ONE SHIVERY NIGHT (1950)

RATING: *** out of ****

PLOT: Hugh Herbert’s construction business (“Houses moved and remodeled”) is in trouble: “We’re not making enough money to keep ourselves in red ink,” proclaims Hugh. But things are soon looking up when Hugh and his assistant Dudley Dickerson are asked by a client (Vernon Dent) to remodel an old mansion rumored to have a fortune buried inside. They set off to remodel the place, unaware that there are a couple of thugs (Philip van Zandt, Robert Williams) inside searching for the money. The thugs pass themselves off as electricians and then proceed to do all they can to scare Hugh and Dudley out of the house. Can Hugh and Dudley complete the reconstruction without being scared out of their wits?

REVIEW: Here is another Columbia Pictures short. Like my reviews of shorts from the Three Stooges and Schilling & Lane, I have to note that being a Columbia production the “story” exists mainly to bridge the gaps between gags and is barely a story at all. When presented with this Columbia shorts formula I feel I have no choice but to grade their efforts on a curve and concentrate on the strengths of the performances as well as the quality of the gags and horror-comedy trappings in each.

Let’s start with the performances. I’m happy to report that this short brings us the indomitably funny Dudley Dickerson and the delightful (to me) Hugh Herbert. For more on each of these funny men, I refer you to my reviews of “The Black Cat” and “Spooky Hooky.”

An interesting aspect of this short is the way it handles race. Unlike a lot of films of its time, “One Shivery Night” presents an African-American character that is front-and-center and not merely subservient. Although Dudley works for Hugh, Hugh treats him more like a friend and partner than a subordinate. This relationship runs through the four horror-comedy shorts Herbert and Dickerson made together. So much so that you not only can say they operate as a “comedy team” but even make the claim that in more enlightened times Dickerson probably would have received equal billing with Herbert.

I’ll say this for the Herbert-Dickerson pairing as well: I think Dickerson’s enthusiasm and natural ease at getting laughs may have inspired Herbert. I note that due to various reports stating Herbert wasn’t entirely happy making shorts for Columbia. Longtime Columbia shorts director Edward Bernds is quoted as saying that Herbert considered working in shorts “slumming.” Note that prior to his tenure at Columbia, Herbert was a featured player providing comedy relief in musicals, utilized as a top “second banana” delivering sure-fire laughs in support of comedians like Wheeler & Woolsey and Olsen & Johnson as well as headlining and co-headlining his own films (including the horror-comedies “Sh! The Octopus!” and “The Black Cat” as well as a string of features for Universal). It may also be that the horror-comedy situations provided a fresh diversion for Herbert, who otherwise was utilized by Columbia in marital farces akin to Leon Errol’s RKO shorts.



Herbert and Dickerson have an easy rapport and are dynamite together. The horror-comedy genre provides them a perfect set-up for a slow-and-steady build-up to more outrageous situations and gags, a la Laurel & Hardy. Like many of the Columbia horror-comedy shorts, the leads start somewhere else (in their detective offices, as bellboys, as exterminators, etc.) before they actually get to the haunted house… and whatever their profession may be is usually the impetus for them having to go to a haunted house in the first place. In this case it’s Hugh’s construction office. This oft-used scenario in the Columbia shorts doesn’t always work – sometimes the gags in the first location are not as strong as the haunted house gags to follow, and as I mentioned in my review of “Idle Roomers,” there is a desire (especially in shorts) to see the comedians get into the spooky setting as soon as possible. I’m happy to report that in “One Shivery Night,” the gags at the office are just as amusing and fun to watch as the haunted house gags to come.

Three of the more memorable bits in the construction office occur once Vernon Dent arrives to hire the boys. With their business dried up and their gas and phone shut off (Hugh only finds out about the phone when he tries to call the gas company to complain!), Hugh and Dudley are desperate for work. When Dent arrives, Hugh pulls out an old trick – he pretends to take calls from other clients with Dent sitting there (he sets off the ringer on an alarm clock that’s out of Dent’s sight to simulate the phone ringing). Hugh talks big like he is in demand with a lot of big jobs to do so he can get top dollar from Dent. In a Stooges-style moment, Hugh gets his hand stuck in a mousetrap then flings it – and it lands promptly on Dent’s nose! Then when Dent asks Hugh about the quality of his work, Hugh guarantees “when I build ‘em they stay built!” – and just then Dent pushes on a beam and it tips over!

In a typical feature, Hugh and Dudley wouldn’t get the job after the mousetrap and beam faux pas, but this is the fast-paced, often illogical world of Columbia shorts, so before you know it Hugh and Dudley are at the mansion and ready to work. When Hugh and Dudley arrive at the site, we’re treated to lots of Laurel & Hardy style slapstick as they try to get tools and ladders off their truck… culminating with Dudley’s head stuck between the rungs of a ladder and Hugh stuck in a barrel with his legs sticking straight up!

Once inside the mansion, the real creepy trappings kick in – lightning flashes, Dudley gets tangled in a drape as if it’s a ghost and then a boxing glove flies out from behind a painting on the wall and clonks him. It’s all fast and furious with marvelous “scared takes” from both Dudley and Hugh. And that’s just for starters. Once the crooks put a scare into our heroes with the power of suggestion by backing up the “ghost” legend, Hugh and Dudley are prime candidates for more scares.

And scared they are! The gags that follow are in many ways standard horror-comedy fare, but they are tried-and-true gags performed with such professionalism and enthusiasm that they are hard to resist even if you’ve seen the same gags before. The crooks pretend to go home for the night but they soon return wearing monster masks. Sleeping Dudley is the first to be frightened. He does a prime scare take, knocking his head back against the wall and running away screaming. Then Hugh thinks Dudley has bumped into him and turns around to find one of the mask-wearing crooks… and then Hugh runs away screaming. Other typical gags include Hugh hiding in a trunk to find a mask-wearing hood already in it, and Dudley sitting on a chair only to have the sheet cover rise up and chase him.

Dickerson in particular gets a lot of scream… er, screen time and utilizes it to the fullest. One completely hysterical scene has Dudley’s suspenders getting caught on a door handle. He’s convinced the ghosts have got him as he flails around trying to escape, but he never gets anywhere – he is always pulled back by the elastic! Eventually he snaps free and lands right in the furniture.



While Dickerson’s screen time and standing in the film are more elevated than most in the period, this short is not completely devoid of stereotypes. We get the requisite gag where Dudley gets covered in white paint, right before the crooks vow to “finish them off” – and then the crooks are scared away (this is an old bit that appeared in many films and cartoons, most notably in Laurel & Hardy’s “The Live Ghost” which doused caucasian actor Arthur Houseman in whitewash; the gag takes on a different pallor when it is an African-American actor turning all white). Hugh is also scared when he sees Dudley – which leads to the incongruous non-sequitor of a closing gag where Hugh slides across the floor and down a slide under a door, quickly followed by Dudley.

All tolled, there’s nothing terribly unique here, just Dickerson and Herbert getting into the spirit of things. For me, their inspired teaming and facility for putting over fright gags are enough reason to elevate this effort to a three star rating.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: This short features two stalwarts of Columbia’s stock cast, Vernon Dent and Philip Van Zandt.

