The Worst Stooge Shorts There Never Were

Fake Shemp · **on:** August 06, 2007, 06:59:25 PM

I do not know if this is a good thread (or lack thereof) to start this topic on, but someone back at Stooge World a long while ago created a topic where you make up your own titles and plots for the worst Stooge shorts and complain about them. I will start off...

ENCHANTING ENCHANTERS (1956) – Quite possibly the only original short filmed with Joe Palma doubling for Shemp. Moe, Larry, and Joe go to a school kinda like Hogwarts to become sorcerers to defeat a horrendous dragon that is about to eat their girlfriends. Unlike his other four shorts where he had almost no lines, Joe Palma speaks in his normal voice throughout the entire short, and he always has his face towards the camera and is never bending forward to match Moe and Larry’s heights, so it’s obvious that he is not Shemp at all! How stupid! Apparently Columbia was going to film this after Thanksgiving without knowing that Shemp would be dead by then, and when he died they for some reason still needed him for this short so that’s why Palma has a lot of screen time in this short. Anyway, their friend Merlin (played by Emil Sitka) helps them out by educating them on their study of sorcery. Ten minutes is wasted just for the scene where the boys are being trained, and nothing funny happens except for the part when Larry tries to cast a spell with his wand and talks gibberish exactly the way Curly did in THREE LITTLE PIRATES and Moe says “Shaddup, you!” slaps Larry and shoots lightning at his eyes, which is quite possibly one of the meanest gags I have seen! Other than that, Sitka had almost completely forgotten his lines when trying to explain how to cast a spell and made up for it by talking about the Civil War, which doesn’t even make sense. When they’re finished with their studies, they confront the “dragon,” only to find that, instead of a dragon, that the only thing threatening the girls is a pink balloon that just makes these roaring noises and nothing else! Then for some stupid reason, Merlin suddenly decides to get revenge on the Stooges (what the hell?)! When this “dragon” scares the trio, Joe Palma flaps his arms and EEBs his way out of the castle and it’s up to Moe and Larry to try to kill the balloon. They fail as the rubbery balloon lightly taps them and the girls to DEATH. Absolutely cheesy and fake-looking, and pretty stupid for an ending! This short was never shown because not only was Jules White drunk when directing this, but all of the pre-screeners threw up during the scene with the dragon that was actually nothing but a balloon.

kinderscenen · **Reply #1 on:** August 09, 2007, 08:15:28 PM

Nah, wouldn't work unless they had a bunch of stock footage of dragons (perhaps like the one they used in "Space Ship Sappy"?) Besides, wasn't Jules White (and Felix Adler) drunk (or high) when "Cookoo on a Choo Choo" was filmed?

Funny, now that you mention it, Palma WAS always hunched--the worst example I can think of off the top of my head was the beginning of "Hot Stuff". Was he that much taller than Shemp (who was noticeably taller than Moe and Larry)?

Larry Larry · **Reply #2 on:** August 16, 2007, 12:37:11 AM

I always liked (hated):

Hansel and Gretel and the Three Stooges (1965)

Not a short, but the thankfully long-lost Joe DeRita feature directed by Walter Lang. In this outing, Moe and the boys work as gardners for a wealthy land baron at a castle. Joe DeRita delivers a performance so boring, that many of the extras fell asleep during filming (pay close attention during the "hike" sequence). Hansel and Gretel live next door to the castle. Their parts are played by actors approaching their late 20s and bear no resemblance at all to children. Jeffery Adler ("The Long Hard War") and Olympic horseback rider Therese Von Mikel play Hansel and Gretel. The comedy includes a solitary eye poke to Larry; Moe fuming and pulling his hands across his face and Joe DeRita doing a variation on the "oyster soup and crackers" sketch. A midget shows up half-way through the movie and frightens the "children" as they walk through the woods. Having lived next door to the children, the Stooges set out to rescue them. They find Hansel and Gretel tied up inside a witch's gingerbread house. Joe DeRita "eats" the entire gingerbread house, the children are saved, and they inexplicably kiss and sing a song, confusing the audience who assumed they were brother & sister, but now question if they are lovers.

