!
And stop running red lights, you're really starting to piss me off!
Angel freaks me out!
ReplyDeleteSome of the LIGHTEST horror comedies have real "freak out" moments. One of mine is that electronic voice at the seance in YOU'LL FIND OUT.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was a little kid, the first time I saw a Stooges short with Shemp, I was annoyed and maybe a little confused. Curly Howard and Joe DeRita had enough of a superficial resemblance that I could watch a 1930's short with Curly, and watch a 1960's feature film (or read a Gold Key comic) with Curly Joe, and the difference was not jarring. Shemp took more getting used to. But, as I've gotten older, he's actually become my favorite "third Stooge."
ReplyDeleteShemp was definitely under-appreciated, and probably for reasons that were not his fault. For one thing, he was over-shadowed by Curly, who came first (in the movies, anyway). Also, the quality of their movies declined in the 1950's, at the same time that Shemp was in them, but the one had nothing to do with the other. The decline would have happened even if Curly could have stayed in the act.
Short subjects, "B" Westerns, and serials were all on the way out by then, anyway. Budgets were cut, so they had to use more and more stock footage. That, in turn, meant that scripts had to repeat scenes and plots from the originals, so many 1950's Stooges shorts were remakes. But you can see the same thing with a lot of Westerns and/or serials from Columbia and Republic in the fifties. ("The Adventures of Captain Africa" is built around footage from "The Phantom," "The Man With the Steel Whip" uses a lot of scenes from older Zorro movies, etc.)
And, yeah, a lot of horror comedies do have "freak out" moments. The Ghost Breakers and Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein had some pretty scary scenes. Conversely, some straight horror movies, like 1933's The Invisible Man, had some comic relief scenes that were as funny as the Stooges comedies.
Hey TC, Now that's what I call a comment! As a stupid kid, for some reason, I always though Shemp came first because he looked older, and I also had no clue how old the episodes were! I always thought they were fairly current. It seemed like the TV showed mostly the Curly episodes, and when they would dig out an older episode, it had Shemp in it! It wasn't until years later I figured out the correct order! What a Maroon!!
ReplyDeleteActually, when I was a kid, I didn't realize that Curly Joe and the original Curly were two different guys. It was years later when I read a book (Movie Comedy Teams by Leonard Maltin) that I figured it out.
ReplyDeleteI happened to get that book two years ago. I expected it to be a very casual guidebook for the "casual reader" (which is usually fine with me), but it turned out to really be LOADED with information.
ReplyDeleteMy first Stooges experience as an Australian kid in the early 60's was with Shemp and I thought he was the greatest. It took me a long time to adjust to Curly.
ReplyDeleteI was disappointed that you didn't feature a shot of Moe battling the Clam in this two-reeler. Whether it's the Three Stooges or Abbott & Costello, I do love a Clam that eats crackers and fights back!
Paul
You're right Paul! I started to, but I didn't capture a good still except the one on Moe's nose. Action shots are the hardest, and that clam was moving around pretty fast! Go check the post again, I added a photo just for you! One of the hardest things about doing this is limiting ourselves to 21 photos! That can really be a challenge!
ReplyDeleteThanks Eegah!
ReplyDeleteMy Pleasure!!
ReplyDeleteHey Eegah, not sure if you are aware but Amazon currently has "The Three Stooges: The Ultimate Collection" for $22.99 which is an absolute bargain.
ReplyDeleteIt contains all 190 Columbia two-reelers remastered and they look gorgeous. I bought each of the individual sets as they were released and then bought this boxed set when it come out a few years ago. It duplicated everything I had but at the time it was the only way to get "Have Rocket, Will Travel".
Enough of the Amazon ad and time for me to get back to reading my favourite blog. Ooh, looks like they have a review of the ultra-crappy A*P*E*.
cheers! - Paul from Oz
Hey Paul, I've been trying to get rid of stuff instead of getting more, but that's a deal I don't think I can pass up! Thanx for the tip!
ReplyDeleteCurly and Shemp were my all-time favorites. Don't get me wrong I love all the Stooges, but Curly and Shemp were just silly. That's why they were my favorite.
ReplyDeleteThanx Silvia Tricia! That's what we're trying to do!
ReplyDelete