Vernon Dent was a character actor in dramas and comedies from several studios (including some co-starring gigs with Clark & McCullough and W.C. Fields) and ultimately settled into a comfortable niche at Columbia playing both antagonists and put-upon victims of the Stooges and other Columbia comedians.

Philip Van Zandt was almost always playing “heavies” whether gangsters, mad scientists, henchman or the like. He appears in the classic Three Stooges 3D short “Spooks” as well as “Dopey Dicks” and “Outer Space Jitters.” He also appeared in comedy features like Laurel & Hardy’s "Air Raid Wardens" and “The Big Noise,” the Marx Brothers' "A Night in Casablanca," and "Ghost Chasers" with the Bowery Boys.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

HUGH (holding a blueprint upside down): I was wondering what those bathtubs were doing on the ceiling!

HUGH (assuring his client of the quality of his work): You leave it to me… I’ll fix it up so nobody will recognize it!

HUGH: We’re miles and miles away from anybody.

DUDLEY: That’s just what I’m afraid of!

DUDLEY: Can I draw part of my back salary?

HUGH: Whatsamatta, you crazy? What about the two dollars I gave you last week?

DUDLEY : I dunno boss, I expect I’m just extravagant!

CROOKS (telling Hugh & Dudley they’re leaving): You don’t think we’re going to spend the night in this creepy night, do you?”

DUDLEY: You mean you’re going to leave us here all alone?

CROOK: Oh you won’t be alone – you’ll have Ben’s ghost to keep you company!

BEST GAGS: I’ve already mentioned most of the highlights in the body of the review. Nothing beats Dudley’s antics, particularly with his suspenders, but here are some more great sight gags:

• The old chestnut of Hugh accidentally drinking from a bottle of ink instead of his beer.
• Hugh finds a wire in his way and starts to follow it into a wall opening… and the crooks promptly trap him inside. Dudley uses a pick to get through the wall, spears Hugh’s derby and pierces a water pipe. The water then starts splashing out of various holes.
• There’s one gag that’s more incredulous than funny where the crooks tie a noose around Hugh’s neck to drag him out of the wall.

BEST COMBO VISUAL-VERBAL GAG: Dudley has stepped into a can of black paint. Hugh walks into the room and sees a trail of black footprints… climbing UP the wall! When Hugh asks where Dudley is, he replies “up here” and we see his head peering from a hole in the ceiling! Dudley replies, “I don’t know how I did it, but here I am! Come on up, boss!”

FURTHER READING: Ted Okuda and Edward Watz wrote an indispensible book called “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” and Leonard Maltin wrote one called “The Great Movie Shorts” (also known as “Selected Short Subjects”). You can order them here:

Selected Short Subjects: From Spanky to the Three Stooges (Da Capo Paperback)












I also encourage you to visit The Columbia Shorts Department – Greg Hilbrich’s excellent site dedicated to the fun and frolics of this studio that gave the world The Three Stooges and so much more.

WATCH THE FILM: Since this is a short there is no trailer, but thankfully I was able to find this short clip whose length falls within the parameters of “fair use” – a really nice clip highlighting Dudley and Hugh’s great “scare takes”:

SPOOK TO ME (1945)

RATING: 2 & ¾ out of ****



PLOT: Andy Clyde takes his ersatz Boy Scouts outfit, the “Bloodhounds” camping for the troop’s one year anniversary. Only trouble is, the campsite is walking distance from an allegedly haunted house! Andy and his valet, Dudley Dickerson investigate and encounter one frightful scare after another. Is the house truly haunted, or are its occupants up to something more sinister?

REVIEW: Here’s another two-reel short subject from Columbia. It’s rather standard in general but a few novel scenes and the seasoned antics of its stars, Andy Clyde and Dudley Dickerson raise it to “above average” status.

Andy Clyde was an interesting comedian in that he had a “shtick.” His persona was one of an old man, equally genial and doddering (and occasionally cantankerous). Clyde played the character going back to silent movie days and was so popular for so long – forty years to be exact – that ultimately he scarcely needed to use his trademarked “old man” makeup! Clyde had character parts in features including several westerns but it was his starring series of two-reel shorts for Columbia that remain most fondly remembered.

Of course, we’ve encountered Dudley Dickerson before here at Scared Silly and we all know how much of a riot he could be.

As so many horror-comedy shorts do, especially those from Columbia, this one hangs its laughs on just the barest of plots. It all begins at the Clyde home where Andy is handing out awards to his “Bloodhounds” troop. This Boy Scouts-like group seems even more survival-oriented than the real Boy Scouts - they practice self-defense and clever escape tactics that would make MacGyver look like an amateur.

The awards scene is brief, no doubt used just to set up how resourceful the kids are. There are some mildly funny touches. As one boy explains how he exterminated a skunk from under a schoolhouse Andy cuts him off mid-sentence. Another kid demonstrates how he stopped a prowler and crunches Andy’s hand so hard that Andy goes flying into the wall!

When Andy announces to the kids that he’s taking them camping as a reward for all their hard work, Andy’s wife provides the next bit of plot-revealing exposition: “That’s fine, Andy – but won’t you be too close to that haunted house,” she asks.

Andy disregards his wife’s comment and the group soldiers forth.

Once at the camping site, it’s the kids that stumble upon the old deserted house and cajole Andy into investigating (it’s hard to tell initially whether the do this for sport or if they really think the house is haunted, but either way soon enough the kids do start to believe it may very well be haunted).

When Andy enters the house he is greeted by people in sheets and suits of armor but he doesn’t notice…. even when he trips into the lap of one of the would-be ghosts. When the armored mystery person throws a battle ax past Andy’s head, he exclaims “bats!,” mistaking it for the winged creature.

Dudley Dickerson enters the film as if he’s always been part of the story (he may have been cut from an earlier scene – or I may have viewed an incomplete print) and we quickly learn that he’s a driver for Andy. In a bit reminiscent of the ending of “Tall, Dark and Gruesome,” Dudley zooms past Andy who slows him down to get an explanation. Dudley explains that his car levitated as he drove by the “haunted house.” Now the kids think it’s haunted for real and call the police.



Dudley and Andy then explore the house together, and have additional encounters with suits of armor and men in sheets. It’s all very standard stuff, except that both Andy and Dudley are quite hysterical with their animated scare takes.

Things quickly take an upswing as a door behind Andy opens to reveal a skeleton… and Andy reaches back behind him to knock on the skull’s head, not looking at what he’s doing. It’s a very funny little shot helped along by the typical wood block sound effect as Andy pounds away.

As Andy and Dudley back into each other there is more taking off screaming. Andy runs down the stairs and hears a disembodied voice, “This is your last warning, foolish mortals. This is the abode of the spirits. Why are you trespassing here?”

Andy awkwardly tries to answer, “I’m a dog catcher… I mean I’m a bloodhound master!”

“You defile the sacred precincts with your earthly presence. Leave while the breath of life is still in you!”