Fake Shemp · **Reply #3 on:** August 26, 2007, 07:25:39 PM

kinderscenen: Actually, I do believe Joe Palma was taller than Shemp, maybe by a few inches. Otherwise, he wouldn't be hunching over, would he!

SLAPHAPPY HOLIDAYS (1947) – This probably isn’t the worst of them all but it is still really bad. The major problem was that not only was this one of Curly’s post-stroke films, but part of this short was filmed before his major stroke, and the other part after. It is almost Christmastime for Moe, Larry, and Curly but they still hadn’t gotten their Christmas bonus yet from their boss (Fred Kelsey), but they will only receive it if they sell enough applesauce makers (a machine that just smashes lots of apples to make applesauce). They need the bonus to pay off the landlord, otherwise they will be sent to jail. Most of the bits with the boys trying to sell the devices to people in town were either unfunny or they were reenactments from earlier shorts. I’ll admit I laughed out loud when the Stooges sell one to a military general in an office, when a hand grenade is accidentally used instead of an apple and blows up in everyone’s faces. But then everything really gets worse from here because the next portion was filmed after Curly’s big stroke. To improvise, the director takes a pathetic way out of this mess by reusing footage of the boys selling reducing machines instead of applesauce makers to the really skinny woman and Symona Boniface. In the new footage, Moe, Larry, and a double for Curly (with his back toward the camera of course) are walking on the sidewalk complaining how they hadn’t sold enough applesauce makers to meet their quota. The guys see a woman walking on the other side of the road, Moe tells the Curly double to tail that woman and convince her to buy one of their products, and the double says in his regular voice “Right!” and walks off. Moe and Larry accept an offer to cook dinner for a nearby sobbing resident for return money and then it goes to the stock footage of the remainder of the short AN ACHE IN EVERY STAKE and the part with Vernon Dent recognizing the Stooges as the ice men in the end is still left in the short and that’s the end! A really disappointing short overall. By the way, the Curly double was actually Joe Palma wearing a fat suit and hunching over.

archiezappa · **Reply #4 on:** August 30, 2007, 07:42:53 PM

The Three Stooges Show Pilot Episode (1977). After Moe's death, the remaining stooges: Emil Sitka, Curly-Joe DeRita and Joe Besser team up for a new television series. I don't understand why they thought this would work.

The episode begins with the three of them asleep in one bed. The phone rings and Joe (who's now wearing a "Moe" style wig) answers the phone. He suddenly starts yelling for the other two to wake up. They need to get to work at the restaurant, because if they're late again, they will be out of a job. They all three pile into the bathroom just like in "Cactus Makes Perfect" with Joe and Curly-Joe redoing the scene of Curly shaving. It's just not the same.

Then, after they're ready, they go to the restaurant. They're all dressed just like Moe, Larry and Shemp were in "Malice In The Palace." In fact, the whole rest of the episode is just a remake of "Malice in the Palace," except, in a role reversal, Curly-Joe is playing Larry's role as cook, while Joe and Emil play Moe and Shemp's parts, respectively.

This episode, which was produced by Columbia, features much stock footage, but since this is in color, the stock footage is colorized. It looks really bad.

After watching this, it's no wonder people said that the act died in 1975 with the deaths of Moe and Larry.

Larry Larry · **Reply #5 on:** August 30, 2007, 11:51:16 PM

DOUBLE BUBBLE (1956)

The third time isn't the charm, in this remake of a remake. Columbia insisted on yet one more short after the death of Shemp. They recycle so much footage ones' head hurts trying to determine where it came from originally. It starts out w/ footage lifted directly from "All Gummed Up" where the Stooges have created a drink that makes old people grow younger. After more recycled footage from "Bubble Trouble", a cranky landlord (Emil Sitka) drinks the potion and turns into a gorilla.

