Recent Posts

21

Stooges DVD/VHS/Home Video / Re: Our Gang silents being prepped for DVD/Blu Ray

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 18, 2024, 01:32:22 PM »

I recently picked up SPOOK SPOOFING in Super 8. Watched it last week -- it was as bad as I remembered it to be when I borrowed a print from a friend about 30 years ago. I also just got BARNUM AND RINGLING which I haven't watched yet.

From the silents I've seen, the Pathes are much better than the M-G-Ms, though I'm not too fond of some of the Pathes I've seen, either. DERBY DAYS, from one of the old DVD sets from Vivendi/Genius, I wasn't too fond of.

22

Abbott and Costello / Re: Abbott and Costello Show - Season 1 Ep. 10 The Charity Bazzar (1953)

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 18, 2024, 01:22:27 PM »

Around the mid 1960s is the earliest instance of anyone outside the entertainment industry owning some form of home TV video recorder I can recall reading about. I'm sure it was quite rare and ultra expensive!

This Wikipedia page confirms the above:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videocassette_recorder

CHEERS! 

Cool!

I'm hanging on to my last working VCR -- I threw a few out a few years ago. Thing is, if you eject in the middle of a tape, the tape sometimes get caught on something and you have to manually reel it up again. Not sure why.

On the other hand, I find that anything I recorded on tape years ago can usually be easily watched on streaming services I already have, or for free somewhere on the web. Oh yea, and in better quality, lol.

Anyway, Fields probably could have appeared on TV, but he stuck with film and radio. He missed the years when TV became household mainstays -- like the VCR in the 80s.

23

Youtube and Google Videos / Re: New Joe Besser Premiere!

« Last post by umbdae on April 15, 2024, 08:15:02 AM »

Thanks for the link.  This wasn't the best show I've ever seen, but it had its moments of fun.  I wonder why it was never broadcast.

24

Questions and Answers / Re: When did Curly begin to slip?

« Last post by Larrys#1 on April 13, 2024, 03:08:26 PM »

I know many of us always dwell on Curly's stroke and like to always think to ourselves, "What if Curly's health never was an issue and stayed as a stooge?" But when you think about it, he was a stooge for 12 good years (or 13 if you count the Ted Healy shorts). After 1946, how long did the stooges stay at their peak before things declined with reused footages and reduced slapstick? I would say around 1953 is when reused footages were starting to creep up. So if Curly would have stayed, he would only have had about 6-7 years until things started to decline.

Curly started out when the stooges were at their peak... they were young, energetic and really were at their prime. Things already were headed for the decline at the late Shemp years. So while I'm just as sad as everyone that Curly had to end his career as a stooges, I'm thankful for the 12-13 years he's put in as a stooge.

25

Abbott and Costello / Re: Abbott and Costello Show - Season 1 Ep. 10 The Charity Bazzar (1953)

« Last post by Tony Bensley on April 13, 2024, 12:06:14 PM »

Well, he actually did live long enough, but I know what you mean. Without looking up the details, i know from "A Plumbing We Will Go" that people had TV sets as early as 1939, the year Fields made "You Can't Cheat an Honest Man." I'm not sure how many comedy/variety shows existed before the 50s, though.

I believe the first televised baseball game was in 1937.

Sorta like how the Internet existed long before the masses (The Hoi Polloi!) actually knew about it, and before it was actually commonly called the Internet. I was using email in the mid-80s.
 

How many people owned a VCR before the 80s, although I believe you could buy one as early as 1976 (Sony Betamax), and perhaps before that?

Around the mid 1960s is the earliest instance of anyone outside the entertainment industry owning some form of home TV video recorder I can recall reading about. I'm sure it was quite rare and ultra expensive!

This Wikipedia page confirms the above:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Videocassette_recorder

CHEERS! 

26

The Three Stooges - Curly Years / Re: Pop Goes the Easel (1935)

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 12, 2024, 06:14:47 PM »

Definitely a classic. I LOVE the energy the boys had in their 30s shorts. I'm also a sucker for location shooting that shows street scenes.

I'd forgotten that this short uses neither "Listen to the Mocking Bird" nor "Three Blind Mice" under the main titles -- though using "Pop Goes the Weasel" is not a very original idea given the title of the short!
I imagine that Columbia chose to use non-copyrighted (I think) music under the titles to save money. Also, they rarely used any background music throughout the 190 shorts.