The next bit follows through on the promise of the skeleton scene by offering something lively and unexpected. A weird animal head is mounted on the wall. It resembles a dog except for its unusual ears begins growling at Andy. Andy is scared at first, but realizing it’s mounted and can’t chase him, Andy begins to fight back. His first move isn’t too bright – taunting the animal by waving his finger by its mouth and whipping it away before it can bite him… until it does! This leads to Andy slapping it in the face as if he’s Moe Howard. It’s obviously a puppet and yet at the same time it’s so odd that it’s simultaneously goofy and creepy.

After Dudley has his own unnerving experience with the disembodied voice, he backs up to the wall where a fellow in a sheet pulls him into a back room.

Meanwhile, Andy is trying to get out and asks a headless fellow in a tuxedo for directions (although he’s not looking at the man when he asks the question so he has no idea the man is headless). The humor here is that the headless man initially answers Andy in a very nonchalant, way. When Andy realizes the man is headless and asks if he’s living, suddenly his voice turns sonorous as he delivers a multi-syllabled “Noooooooo!”

As Andy runs further amok, he stumbles into a room that (pardon the pun) gives up the ghost: it’s a room full of counterfeiting equipment! Andy’s initial reaction when he finds all the money is to exclaim that he’s “rich” and to start allocating the funds (“this is for a new car”… “this is for income tax”…).

This leads to a funny gag where the crooks come into the room and Andy starts stuffing the money into their pockets to share. When he gets his hand stuck in one of the pockets, he pulls out a gun. “A gun, huh? Been hunting,” Andy asks before the truth becomes obvious.

We are then treated to a standard chase finale with the Andy and Dudley on the run from the crooks. Caught, our heroes are tied to a table to face a death-gimmick the likes of which are usually seen in serials and reruns of “Get Smart” and “Batman.” The crooks have rigged a huge blade above the table, suspended by ropes held down by weights. They light a candle to burn through the rope that will do away with Andy and Dudley in rather gruesome fashion (especially for a horror-comedy) by lopping off their heads!

Fortunately, the Bloodhounds have entered the house and are doing a little rigging of their own. They knock out one of the thugs with some bottles tied overheard and then trip others with some rope. Ultimately, one of the boys, Pee Wee unties Andy and Dudley in the nick of time while the others go get the police to arrest the crooks.

The police reveal to Andy that there’s a thousand dollar reward but Andy protests that that isn’t enough and starts unloading his pockets of all the counterfeit bills! Andy still thinks the money is real but when the policeman tells him otherwise he pretends he knew it all along.

As Andy goes to leave, he starts saying goodbye to everything: “Goodbye old house… goodbye funny chairs… goodbye old solider,” this last a wave to the suit of armor. When the suit of armor waves back, Andy flips its visor to reveal a beautiful girl inside. He goes to kiss her but the visor slams shut on his nose leading right into the end credit.

The supporting cast is serviceable but unremarkable. For Violet Barlowe, this short was only one of three film appearances. As Andy’s wife she’s barely on film but she does get to deliver the key setup line about “the haunted house.” It’s no wonder Barlowe didn’t have too many film credits – she was too busy entertaining the troops, having appeared in over 400 USO shows during World War 2 (including emceeing an entire Hollywood Canteen show).

As Blackie the chief crook, actor Frank Hagney doesn’t make much of an impression. His dialogue is stilted as if he didn’t take time to memorize it or just couldn’t get into the rhythm of the proceedings. It must have just been an “off” day for him though as he was readily employed during a lengthy career playing characters on both sides of the law in both movies and TV shows. Among the actors and characters he rubbed shoulders with were Laurel & Hardy, Abbott & Costello, Harold Lloyd, Dick Tracy, Superman, the Invisible Man and many more.

And the kids? Well, they’re uncredited. Most of them are just fine, with Pee Wee a standout. It’s worth pondering if Columbia could have fashioned their own Our Gang/Little Rascals-esque series utilizing these kids. Worth pondering until you find out the studio actually did shoot a kid shorts pilot nine years after this short that failed miserably. They named the kid group, “The Mischief Makers” and according to Ted Okuda and Ed Watz, authors of the essential “Columbia Comedy Shorts” book it was “unquestionably the worst two-reel comedy in the history of the department, bar none.” Perhaps Columbia should have tried nine years earlier with Andy’s Bloodhounds gang instead.

Also worth pondering is whether Andy Clyde had any influence in the story setup for this short. At this stage of his career, when not subjecting himself to Columbia’s breakneck pace of shorts production (something he would do for another eleven years after “Spook to Me!”), he appeared in several outdoor adventures and westerns (including a stint as Hopalong Cassidy’s sidekick, California Carson). The “Bloodhounds” motif of outdoor scouts could possibly have been inspired by Clyde’s experiences filming frontier adventures.

As mentioned upfront, this short is full of typical horror-comedy gags and would be unremarkable if not for its trio of unexpected gags (the skeleton knock, the mounted dog head and the headless man) as well as the comedy expertise of Clyde and Dickerson. The pair are masters of timing and scare takes, and help make this worth a look.



SPOTTED IN THE CAST: One of the two henchmen was played by Wally Rose. Like Violet Barlowe, his on-screen credits are sparse and typically he’s playing a henchman or guard or some other burly character. More notably, though he was a founder of both the Screen Actors Guild and the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

ANDY (after his wife mentions the haunted house): Haunted house? There isn’t any such thing! Just because the Bancroft family disappeared overnight doesn’t mean it’s haunted.

DISEMBODIED VOICE TO DUDLEY: “Where do you think you’re going? You’ll be sorry you came here!”
DUDLEY: “Brother, I’ve been sorry a long time!”

ANDY: “Say that’s a durn bright idea. The candle burns the ropes, the weights fall… if this works good I’ll tell the Bloodhounds.”
DUDLEY: “If this works good, boss we ain’t gonna’ tell anybody but us angels.”

BEST VISUAL GAGS:

Nothing in the short tops the aforementioned gags of Dudley speed-running, Andy knocking on the skeleton’s skull as if it’s a block of wood, and Andy’s encounter with the mounted dog head and headless man.

FURTHER READING: Ted Okuda and Edward Watz wrote an indispensible book called “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” and Leonard Maltin wrote one called “The Great Movie Shorts” (also known as “Selected Short Subjects”). You can order them here:

Selected Short Subjects: From Spanky to the Three Stooges (Da Capo Paperback)












I also encourage you to visit The Columbia Shorts Department – Greg Hilbrich’s excellent site dedicated to the fun and frolics of this studio that gave the world The Three Stooges and so much more.

WATCH THE FILM: Here’s an opportunity to view a short clip containing some of the best gags from “Spook to Me” – enjoy!

TALL, DARK AND GRUESOME (1948)

RATING: * & ¾ out of ****

PLOT: Playwright Hugh Herbert just can’t make headway on his latest script with all the noise going on outside his city office. He and his assistant Dudley Dickerson commence to a quiet country cabin but the quiet is soon undone by real live gorilla and some masqueraders in scary costumes. Will Hugh finish writing his play or will his attempts to write the play finish Hugh?!