We finally reach new footage about 12:00 minutes in. The gorilla runs out of the building and into the street. Moe and Larry chase the gorilla outdoors, down the street, and into a skyscraper. We jump to recycled footage from the lobby scenes in "Flagpole Jitters", itself a remake of "Hokus Pokus". The gorilla chases the boys up a flight of stairs and out to the flagpole. Larry and Moe get in 2:00 minutes of truly, funny new material, but penny-pinching Columbia, refuse to pay for new Joe Palma footage so they recycle his "from behind" shots from "Scheming Schmers", and even manage to re-recyle some of that short's recycled stock scenes from "Vagabond Loafers" for good measure.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #6 on:** September 04, 2007, 02:14:56 PM

This could be a really silly topic, but actually it works pretty well as a way of satirizing some of the things that were actually done in Stooge films... Here's my entry:

PLUMB DAFFY (1959) - It wasn't enough that A Plumbing We Will Go was remade with Shemp as Vagabond Loafers and with fake-Shemp Palma as Scheming Schemers. No, someone at Columbia decided that it needed to be remade with Joe Besser as well. Of all the Stooge shorts that recycle footage, this may be the one that contains the least new material, much of it showing close-ups of Besser reacting to what Moe & Larry say or do in old footage (often with "Joe" dubbed in where they originally said "Shemp"). It's also the short that recycles footage from the greatest number of previous shorts. Recycled footage comes from all 3 of the shorts named above, plus Half Wits Holiday and possibly one or two other Curly or Shemp outings. And it's the only Besser short to recycle footage from a previous Besser short, Pies And Guys.

(P.S. to Larry Larry: IIRC, there were no "from behind" Palma shots in Scheming Schemers -- just a "from the front" shot with something obscuring his face. Seeing if we're paying attention, or what?)

Fake Shemp · **Reply #7 on:** September 04, 2007, 06:39:40 PM

Wow, Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum, you actually beat me to that short. I was actually thinking about the same nonexistent bad short today, but I guess I'll show off my version anyway. And yes, I know it is a silly topic, but I decided to resurrect the topic because I was inspired at a similar topic already created a long time ago that I stumbled across.

PIXILATED PLUMBERS (1958) – Jules White was so fascinated with the two remakes of the classic short A-PLUMBING WE WILL GO that he decided to yet again rework it into this god-awful short, this time with Joe Besser as the third stooge, using stock footage from those three plumber shorts and combining their storylines. It pretty much has the same opening sequence as LISTEN, JUDGE where the boys are accused of stealing a chicken from someone’s farm and realize the jig is up when the judge notices the chicken in Joe Besser’s suit coat and the boys run away. Milton Frome plays the judge in this short and he performs his role flatly, right down there with his weaker performance as Prof. Quackenbush in PIES AND GUYS. The film also borrows ideas from A-PLUMBING WE WILL GO, with the boys posing as plumbers to escape the cops and the judge, only they took out the magician sequence. Not only is Joe Besser his usual whiny self and hardly takes any punishment here, he also wanted Moe and Larry to wear their gentleman-type hairstyles for this short. That was terrible because you can easily tell the difference between which scenes are reused and which ones aren’t. I especially cringed when I saw Joe’s variation of the bathroom sequence with him trying to get the water out of the shower and him being trapped in the maze of pipes because he’s at his very whiniest and most annoying during that part. Plus, Moe doesn’t even scold him after crashing into the basement. After many more scenes, they recycle the part where Ethel and Allen hide the painting in the pipe and Moe, Larry, and Joe confront Allen and get into a pie fight with him. What makes that part really lame is that the sequence is almost entirely recycled from SCHEMING SCHEMERS and HALF WITS HOLIDAY, when the only time we see Joe during that time is close-ups of him getting pies into his face when trying to throw a pie at Allen. After Allen gets clobbered with the pipe, the police and the judge arrive at the house to arrest Allen (actually a double for Kenneth MacDonald because he had already left Columbia by that time), but for some stupid reason don’t even arrest the boys even though they notice them there.