I love how they hop-scotched through the buckets when running from the cop -- and the cop follows suit. When the boys then hop-scotched through an actual chalked hopscotch on the sidewalk, the cop for some reason doesn't follow suit. I found that strange. I would have had the cop start to do it, then stop as he realizes how stupid it is to waste time. That would have been funnier.

BTW, do kids still play hopscotch? I long for the days when kids played street games and didn't spend all their time on their iPhones or playing Nintendo!

This is one that I will watch again soon, since there are so many little things that you might not catch without repeated viewings.

I think the 2012 movie, which I haven't seen in a while, had some street scenes with those boards where they were looking for work, didn't they? I remember when I first saw it that it reminded me of this short.

27

The Three Stooges - Shemp Years / Re: Vagabond Loafers (1949)

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 12, 2024, 05:43:52 PM »

I watched this yesterday since I just received a Super 8 print a few days ago.

I haven't watched "A Plumbing We Will Go" in a while, so I won't compare.

This was a very funny short -- easily one of the best Shemps. I laughed out loud a few times. I notice that when I haven't watched many Stooges shorts in a while that I find them funnier, but I suppose that that goes for just about any of the comedians. I'm also more focused when I watched them on film rather than on video. It's much more involving for me -- but that's an entirely different topic for a different day.

Since they got Dudley Dickerson anyway, I'm not sure why they just didn't have him re-enact his old scenes -- or create some new gags with him in the kitchen.


BTW, when I google the name of this short, I found this!

https://www.vagabond.com/us/men/footwear/loafers/

28

Abbott and Costello / Re: Abbott and Costello Show - Season 1 Ep. 10 The Charity Bazzar (1953)

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 12, 2024, 05:34:28 PM »

I can’t help but think of W.C. Fields and how it’s a shame he didn’t live long enough to be on television.  I really bet he would have succeeded. 

Well, he actually did live long enough, but I know what you mean. Without looking up the details, i know from "A Plumbing We Will Go" that people had TV sets as early as 1940, the year after Fields made "You Can't Cheat an Honest Man." I'm not sure how many comedy/variety shows existed before the 50s, though.

I believe the first televised baseball game was in 1939.

Sorta like how the Internet existed long before the masses (The Hoi Polloi!) actually knew about it, and before it was actually commonly called the Internet. I was using email in the mid-80s.
 

How many people owned a VCR before the 80s, although I believe you could buy one as early as 1976 (Sony Betamax), and perhaps before that?

29

Abbott and Costello / Re: Abbott and Costello Show - Season 1 Ep. 10 The Charity Bazzar (1953)

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 12, 2024, 05:28:05 PM »

Only made it up to this episode?  I last visited the site about a year and a half ago.
I never rewatched all the episodes again myself, either -- just a select few. Too many other things to watch that I've never seen before.
I do remember this being one of the better episodes, though.

30

Stooges DVD/VHS/Home Video / Re: Does anyone collect The Three Stooges on film: 8mm, Super 8, or 16mm?

« Last post by NoahYoung on April 12, 2024, 05:21:33 PM »

It's been awhile since I've been here...

I've discovered some edits in my "unedited" Super 8 sound prints.

In "Three Sappy People",  it is missing the punch bowl gag, and the wooden leg gag. So this only runs about 13 minutes. I've had this print for awhile and only discovered this about a year ago. The reason is I never watch it on DVD since I have the film print. It was only through reading the reviews here that I discovered something was missing.

In "A Bird in the Head," it is missing the scene where Curly and the gorilla drink the alcohol.

Some googling on these titles showed that these scenes were cut when Screen Gems first released them to TV, due to not being able to show the consumption of alcohol. Not sure why the wooden leg scene was cut, other than maybe they thought it would be offensive.

When I was a kid, all the cuts were made to remove the violence, and were usually done by the local stations -- very badly, I might add. Because of the separation of the sound track and the frame of the film being projected, you could still hear the sound effect of Curly being hit on the head, and his reaction to it, though the visual was missing.

Anyway, this is false advertising at it's best, since all the prints weren't "unedited" as it said on the box. I wonder how Sony would react if I compained to them about something that happened 50 years ago? (Though Sony didn't own them at the time.)

(As an aside, I recently discovered that Sony and Columbia collaborated on some vinyl LP releases long before Sony bought Columbia in 1989.)