REVIEW: A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending a special presentation of silent films at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts (click here to see my write-up about the event). These weren’t just any silent films – they were silent horror-comedies programmed by Bruce Lawton with wonderful piano accompaniment from Ben Model as part of their "Silent Clowns" film series.

But they were more than just silent horror-comedies, too. Mr. Lawton did a terrific job putting together a selection of shorts with a very specific theme: “Scary Shenanigans on the Second Reel.” Bruce’s concept: screen comedy shorts where the spooky stuff doesn’t happen until the second reel.

This idea of the second half of the film being the scary part worked beautifully in the shorts Bruce and Ben showed, including Harold Lloyd’s classic (and soon-to-be-reviewed-by-me) “Haunted Spooks” and two films I’ve previously reviewed, Buster Keaton’s “The Haunted House” and Our Gang’s “Shootin’ Injuns.” By no means is it a silent-film only concept, however. Some notable talkies that also went this route include such shorts as the Three Stooge’s “Idle Roomers” (reviewed here) and Laurel & Hardy’s “The Live Ghost” (reviewed here) as well as the final Hal Roach-produced Our Gang/Little Rascals short, “Hide & Shriek” (reviewed here). Even some features have followed this format – Bob Hope’s famed “The Ghost Breakers” has a rather lengthy prelude before the creepy stuff begins while the majority of spooky kookiness in Wheeler & Woolsey’s “The Nitwits” takes place in the third reel.

So here we have the great team of Hugh Herbert and Dudley Dickerson again. You may recall I waxed rhapsodic over their hysterical horror-comedy, “One Shivery Night.” I mostly love these two guys whether paired with each other, paired with others (like Hugh with Allen Jenkins in “Sh! The Octopus” and with Broderick Crawford in “The Black Cat”) or playing in solo or supporting roles (Herbert brilliant in Wheeler & Woolsey’s “Diplomaniacs” and Olsen & Johnson’s “Hellzapoppin;” Dickerson just as brilliant in Our Gang/Tthe Little Rascals’ “Spooky Hooky” and the Three Stooges’ “A Plumbing We Will Go” as well as several other Stooges shorts and Marx Brothers features).

Given the above, as well as the fact that, as reported by Ted Okuda and Ed Watz in their essential book, “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” this short was well-received by both movie exhibitors and audiences alike, I truly wanted to love “Tall, Dark and Gruesome.” But when compared to “One Shivery Night” and everything else I’ve mentioned, it just pales in comparison. It’s not terrible – it’s a typical two-reel comedy of its day – but it lacks the spark and wit we’ve come to expect from this twosome. Still, there are some late inning antics that help save the film from being a complete “miss.”

Alas, many of the best laughs in “Tall, Dark & Gruesome” come in the first reel, the setup before the scary stuff kicks in. The short starts with Hugh as a mystery writer quoting his own dialogue “You gangsters don’t scare me with those machine guns! You wouldn’t dare use them!,” he intones... and promptly leaps scared out of his chair as a jackhammer on the street below punctuates his prose! Ever observant, Hugh’s assistant Dudley offers that “Some of these days, boss you’re gonna’ scare yourself to death, writing all them mystery plays.” It is an effectively compact introduction to the two main characters, establishing both their roles and their relationship to each other.

Hugh gets hit with something (rotten fruit, perhaps – the resolution is none too clear) when he yells out the window to the construction workers, leading into a scene where he gets stuck halfway in and halfway out the window. This is where the hit-and-miss nature of this short comes into full view, as the “comedy” here is labored, strained and unfunny. It’s hard to pinpoint why – both masters like Laurel & Hardy and Abbott & Costello as well as lower-tier film clowns from yesteryear have mined laughs out of such scenarios, but here it just plays flat. It’s possible that the sight of Herbert, clearly a middle-aged man dangling from a window just doesn’t inspire the same funny/fear response in audiences as when they watch whimsical man-boys like Stan Laurel, Lou Costello and Curly Howard find themselves in similar situations.

We go from an unfunny bit to a funny bit, as Dudley actually vacuums up the pages of Hugh’s play script. The laughter is brief, however: as Hugh tries to retrieve the pages from the machine, the vacuum backfires spraying him with black soot and dust. This leads to a string of tasteless racial jokes as Hugh now appears to be in “blackface.” First Hugh talks into the mirror thinking he’s talking to Dudley, then Dudley tries to shoo Hugh away thinking Hugh is some sort of solicitor.

Dudley suggests that Hugh put on earmuffs to muffle the noise of the riveters. Then Hugh’s producer calls to prod him about the delayed play script and another labored gag occurs as Hugh takes the call with the earmuffs on continuously exclaiming he can’t hear a thing. In the hands of Stan Laurel, such a gag would come off as whimsical and cute but with Herbert’s advanced age and forced delivery, the sequence falls flat.

It does, however, lead to the plot device that enables the second reel to become a horror-comedy. When Hugh laments to his producer that it’s too noisy for him to finish the play, the producer suggests Hugh commence to a quiet country cabin of a friend named “Captain Dalton” who is away. Of course it’s shades of “Seven Keys to Baldpate” and all that’s really needed to get Hugh and Dudley out of their cityscape and into a climate of fear.

Shortly after Hugh and Dudley’s arrival, a big case is delivered to the cabin for the vacationing Captain Dalton. When Dudley informs Hugh about the case, Herbert muses that “Twelve Bodies Make a Case” would be a great title for a mystery play, easily the most cleverly written line of dialogue in this short.

Dudley raps on the case (including the obligatory “shave and a haircut – two bits”) and whatever is inside of course raps back. In a fourth wall busting moment, Dudley looks straight at the audience and asks, “did you hear what I heard!”

The audience soon gets a glimpse of the case’s occupant: a gorilla! Dudley has opened the latch but is distracted by Hugh calling out to him and doesn’t notice that the beast keeps reaching to grab him as he sweeps! Hugh requests a shave from Dudley while in the other room the gorilla breaks through the bars and out of the case. The surly simian walks in on Dudley shaving Hugh, unbeknownst to both… until Dudley spots the gorilla and passes out!

The gorilla becomes fascinated with the snoring Hugh, lulled into a deep snooze from his shave. He starts to use the blade on Hugh’s whiskers. Hugh starts making mildly funny comments about the rough shave but as he opens his eyes to see the gorilla there, what should be hysterical ends up hysterically unfunny as Herbert mugs in a rather inert fashion spouting out such unfunny lines as “where’s my mother” (as opposed to the clichéd but much funnier “I want my mommy.”

Hugh beats feet and then Dudley comes back into the room to continue giving Hugh a shave – not realizing the gorilla has taken Dudley’s place in the chair and has shaving cream smeared on his face. He laments that he had the craziest dream about a gorilla… and then realizes the gorilla is there in the chair. Unfortunately, Dudley catches Hugh’s broad bug from a moment before as his scare reaction is just as unconvincing and forced as Hugh’s, until saved a bit by some funny arm-waving and sped-up action.