Here's another one:

HEAVEN’S ABOVE (1956) – Made before Shemp’s sudden death in 1955, this was one of the rare remakes that contains more new footage than old footage. Well, some idiot at Columbia apparently liked HEAVENLY DAZE and BEDLAM IN PARADISE so much that he decided to remake the original again. This begins with Shemp in a bar betting his friends that he can drink 1,000 shots of Old Panther: Distilled Yesterday without kicking the bucket. Every time he drinks a shot he EEBs, makes funny noises and faces, and then proceeds to tell a joke. It is funny the first time, but then we actually see him drink another shot, repeating the EEBing and facial expressions and telling the same exact joke many more times, and the whole gag gets old and boring really fast. After his 23rd drink he finally dies, and it cuts to recycled footage of HEAVENLY DAZE, with Shemp in heaven and Uncle Mortimer telling him in the new footage to reform Moe and Larry or else they will commit suicide because of the loss of Shemp. It cuts to stock footage of Moe and Larry crying in the office with I Fleecem. After they give him all their inheritance money and pull out their pants pockets to reveal that’s all they have, the scene dissolves to a new scene in which Moe and Larry are depressed about their dead brother and that they have no more money, and soon they enter the same bar containing the same old friends of Shemp that dared him to drink down till he died. The gang dares Moe and Larry to do the same thing, guzzle down 1,000 shots without dying. Shemp then appears on Earth in angel form, but thinks this is amusing, so he doesn’t intervene. Again, Moe and Larry drink down a shot one by one, every time they do that they pathetically EEB like Shemp, make the same funny faces and noises, and tell the same rotten joke. After only ten drinks they are dead. They go to heaven and Uncle Mortimer tells them to reform theirs and Shemp’s depressed girlfriends or they will kill themselves too. And you probably know the rest. This was never shown because A) the girlfriends who are successfully dared to the contest kick the bucket after drinking ONE shot, which was uncalled for, B) the repetitive "drinking, doing funny stuff" is the ONLY gag in the whole entire short, and C) the short itself sucks.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #8 on:** September 06, 2007, 08:31:23 AM

Quote from: KingKongFu on September 04, 2007, 06:39:40 PM

Wow, Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum, you actually beat me to that short. I was actually thinking about the same nonexistent bad short today, but I guess I'll show off my version anyway.

I must say, I like your version better! (Given my usual creativity level, it's amazing that I even attempted this!)

EDIT: I also think the stuff here is much better than what's at that other board.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #9 on:** September 06, 2007, 01:47:16 PM

Here is a "Short That Never Was" idea from a SEINFELD script (writer Larry Charles). Kind of a sick idea, like some of those at that other board, as compared to the stuff on this board, but here it is:

Kramer: Oh, uh, Helena, how are you?
Helena: I haven't worked since 1934, how do you think I am?
Kramer: Well, that's only uh, 58 years.
Helena: It was a Three Stooges short, "Sappy Pappies." I played Mr. Sugarman's secretary, remember?
Kramer: Yeah, right, right, yeah, yeah, that was a Shemp, right?
Helena: No, a Curly. The boys played three sailors who find a baby, the baby's been kidnapped and the police think that they did it.
Kramer: Uh huh, right.
Helena: But, but of course they didn't do it, the police had made an awful mistake.
Kramer: Right.
Helena: Moe hits Curly with an axe...
Kramer: Uh huh.
Helena: The Stooges catch the kidnappers...
Kramer: Right.
Helena: But it's too late.
Kramer: Really.
Helena: The baby's dead.
Kramer: Really?
Helena: The boys are sent to Death Row and are executed.
Kramer: Well I don't remember that part.
Helena: I play Mr. Sugarman's secretary.
Kramer: Oh, yeah, yeah, you were, you were very good.
Helena: Yeah, it was sad for a Three Stooges, what with the dead baby and the Stooges being executed and all.
Kramer: Well, that was an unusual choice for the stooges.

locoboymakesgood · **Reply #10 on:** September 06, 2007, 04:11:32 PM

I don't remember which Palma short it was, but the only thing I can remember is that he was severly hunched over, and says "Right!" in this quick trying-to-be-Shemp voice, then scurries off the screen at a sideways angle. It couldn't have been MORE obvious that it wasn't Shemp.. my God.

