Topic: Your Favorite Stooge Visual/Sight Gag

[Hammond Eggar]

As Stooges fans, we all have our favorite shorts.  We also have our favorite routines.  That said, I'm curious to read what your favorite sight gags from the Stooges films are.  I'm speaking of things seen in a short or feature that are visually funny or over-the-top, and as such, are memorable.  Here are some of my selections to get us started.

The dogs at the dinner table (Calling All Curs)
The cage of pipes (A-Plumbing We Will Go)
The Stooges being chased down a street by an entire football team (No Census, No Feeling)
The staircase (An Ache in Every Stake)
The stack of barrels (Three Little Beers)
The misshapen horse (Saved By the Belle)

So, what are your choices for the greatest/funniest Stooges visual or sight gag?

[Lefty]

Right off the top of my head, one of my favorites is every time when Moe's hair goes up via the unseen fan when he's frightened.  "We can't go in that room, the GOON is in there.  The goo-goon!  Nyah-ah-ah-ah-ah!"

[Shemp_Diesel]

The first gag that comes to my mind is Moe's knuckleball pineapple that he throws at Billy Gilbert in Pardon My Scotch.

Another good one is the runaway hot dog from Income Tax Sappy. (Now I've seen everything)....

[Blystone]

Moe turning Larry upside down and trying to stuff him down the sink in "False Alarms."
The Niagara Falls TV scene in "A-Plumbing We Will Go." Also in that one, Curly's cage of pipes, and Dudley Dickerson: "Dis house is sho' gone crazy!"
Curly and his gold detector flying through the air in "Cactus Makes Perfect."
Larry in "Goof On The Roof:" "What I need is a longer arm or a shorter wall... shorter wall!"
Moe slamming the piano lid on Larry's fingers in "Brideless Groom."
Also from "Brideless Groom," Moe and Shemp in the phone booth.

It's a long list... if I don't stop, I could go on all day! You can see that I like those subtle gags.

[Shemp_Diesel]

Another good one I thought of is from Flat Foot Stooges when Moe uppercuts Larry & sends him flying up the firepole.

[GentWithoutCents]

- Curly grabbing a ladder, quickly followed by the guy who was up the ladder plummeting to the ground! ~ Ants in the Pantry
- Moe getting pulled through the wall in They Stooge to Conga and Listen Judge
- Shemp spitting out his teeth after being whacked particularly hard. One fine example that springs to mind is Booty and the Beast, but I'm sure he did this a few other times as well.

[Hammond Eggar]

Another visual gag I enjoy is from Malice in the Palace.  After entering the palace in search of the diamond, the boys appear as a huge giant with Shemp on top.  Classic!

[Blystone]

One I left out: Larry racing madly all over town trying to find a recording of "Pop Goes The Weasel" in "Punch Drunks." And how his search ends up— after all that effort, Moe busts the radio over his head!

[Curly4444]

One I left out: Larry racing madly all over town trying to find a recording of "Pop Goes The Weasel" in "Punch Drunks." And how his search ends up— after all that effort, Moe busts the radio over his head!

Dam, I was going to use that one. When i was little i laughed my ass off. I was like, man that Larry runs fast.


Oh, I got one. Another fav sight gag of mine was in disorder in the court. When Larry stands up and beats his chest and screams like hes mad.


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[Desmond Of The Outer Sanctorum]

My familiarity with & memory of the shorts isn't enough for me to answer this definitively, so I'll just throw one in that no one else is likely to mention: Joe polishing his head in RUSTY ROMEOS.

[FineBari3]

Shemp vs. the ironing board in SING A SONG OF SIX PANTS.

[Hammond Eggar]

One of the best Stooge-related sight gags, though, has to be the one of themselves in 1963's It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.  Director Stanley Kramer once stated that, when casting the film, he looked for performers who were well known for a specific piece of business.  Audiences were so familiar with the antics of the Stooges that the mere sight of them was enough to create wild images in people's minds as to what would happen next.  There was no need to actually show the boys doing anything, as nothing a person could write would have been nearly as funny as the imaginations of those in the audience.

That said, another great sight gag I just remembered is the shot of Curly in Idle Roomers carrying a huge stack of luggage on his back. That's, indeed, a great Stooge visual.

[Lefty]

Speaking of "Rusty Romeos." there's the one thing that makes it more enjoyable for me to watch than "Corny Casanovas" -- Joe shooting the tacks into Connie Cezon's derriere, then whacking her there with the gun.

[metaldams]

Speaking of "Rusty Romeos." there's the one thing that makes it more enjoyable for me to watch than "Corny Casanovas" -- Joe shooting the tacks into Connie Cezon's derriere, then whacking her there with the gun.

I swear to you, I remember an old poster years ago on the C3 board who was actually turned on by that gag.

[metaldams]

I think the greatest Stooge sight gag is anytime all three of 'em are on the screen and there's about a minute's worth of banter and slapping/gouging.  Seriously, guys like Keaton did sight gags much better, but the above scenario?  The Stooges at their best.

That said, gotta love the maze of pipes in A PLUMBING WE WILL GO and the sweater gag in HOW HIGH IS UP?