The short has one more plot complication up its sleeve (and desperately needs it because it would be completely D.O.A. if it just had to rely on Hugh and Dudley’s encounters with the gorilla): a trio of lost partygoers arrive to ask directions. The party they were heading to? A masquerade party of course, with one man a devil, another a skeleton and a woman dressed as a ghost. The woman is the ubiquitous-to-Columbia shorts heroine, Christine McIntyre, statuesque blonde beauty who tussled a time or ten with many funnymen, most notably The Three Stooges (you can read Dave Whitney's affectionate tribute to this underrated comedienne when you click here). When the already skittish Dudley answers the door, he races screaming from the costumed trio.

The partiers find their way in and start chumming up to the gorilla, who they think is someone else going to the masquerade party. In fact, the devil is quite impressed: “You’re part of the masquerade, too! Say, that’s some costume – you oughtta’ win first prize!,” the faux Faust exclaims. It doesn’t take long for the partiers to realize they’re dealing with a real gorilla (or at least a very menacing brute in a gorilla suit) and scatter in various directions to elude him.

Hugh takes refuge in a bedroom where the skeleton-wearing man has plopped down into a chair and draped a cloth over himself. Hugh decides to have a cigarette to calm his nerves, but when the skeleton hand not only offers it to him but lights it Hugh goes running – first to a closet door where the ghost woman is hiding, then back to the bedroom door where the devil man is.

The bedroom bits are funny and the costumes remind one of the Faust players Buster Keaton tangled with in “The Haunted House” but when compared to the great “One Shivery Night” the screams and reactions from Hugh and Dudley are so forced this time that they become overreactions. Yet, old pros that they are the duo still have their moments. Dudley in particular gets to shine in the next sequence. He’s hiding under the bed, and when Hugh dives under it to join him Dudley retreats in sped-up motion… right into the room containing the case the gorilla was shipped in, now inhabited by the devil man! After much rocking of the case and screaming from Dudley, he makes another hasty retreat, right into a closet where the skeleton man is. The skeleton man grabs Dudley’s shoulder, which sends him careening toward the nearest exit. A very funny bit ensues with Dudley trying to open the door but having the door knob stretch out on and on forever like one of comic book hero Plastic Man’s dangling limbs.

Many horror-comedies, including some of the truly great ones defy all (or at least most) logic, but there is the nagging question here of why the masqueraders, obviously scared by the gorilla would not only stick around inside the house but persist to take delight in scaring the heebie-jeebies out of Hugh and Dudley. It is something of a disconnect. And come to think of it, just why has a gorilla been delivered to the cabin of the vacationing Captain Dalton?!

Just as Dudley’s bits improve the film in spots, so too do Hugh’s, as he has a great bit where he decides to fight back and take on the gorilla. He’s in a room with various ancient swords on the wall. As he swings a blade around in preparation, Dudley enters and just as quickly exits, thinking his boss has gone mad and is about to slice him up. Dudley decides the swords will just not do; lucky for him there’s a cannon in the room! Hugh gleefully taunts the gorilla to come in (“C’mon in gorilla – I dare ya’!” and “Whatssamatter – you afraid?!”) and positions the cannon directly opposite the a door, not realizing the gorilla will enter through an alternate entrance! A very funny turning of the tables finds Hugh cowering behind a couch as the gorilla aims the cannon right at him! This is a big dumb hairy beast though (the gorilla, not Hugh!) and soon the animal’s curiosity gets the best of him as he stares down the barrel of the cannon. Cut to Hugh’s reaction as the cannon goes off; the next hysterical shot showing the gorilla blown sky high atop the chandelier!

These bits lead to a rather socko ending. Hugh has run out of the room but Dudley’s luck isn’t as good: he comes into the room and the gorilla (complete with chandelier) lands right on top of him! Cut to Hugh driving away at top speed, delivering the funniest line in the film, “C’mon car you can do better than a hundred!” This laugh is topped by the sight of Dudley outracing the car on foot! “This guy must be going 200 miles,” muses Hugh. That would be a fine place to end, but the script throws in one last scare take, as the skeleton man emerges from the back seat to tap Hugh on the shoulder. Hugh passes out, leaving the skeleton to grab the steering wheel as the end credits roll.

The final bits help bring the short to just about an average rating. They’re so good in fact that they serve to point up the weak bits. It’s a shame the short isn’t better than it is, but if you’re a big fan of horror-comedies, Hugh and/or Dudley and of course, gorillas then “Tall, Dark & Gruesome” may be just the short for you!

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: A couple roles in this short are filled by some extremely busy character actors of yesteryear. Charles C. Wilson plays the producer of Hugh’s play, one of a long string of authoritative characters that include many stern bosses and gruff lawmen. Along the way, he had the good fortune to appear in many classic and notable films, including “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town,” “Meet John Doe,” “This Gun for Hire,” “Scarlet Street” and more. On the comedy front, he was in Joe E. Brown’s “Elmer the Great,” Danny Kaye’s “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” the series entry “Blondie in College,” Laurel & Hardy’s “The Big Noise,” the Hope-Crosby “Road to Utopia,” and the classic Wheeler & Woolsey horror-comedy, “The Nitwits.” He was also in the 1943 “Batman” serial and even appeared in a film called “Tall, Dark and Handsome.” He previously appeared with Hugh Herbert in the Bette Davis starrer, “Fog Over Frisco.”

Deliveryman Charles Heine Conklin was a real veteran by the time this short was made. He had appeared in dozens of silent comedy shorts for famed Keystone Films producer Mack Sennett, was in Chaplin’s legendary “The Gold Rush” and “Modern Times” and continued to perform into the talkie era in a variety of notable genre films including many comedies… and a few co-starring Herbert. Among them, “Million Dollar Legs” with W.C. Fields, Leon Errol and Hugh Herbert; Wheeler & Woolsey’s “Diplomaniacs,” also with Herbert; Harold Lloyd’s “Professor Beware,” and a variety of Columbia shorts starring The Three Stooges, Andy Clyde He also appeared in such mystery entries as the Charlie Chan, Lone Wolf and Boston Blackie series. His career came full circle when he played a Keystone Kop in Olsen & Johnson’s “Crazy House” and a studio guard in “Abbott & Costello Meet the Keystone Kops.”

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

HUGH: “Tell them to stop that noise – they’re driving me crazy!”

DUDLEY: “I did boss, but the places they told me you could go, my pastor wouldn’t let me repeat!”

DUDLEY: It’s so quiet here you can hear the flies walking on the ceiling!
(then after some knocks on the door): What was that?

HUGH: A couple of flies I guess…

HUGH: A couple weeks up here will help cure your nerves.

DUDLEY: Ain’t nothin’ wrong with my nerves, boss – why I could walk through a cemetery at midnight without… what am I saying?!

HUGH: If this is gonna’ be “gorilla” warfare, I’m gonna’ be prepared for it!

BEST VISUAL GAGS: As the entire short is very hit-and-miss, the visual highlights are few and far-between. There is a lot of running and screaming that should be funny but mostly isn’t. We’re left with a couple bits from the first reel, namely Dudley vacuuming up Hugh’s script pages and a stiff drink of furniture polish that sends Hugh’s hat flying straight up. The second reel delivers the bang-up gag of Dudley tussling with the door handle and he gorilla on the chandelier; as previously mentioned, pretty much all the business leading up to and including the finale are a hoot.