I vaguely remember the short when I was a kid and didn't think anything of it, but after a re-run on Spike or AMC I was like "WTF?".. by then I knew it was Palma, I just couldn't believe how bad it was!!

Pat The Stooge · **Reply #11 on:** September 07, 2007, 06:43:54 PM

Jerky Jailbirds(1956) With Moe,Larry and Shemp(Joe Palma)

A pathetic remake of BEER BARREL POLECATS(1946) with stock footage without Jerry and stock footage of Shemp in Hot Ice(1955) Joe Palma doubling for Shemp.

The Stooges are wrongfly arrested on probition charges(its takes place in 1929) and they must escape from jail to clear thier name so they hire a female P.I. named Polly(played by Muriel Launders) who loves to sing and dance so she offers the boys a contract in show business if they help her land a vaudville gig. So after they agree, she convinces the judge to release them from jail and so starts a stage musical called "Probition and Calammity" where Polly preforms the numbers: I love to sing to the sky, and "Can you feel the Sunshine" with Joe doing a terrible Shemp imitation singing "My girl Nelly" (from SOUP TO NUTS(1930) while the boys throw together everything from that time period from, chorus gals to poorly executed dirty jokes. Moe and Larry have very little lines in this short and Joe and Launders try and fail to save face with thier terrible and off key singing in the new footage.

Boob Tube Horseshoes(1957) featuring Moe,Larry and Joe Besser
A godawful remake of Goof on the Roof(1953) where the classic is destroyed by Joe's poor improve and weak timing.
The Boys are forced to housekeep for thier newlywed pal Jack(played by Mousie Garner) who's just been married to a wealthy young woman(played by Norma Randell) while Joe decides to let his sister Bertie the talking horse move in and are expecting a TV to be delivered soon. Joe ruins Shemp's routine with the "cockeyed door" "crackerjack ring" gags being delivered too poorly and yes some of the stock footage is used from Goof on the Roof with the Moe and Larry scenes. Joe meanwhile discovers that his sister is pregnant with Mr. Ed's colt and decides to forge money from thier friends account to buy nursery items for Bertie's unborn child, But just as the televison is delivered, Mr. Ed rushes in and knocks over the T.V. breaking it with Jack and Marie chasing after Ed with a 2X4 while the end music plays and rolls to the "End". The the new scenes are unwatchable and the stock footage without Shemp is irrelvant, also there's an unccany portrait of Curly hanging on the wall.

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #12 on:** September 08, 2007, 02:16:49 PM

It seems like a disproportionately large number of these involve Joe Besser... and a REALLY disproportionately large number involve Joe Palma!

Pat The Stooge · **Reply #13 on:** September 08, 2007, 02:37:12 PM

I don't mean to be rude Desmond, but just how many Shemp-Joe messes you think Columbia would have made until they could replace Shemp if they didn't get Joe Besser or DeRita?

JazzBill · **Reply #14 on:** September 08, 2007, 03:34:57 PM

Quote from: locoboymakesgood on September 06, 2007, 04:11:32 PM

I don't remember which Palma short it was, but the only thing I can remember is that he was severly hunched over, and says "Right!" in this quick trying-to-be-Shemp voice, then scurries off the screen at a sideways angle. It couldn't have been MORE obvious that it wasn't Shemp.. my God.

I vaguely remember the short when I was a kid and didn't think anything of it, but after a re-run on Spike or AMC I was like "WTF?".. by then I knew it was Palma, I just couldn't believe how bad it was!!

That was one of the Shempless Shemp shorts, Hot Stuff ( 1956 )

Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum · **Reply #15 on:** September 08, 2007, 08:31:48 PM

Quote from: Pat The Stooge on September 08, 2007, 02:37:12 PM

I don't mean to be rude Desmond, but just how many Shemp-Joe messes you think Columbia would have made until they could replace Shemp if they didn't get Joe Besser or DeRita?

Now that's a scary thought... almost enough to make one more tolerant of the Besser era.

Anyway, I guess my point was this: Given that these "never were" ideas seem to be our way of satirizing certain aspects of Stooge history, the Shemp-Joe shorts would be the phase that most calls for such satire!