[JazzBill]

I always liked the end of "So Long Mr. Chumps". When Larry is putting the fake rocks on Curlys head for Moe to hit, till the last one where you see him struggle with a real rock.

[ICE MAN]

CURLY IN THE SHOWER IN "A PLUMBING WE WILL GO"

[kinderscenen]

So far, two have come immediately to mind:  Moe getting slapped (pawed?) on the head by the "bear" when he sticks his head out of the window in Idiots DeLuxe, and Larry getting the taste slapped out of his mouth by the "phantom hand" of Moe in Who Done It? (originally, then, of course, the remake.)  You see Larry talking on the phone, then you see this hand just slapping the crap out of him--so hard that you can see the spit on the side of his mouth.  Hi-larious!

[Dog Hambone]

One I left out: Larry racing madly all over town trying to find a recording of "Pop Goes The Weasel" in "Punch Drunks." And how his search ends up— after all that effort, Moe busts the radio over his head!

I also thought it was funny how the radio continues to play after it is no longer plugged in.

A few of my favorites, that still make me laugh out loud:
Curly as the helmeted bucker-upper sliding on the greased girder in HOW HIGH IS UP
Shemp vs the hammock in DUNKED IN THE DEEP (used a second time in remake)   
Shemp on the rotating clothes rack, where he ends up winning his fight with Terry "Slippery Fingers" Hargen in SING A SONG OF SIX PANTS (also used a second time in remake)

    

[Curly4444]

Another fav of mine is in "A plumbing we will go". Its when curly hooks up the water pipe to the electrical system. Water then fills up the light bulb and starts spraying out of everywhere(ie the stove).

[Mike Lipincranz]

Another fav of mine is in "A plumbing we will go". Its when curly hooks up the water pipe to the electrical system. Water then fills up the light bulb and starts spraying out of everywhere(ie the stove).

I got 2 of them from the same short I believe....."Shivering Sherlocks":

Shemp with the "hunk of pipe routine" and the opening scene with the boys in a garbage can in a back alley.....Cy Schindel-"Who's in that can?"  Shemp: Just garbage....SLAP......Them they start biting each other's toes and the one further away yells in pain (Just to imagine the position of their legs all wrapped around is hilarious to say the least)....I almost wet myself every time...

[Dunrobin]

Another fav of mine is in "A plumbing we will go". Its when curly hooks up the water pipe to the electrical system. Water then fills up the light bulb and starts spraying out of everywhere(ie the stove).

The stove always struck me as particularly funny, considering it's a gas stove and wouldn't have even been connected to the electricity.   

[Curly4444]

The stove always struck me as particularly funny, considering it's a gas stove and wouldn't have even been connected to the electricity.

I know go figure.


The part where the black cook puts on the rain gear is funny also. 

[Blystone]

I also thought it was funny how the radio continues to play after it is no longer plugged in.

Actually, that's not a gag. I had to explain this once to someone who was watching "Punch Drunks" for the first time, when she said, "How can that radio be playing when it's not plugged in?" Here's how: many of those 1920's-30's table radios were battery-powered. They had a compartment in the back that held a large, square battery that was about the size of a milk carton. Why was this? Because many homes at the time weren't wired for electricity, especially in rural areas. One of the reasons why president Franklin D. Roosevelt and governor Lyndon Johnson of Texas were such popular politicians during the Depression was because they sponsored public works projects that brought electric power to "the sticks."

So, the people there could finally have not only radios that didn't need batteries, but refrigerators and washing machines and toasters and vacuum cleaners! "Land's sake, Maw, what'll those city folks think of next?"

EVERYTHING'S UP TO DATE IN KANSAS CITY
From the stage show "Oklahoma" (1943)
(Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II):

"I went to Kansas City on a Friday
By Saturday I learned a thing or two
But up 'till then I didn't have an idea
Of what the mod'rn world was comin' to.

"I counted twenty gas buggies goin' by theirselves
Almost every time I took a walk
An' then I put my ear to a bell telephone
An' a strange woman started in to talk.
What next! What next?

"Everything's up to date in Kansas City
They gone about as fer as they can go
They went an' built a skyscraper seven stories high
About as high as a buildin' orta grow.

"Everything's like a dream in Kansas City
It's better than a magic lantern show.
You can turn the radiator on whenever you want some heat
With every kind of comfort every house is all complete.
You could walk to the privy in the rain and never wet your feet!
They've gone about as fer as they can go.
They've gone about as fer as they can go!

"Everything's up to date in Kansas City
They've gone about as fer as they can go,
They got a great big theatre that they call a Burley-que,
For fifty cents you see a dandy show!

"One of the gals is fat and pink and pretty
As round above as she was round below
I could swear that she was padded from her shoulder to her heel
But then she started dancin' and her dancin' made me feel
That every single thing she had was absolutely real!
She went about as fer as she could go
Yes, Sir! She went about as fer as she could go!"

And there's your history lesson for today, for whatever it's worth.

[Mike Lipincranz]

YODELAAAA AAA AAA DEEE,  YODELADE OH!  ...Not me-there might be a loose piana up there or something!