FURTHER READING: Ted Okuda and Edward Watz wrote an indispensible book called “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” and Leonard Maltin wrote one called “The Great Movie Shorts” (also known as “Selected Short Subjects”). You can order them here:

Selected Short Subjects: From Spanky to the Three Stooges (Da Capo Paperback)












I also encourage you to visit The Columbia Shorts Department – Greg Hilbrich’s excellent site dedicated to the fun and frolics of this studio that gave the world The Three Stooges and so much more.

WATCH THE FILM: Enjoy this clip featuring of most of the spooky bits in this short:

ONE QUIET NIGHT (1931)

PLOT: Mr. Bates (Walter Catlett) has a case of the hiccups that would make a jackhammer feel inadequate. His condition is so bad that doctors fear it could be fatal! To make matters worse, he isn’t quite fond of Jimmy (Richard Malaby), the man who wants to marry his daughter Helen (Dorothy Granger) – the very mention of the prospect gets him hiccupping all over again! The latest remedy: doctors prescribe that Walter be taken to a house in the country for “absolute quiet.” The house is of course a spooky old place described by the doctor as being as quiet as “a tomb.” But did someone remember to tell the noisy ghosts that?!

REVIEW: This one-reeler for Educational Pictures features Walter Catlett, who is best remembered as a comedic character actor who added spice and accent to several classic musical and comedy features of the 1930s, ‘40s and ‘50s.

The set-up is compact and to the point, with Walter’s daughter Helen and her boyfriend Jimmy in the waiting room at the doctor’s office, awaiting the prognosis for Walter’s case of “near fatal” hiccups. In the brief opening, we learn of Walter’s condition, the fact that it was brought on and is exacerbated by Jimmy’s frequent attempts to ask Walter for his daughter’s hand in marriage, and the doctor’s prescription of rest at a “quiet” country home.

When the doctor, Walter, Helen and the driver, Chester arrive the house is completely dark. When the light switch is flipped a spooky white owl squawks and flies off (perhaps a predecessor of Harry Potter’s Hedwig?). Chester lets slip that he’s afraid to go upstairs which leads the doctor to confess that the house is allegedly haunted. The doctor leaves but not before instructing Walter to remember to take his medicine and avoid getting angry. And not before cackling menacingly on his way out!

As Walter sleeps his snores alternate with hiccups. Chester sleeps in the same room; right next to a window and when the wind causes the window shade to snap up both men are startled. As Chester rises, he casts an ominous shadow in Catlett’s direction.

After a brief exchange between the two, the sheet on Walter’s bed flies straight up into the air! He runs into the hallway where he sees a candle headed his way! After a momentary scare he realizes it’s his daughter, awoken by the commotion. She asks if her dad if he heard a scream and just then maniacal laughter is heard! As Walter turns he notices the eyes of painted portrait on the wall are darting about. His daughter runs off in fear and when Walter turns again he notices someone holding a much larger candle – a scary man with a top hat who looks a bit like Mr. Hyde!

This leads to a series of blackout gags where we go back and forth between Walter, Chester and Helen being scared. Chester is still dealing with the disembodied sheet in the other bedroom and prays to his “mammy” for help! The Mr. Hyde creature continues to menace Walter and Helen to the point where Helen faints. A scary arm with long, sharp fingernails reaches through the wall and strokes Chester’s face. Walter steps on a bearskin rug and is verbally chided by the bear for doing so! This is followed by Chester accidentally stepping on a lion-skin rug who threatens to bite his leg off if he doesn’t step off! A stuffed toucan then queries, “can’t a guy get some sleep around here!”

These gags culminate in the first big twist: as a ghostly figure with a hideous face heads down the stairs toward Walter and Helen, it trips down the steps and the headpiece falls off, revealing Jimmy underneath! Of course he tells Walter that he only did it to cure his hiccups since “the only cure is a bad scare!” Realizing his hiccups are gone, Walter changes his tune and thanks Jimmy, then asks him how he ever got the animals to talk.

“Animals, what animals,” asks Jimmy. “He means us!” exclaims the bear as the trio try to run out the door. Unfortunately it’s locked, but the helpful lion offers, “The key is on the table!”

This is followed by a second twist, as the trio is accosted by the Mr. Hyde monster and a couple of ghosts on their way out. It’s the doctor and his helpers. “That last scare ought to make the cure permanent – I don’t think he’ll suffer from hiccoughs from now on!”

Maybe not. Now that Jimmy is in Walter’s good graces, he once again asks Walter if he can marry his daughter. This starts the hiccough fit all over again – but this time it spreads to Jimmy and Helen, too!

In a fast-paced ten minutes (this was a one-reeler), this short manages to pull out nearly all the trappings of a typical “old dark house” scare comedy: the old house itself with its ornate furnishings and foreboding dark shadows, the scared servant (in this case, the driver), sounds and voices out of nowhere, things (like window shades and sheets) that move on their own, the portrait with moving eyes, scary monster and ghost figures, etc. It’s all stock material – nothing really new or original here, including the “scares as a cure for hiccups” premise that appears in countless live-action and animated comedies – but it’s elevated a notch by the performers who all sell the laughs and scares with great gusto and enthusiasm.

Of course the center of the action is the short’s star Walter Catlett, who is perfect here as his typical excitable, put-upon character. An ex-vaudevillian, Catlett had a lengthy career in both shorts and features for a variety of studios. Among the studios for which Catlett made comedy shorts were Sennett, Educational and Columbia (for which he would make a two-reel horror-comedy called “You’re Next” featuring Dudley Dickerson). In features, Catlett had the good fortune to appear in such classics as “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” “Bringing Up Baby,” “Mr. Deeds Goes to Town” and “A Tale of Two Cities.” On the classic comedy front, he appeared alongside such luminaries as Hugh Herbert, Abbott & Costello and Danny Kaye, and even had a part in Olsen & Johnson’s classic horror-comedy, “Ghost Catchers.” However, with all his many credits Catlett is undoubtedly most famously known by children around the world as the voice of “Honest” John Worthington Foulfellow, the conman fox from Disney’s classic animated feature, “Pinocchio.” Not only was Catlett offered an opportunity to play a brash and flamboyant comic villain in the role, but he also got to sing an enduring tune, “Hi Diddle-Dee-Dee.”



As for the rest of the cast, the beautiful Dorothy Granger (my all-time favorite classic comedy actress) displays her usual comic prowess in going toe-to-toe with comedic males (in a career spanning several decades she played opposite giants like Laurel & Hardy, W.C. Fields and The Three Stooges and enjoyed a recurring role as Leon Errol’s wife in his great shorts). The actor playing the doctor imbues the character with a very cavalier and cocky attitude that is both funny and alarming (would anyone really want a doctor who would go to such lengths to scare the wits out of them?). Chester, the driver is essayed by an African-American performer I don’t recognize. His role offers the usual conundrum: he’s relegated to a “scared servant” part but like fellow African-American comedic actors Mantan Moreland and Dudley Dickerson he is quite funny going through those motions.