Larry Larry · **Reply #16 on:** September 09, 2007, 12:37:06 AM

STOP! DROP! AND ROCK AND ROLL! 1962

Paul Winchell returns to "host" another haphazard collection of memorable Stooge moments once again re-edited by Jules White. Between Stooge clips, we revisit Winchel as he takes the viewer through his rehersals with his new rock band of chimpanzees (The Marquis Chimps). Known as Paul Winchell and the Raiders, the band sports Colonial attire. Winchell's attempts to be relevant to the youth of the day, means repeated uses of the phrases "daddy-o" and "like crazy man". Classic bits from "A Duckling They Will Go", "Ache in Every Stake" and "Stone Age Romeos" don't excuse Columbia from this awful mess. Near the end of the film, Winchell dismisses the monkees from the band and replaces them with his dummy Jerry Mahoney. The chimps, upset at their dismissal, head to Vaudeville where they are hired to star in a Three Stooges revival. This gives the filmakers the opportunity to let the chimps re-create the classic "Niagra Falls" sketch.

locoboymakesgood · **Reply #17 on:** September 10, 2007, 09:30:54 AM

Quote from: archiezappa on August 30, 2007, 07:42:53 PM

The Three Stooges Show Pilot Episode (1977). After Moe's death, the remaining stooges: Emil Sitka, Curly-Joe DeRita and Joe Besser team up for a new television series. I don't understand why they thought this would work.

The episode begins with the three of them asleep in one bed. The phone rings and Joe (who's now wearing a "Moe" style wig) answers the phone. He suddenly starts yelling for the other two to wake up. They need to get to work at the restaurant, because if they're late again, they will be out of a job. They all three pile into the bathroom just like in "Cactus Makes Perfect" with Joe and Curly-Joe redoing the scene of Curly shaving. It's just not the same.

Then, after they're ready, they go to the restaurant. They're all dressed just like Moe, Larry and Shemp were in "Malice In The Palace." In fact, the whole rest of the episode is just a remake of "Malice in the Palace," except, in a role reversal, Curly-Joe is playing Larry's role as cook, while Joe and Emil play Moe and Shemp's parts, respectively.

This episode, which was produced by Columbia, features much stock footage, but since this is in color, the stock footage is colorized. It looks really bad.

After watching this, it's no wonder people said that the act died in 1975 with the deaths of Moe and Larry.

I don't know why, but I can totally visualize this and thought about this half a dozen times over the weekend. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.

archiezappa · **Reply #18 on:** September 10, 2007, 09:49:50 AM

Quote from: locoboymakesgood on September 10, 2007, 09:30:54 AM

I don't know why, but I can totally visualize this and thought about this half a dozen times over the weekend. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.

Thanks. That made my day that you thought it was that funny. Awesome!

locoboymakesgood · **Reply #19 on:** September 10, 2007, 05:45:23 PM

Quote from: archiezappa on September 10, 2007, 09:49:50 AM

Thanks. That made my day that you thought it was that funny. Awesome!

I think it has something to do with that fact that Joe Besser wearing Moe's hairstyle is ... well brilliant. You should write.

Fake Shemp · **Reply #20 on:** September 23, 2007, 12:28:23 PM

MICROPHONY EXPRESS (1959) – If you had thought that it doesn’t get any worse than SWEET AND HOT, think again. This is both the sequel to SWEET, and a very abysmal remake of the classic short MICRO PHONIES, and it sure as hell is not a pretty sight here. It has Muriel Landers as Tiny (under the assumed name of Alice Andrews), and boy does she really bomb this one! She has gained more weight here and her singing voice is much more annoying than ever before. The song she sings in the short is of course the “Voices of Spring” song and redoes it terribly, with her singing voice being much screechier than ever! Even worse than in SWEET AND HOT! Joe didn’t look like he was even trying when he was lip-synching the song disguised as the “senorita”. I don’t blame him, though; he didn’t want to do this mess. All of the invited party members in the house scene act more as if they were zombies than actual guests having a good time. And whose dumb idea was it to have Larry portrayed as one of the guests in the house (near the farm that Tiny owns) instead of the second Stooge, while Moe and Joe are the only Stooges here? Absolutely awful. The only real highlight in this short was Gene Roth playing the same man doing that singing, getting-cherries-in-his-mouth bit, with the same butchering of the English language he had done in DUNKED IN THE DEEP, but that doesn’t save this film from being a bomb. Oh, and this was the only short with no recycled footage that was only shot in ONE day! Considering that fact and the fact that this was one of the last Besser shorts, it’s no wonder this film was a stinker. Heck, if this makes even the hardcore Besser fans cringe in agony, then this is probably completely unwatchable!

JazzBill · **Reply #21 on:** September 23, 2007, 12:46:53 PM

Quote from: KingKongFu on September 23, 2007, 12:28:23 PM

Heck, if this makes even the hardcore Besser fans cringe in agony, then this is probably completely unwatchable!

Are you saying there are hardcore Besser fans ?

Larry Larry · **Reply #22 on:** September 24, 2007, 03:40:03 PM

BYE, BYE BIRDIE (1958)

Jules White helms the final piece of “horse-short" trilogy. Opens with the Stooges, Birdie and Schnapps all 5 asleep in one big bed; the frame sagging from all the weight. While the Stooges have their eyes closed, the horses are wide-eyed awake and blinking, creating an unintentionally funny and odd visual. Moe attempts to recreate Shemp’s classic “be-be-be” snore, but unfortunately doesn’t do a very good job.

When the morning alarm rings, Larry smacks it so hard to turn it off, that the bed collapses & crashes through the floor into the landlord’s apartment below. The obvious “stuffed horses” flop around on top of the Stooges and landlord making it the short’s funniest scene.

Evicted and penniless, the Stooges are homeless. The boys look for work with Moe slapping Larry a lot, and Joe working in a feeble belly bump or two. The horses are left alone while the boys interview. When the boys are finally hired, they rush out to tell the good news to Birdie, only to find out both horses have been destroyed at the glue factory. The disturbing ending caused Columbia to shelve the project.

Fake Shemp · **Reply #23 on:** September 24, 2007, 10:30:22 PM

Quote from: JazzBill on September 23, 2007, 12:46:53 PM

Are you saying there are hardcore Besser fans ?

I didn't know there were hardcore Besser fans either!

Quote from: Larry Larry on September 24, 2007, 03:40:03 PM

BYE, BYE BIRDIE (1958)

Jules White helms the final piece of “horse-short" trilogy. Opens with the Stooges, Birdie and Schnapps all 5 asleep in one big bed; the frame sagging from all the weight. While the Stooges have their eyes closed, the horses are wide-eyed awake and blinking, creating an unintentionally funny and odd visual. Moe attempts to recreate Shemp’s classic “be-be-be” snore, but unfortunately doesn’t do a very good job.

When the morning alarm rings, Larry smacks it so hard to turn it off, that the bed collapses & crashes through the floor into the landlord’s apartment below. The obvious “stuffed horses” flop around on top of the Stooges and landlord making it the short’s funniest scene.

Evicted and penniless, the Stooges are homeless. The boys look for work with Moe slapping Larry a lot, and Joe working in a feeble belly bump or two. The horses are left alone while the boys interview. When the boys are finally hired, they rush out to tell the good news to Birdie, only to find out both horses have been destroyed at the glue factory. The disturbing ending caused Columbia to shelve the project.

What happened to Birdie's baby horse Piggy? Did she die?

Larry Larry · **Reply #24 on:** September 25, 2007, 04:08:18 PM

Quote from: KingKongFu on September 24, 2007, 10:30:22 PM

What happened to Birdie's baby horse Piggy? Did she die?

The producers had originally intended to include Piggy in "BYE, BYE, BIRDIE". But tragedy struck.

During the filming of the classic western "Six Gun Justice" on Columbia's back lot, little Piggy was nearly trampled to death in a stampede, and had to be put down.

Looking to save yet one more nickel, Columbia shot some "from behind" footage using a mule as a Piggy-double. But the footage just didn't look right, so production went forward without mention of Piggy.