On top of all the great acting, there is the surprising element of talking rugs and taxidermist dummies. The bearskin and lion skin rugs and stuffed toucan provide some of the biggest laugh-out-loud moments in the short. As classic horror-comedies go, “One Quiet Night” is worth watching for all of its fun elements, and being a one-reeler that plays at a swift clip it doesn’t give a viewer time to reflect upon how shopworn some of the gags and overall premise may be.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: This short only has three credited players – Catlett, Granger and someone named Richard Malaby. Catlett and Granger of course are known performers but I have no idea who Richard Malaby played – he only has one other acting credit to his name and I couldn’t find a photo of him. Since there are three other major parts in the film (the boyfriend, the doctor and the driver) it’s anyone’s guess who Malaby played. I’m guessing he’s the boyfriend but he could be the doctor. Or perhaps he’s the driver. Who knows?

Therefore, for this particular entry we’ll do “Spotted in the Credits” instead. Almost (more on that in a moment). This film was directed by Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. For the general public who has heard of Arbuckle, most know him from the infamous scandal that brought his star down. What they may not know is that after three trials he was acquitted of the charge of accidentally causing Virginia Rappe’s death. The star, who mentored Chaplin and worked with Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton was once just as famous and beloved as those three giants of the silent screen. Fatty was given some opportunities after his acquittal to appear in sound shorts (including a couple co-starring Shemp Howard) as well as to direct shorts starring the likes of Al St. John, Lloyd Hamilton and Lupino Lane, among others. Just two years after directing “One Quiet Night” and also starring in a half dozen shorts for Vitaphone, Warner Brothers offered him a shot at a feature. It was never to be, as Fatty suffered a fatal heart attack the very same day the offer was made.

So, I mentioned above that this is an ALMOST “Spotted in the Credits.” Why? Because in original release prints of “One Quiet Night” the short’s direction is credited to William Goodrich. Despite Arbuckle’s acquittal, the scandal was just too fresh in the public’s mind for him to draw attention to himself, hence the alias (which often was shortened to just "Will B. Good" - as suggested by Buster Keaton). In later years when Arbuckle's post-scandal directorial efforts were re-released theatrically and to TV stations by other distributors, Arbuckle’s real name was restored to the credits in place of the pseudonym.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

For my money, the best dialogue comes from the bearskin rug, lion skin rug and stuffed toucan, but here are some of the memorable human exchanges as well:

JIMMY: Mr. Bates, can I marry your daughter?

CATLETT: No! HICCUP! A thousand HICCUP times no! Confound you HICCUP you’re the HICCUP fellow who HICCUP started this HICCUP hiccup mess!

CATLETT: It’s like a HICCUP tomb!

DOCTOR: Exactly what you need – absolute quiet!

DOCTOR: Driver, take Mr. Bates’ bags to his room.

CHESTER (THE DRIVER): Me go upstairs in this house? No sir, pos-i-tive-ly!

CATLETT: What did he mean?

DOCTOR: That’s a lot of nonsense, Mr. Bates. Some people think this house is haunted.

CATLETT: Haunted?!

DOCTOR: They think there’s ghosts.

CATLETT: Ghosts?!

DOCTOR: Of course to us, that’s silly!

CHESTER: Do you mind if I leave all the doors open?

CATLETT: Why?

CHESTER: In case I wants to leave quick!

CATLETT: What are you puttering around about? Why don’t you go to sleep?

CHESTER: I just can’t sleep tonight. I reckon I got the in-so-amonia!

CATLETT: “In-so-amonia!” Chester, you certainly do murder the English language!

CHESTER: I hope that’s all that’s murdered down here tonight!!!

BEST VISUAL GAGS:

All the aforementioned scare gags and the actors’ reactions to same are very well done. Like the dialogue, the best visual also belongs to sight of the bearskin rug, stuffed toucan and lion skin rug as their mouths all move in a visually funny manner.

FURTHER READING:

Rob King, an Assistant Professor of Cinema Studies at the University of Toronto wrote an essay about the comedy shorts of Educational Pictures for the magazine “Film History: an International Journal.” You can read about it and order a copy when you click here and here.

PARDON MY TERROR (1946)

NOTE: Due to my inability to obtain images from “Pardon My Terror,” the images used in this review come from various Schilling & Lane shorts, but not from the film that is being reviewed.

RATING: *** out of ****

PLOT: Gus (Schilling) and Dick (Lane) run the “Wide Awake Detective Agency.” A beautiful woman (Christine McIntyre) hires the pair to find her missing millionaire grandfather (Vernon Dent). At the family home, the daffy detectives run into one unnerving situation after another as they deal with a spooky butler, a femme fatale who serves explosive cocktails, figures lurking in the shadows and more. Can Gus and Dick locate the millionaire before being scared out of their wits?

REVIEW: When it comes to classic comedy duos, there are levels of recognition. Just about everyone knows Laurel & Hardy, Abbott & Costello and Martin & Lewis. When you move on from the general public to bona fide movie buffs, you’ll find some folks who also know Wheeler & Woolsey, Olsen & Johnson and maybe Clark & McCullough. However, to find people who know the teams of Schilling & Lane and Vernon & Quillan, you usually have to find film scholars, or at least those who take their movie-loving hobby beyond the obsession a mere “movie buff” would.

Both Schilling & Lane and Vernon & Quillan were teams created by Columbia Studios for their shorts department. Columbia of course was the home of the mega-popular Three Stooges, but the shorts unit produced many other series featuring all sorts of comic talents. For some reason (speculation is that the studio wanted to duplicate the Stooges’ success, but given how the majority of Columbia’s prefab teams were duos and not trios, I think perhaps they were also hoping they’d capture lightning in a bottle like competitor Hal Roach Studios did when Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy evolved from solo performers into a team), the unit kept trying to come up with their own daffy duos. This led to all sorts of odd combinations, often pairing such legendary talents as Buster Keaton, Harry Langdon and Shemp Howard with partners who either weren’t as talented or just didn’t mesh well together. The one instance at Columbia where a prominent solo star was teamed with another talent and it worked was when Hugh Herbert and Dudley Dickerson co-starred in some prime horror-comedy shorts. They weren’t billed as a team in the credits, but the shorts played out as if they were a team.

When Columbia paired Schilling and Lane, both had been around and found successful, steady work but neither was a headliner. Gus Schilling’s background was burlesque and the stage, and prior to his shorts with Lane he was a character actor in entries in the Mexican Spitfire and Dr. Kildare film series, appeared in Olsen & Johnson’s “Hellzapoppin’” with Hugh Herbert, and again with Herbert, Edgar Kennedy and Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer in “There’s One Born Every Minute.” His roles weren’t limited to B-movie comedies, however – Schilling also appeared in the high profile Orson Welles films “Citizen Kane” and “Magnificent Ambersons” (Schilling would continue to co-star in films featuring Welles throughout his career). Richard Lane started in the circus and moved to vaudeville. His pre-Schilling & Lane roles also included “Hellzapoppin’” and its follow-up “Crazy House,” series entries in the Mr. Moto, Charlie Chan and Boston Blackie mysteries (where he had the recurring role of Inspector Farraday), a feature each with Jack Benny (“The Horn Blows at Midnight”) and Danny Kaye (“Wonder Man”), three features with Abbott & Costello (“Ride ‘em Cowboy,” “It Ain’t Hay” and “Here Come the Co-Eds”) and a pair with Laurel & Hardy (“A-Haunting We Will Go” and “The Bullfighters”).

The Schilling & Lane team was one of what I like to refer to as the “on-call” or “on-demand” Columbia acts. This meant that the studio called upon the duo whenever they needed to fill a spot in the production schedule. In other words, their series was not “regularly scheduled” – the shorts just happened as they happened – thus the fact that their eleven shorts were spread out over four years. The best of the Columbia “on-call” stars realized that without the benefit of a steady stream of product, audiences wouldn’t have time to get to know their personalities in a progressive fashion. Both Vernon & Quillan and Schilling & Lane were wise enough to maintain broad archetypes that could adapt to any of the situations the scripts required. Lane maintained a sharp, take-charge con-man veneer, while Schilling had the jittery, nervous scaredy cat down pat.

After a year and three shorts, Schilling and Lane were faced with the most “on-demand” assignment of their careers: they were called into action unexpectedly to fill in for the Three Stooges in a script that had been written for the trio but couldn’t go into production because Curly Howard had a stroke. The show had to go on – Columbia didn’t want to waste a script or a slot on the production schedule so they merely shot the short with Schilling and Lane, Schilling was assigned Curly’s dialogue and actions as well as some of Larry's part while Lane was also pressed into double-duty performing both Moe’s and Larry’s parts!

One drawback to the adherence of the original script is that it compromises Richard Lane’s character slightly. In the other shorts, Lane could be pushy toward and occasionally agitated with Gus, but in this short, the script requires Lane to knock Gus around like Moe would Curly and Larry. This works fine in the Stooges world because of the relationship of those characters and the mechanics of the world they inhabit, but it is a bit more jarring in the frantic yet more carefree world usually seen in the Schilling and Lane shorts. It is a tribute to the professionalism of Dick and Gus that their basic personalities could survive this adjustment and they are still likeable despite the lumps Gus takes.

The short opens on an eerie note. We see the millionaire at his desk as a pair of hands emerge from the shadows to strangle him! The millionaire’s grand-daughter Alice enters the room and screams at the sight of her grandfather slumped over his desk. Her screams bring help, but by that time her grandfather has mysteriously disappeared.

This leads into a classic gag that would be reprised by the Stooges when they redid the short as “Who Done It.” We cut to the exterior of the “Wide-Awake Detective Agency.” Inside are Gus and Dick – each wears a pair of fake eyeballs (they almost look like ping-pong balls inserted into their eye sockets) that make them look like they’re awake even though they are snoring away! They are awoken by a “dooting” noise emitted from a monitor on their desk, leading to a great verbal gag (see “BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES” below).

The laughs continue in this office setting. Hearing what they think is a customer approaching, Gus and Dick spring into action as if they are busy, with Dick picking up a phone to pretend he’s on the line with another client. “Our fee is five thousand dollars,” he proclaims. Hopes of a new customer are dashed when the boys realize it is simply their landlord Mr. Dugan looking for the rent. Dick pulls out a gun and tells Dugan, “See this gun – we’re gonna’ let you have it! Dugan almost faints but then they tell him they’re letting him keep their guns as collateral. The landlord is dismissive of the guns: “Why these guns won’t even go off!” He throws them to the ground and they do go off, sending bullets flying and ricocheting everywhere! A janitor standing just outside the front door pops his head in, frightened by the racket while the bucket of water he holds suddenly springs multiple leaks – there are holes all over it and the water goes everywhere.

The millionaire’s granddaughter then arrives to bring us back to the plot. She explains her dilemma as she hires Gus and Dick (offering them a substantial reward) and clues them in to the ominous nature of the assignment by asking if they have insurance. When jittery Gus shows doubts about the potentially frightening assignment, Alice exclaims “You’re not afraid, are you?” They have good reason to be afraid as a trio of schemers is soon also revealed to be in the house (the connection these folks have to the millionaire and his granddaughter or the reason why they’re in the same house is never explained). The femme fatale of the group shakes a pill container and exclaims “Two little pills… two little drinks… two ex-detectives!” One of the others tries to show her up – with an electric chair he’s rigged!



Gus and Dick show up at the estate and are immediately put ill-at-ease by one of the schemers. “I suppose you’ll want to search for clues,” he says. “Would you rather start where the ghostly white figures were seen or where we found the pool of blood?” When Alice tells Gus and Dick to be careful, the man adds “It’s very hard to get blood stains out of the rugs!”

Gus and Dick come up with a plan: they’ll split up to search for clues, but if one of them is in danger he is to yell “it’s getting warm in here!” The pair then go off their own ways. Gus senses eyes peering at him from behind a painting. He can’t seem to muster up the volume to say “it’s warm in here” – he’s so paralyzed by fear he can only mutter it so he just runs out of the room. This leads to a classic gag where both Gus and Dick knock on hallway walls (answering each other’s knocks) on opposite corners until they meet at the center and then run from each other in fear.

The next bit involves Gus’ encounter with the femme fatale. He runs into a room to find the seductive beauty waiting for him. “I dreamed of a dark handsome man to come and save me,” she purrs. “Well what’s keepin’ him?” Gus answers. As he tries to squirm away, the woman aggressively collars Gus by the neck so hard that it cracks. “What are you, a lady wrestler?!” asks Gus.” Once again Gus is blurting out how “warm” it’s getting – especially with the deadly diva running her fingers through his hair. When she offers him a drink, Gus is skeptical. Falling off the couch, he learns just how right his instincts are as his drink spills onto the floor and bursts into flames!

Gus beats feet, running through the hall hysterically yelling, “Dick! Dick! It’s awful warm in here! A dame just tried to poison me – we gotta’ get outta’ here!” Dick says nothing doing, not with all the reward money at stake.

They resume their search for clues together, with Gus looking through books in a bookcase. As he rearranges each book, a fist flies through from the other side and socks Gus in the nose. “What’s all the racket, lamebrain?” asks Dick in what may be the most obvious “Moe-line” in the script. Gus makes Dick look through the books to prove that he’ll get hit, too… but Dick drops a book – and when he bends down to pick it up, the fist flies out and socks Gus again!

Dick is tired of Gus’ claims of getting hit and starts whapping Gus in different parts of his face saying, “how did it hit you – like this?” This is a prime example of something that would have worked well with Moe and the Stooges, but works less well here. Ultimately, Dick does get whacked by the fist from the bookcase and finally believes.

The butler shows Gus and Dick to their rooms with the classic “Walk this way, please” routine seen in countless old comedy films and later reprised by Mel Brooks in “Young Frankenstein.” The routine is simple: the person saying “walk this way” has a funny way of walking – either their arms are in a weird position or they step in an awkward fashion or some variation thereof. The characters following the person usually give one another a look as if to say, “it’s screwy, but why not?” and proceed to follow that person, mimicking their walk along the way.

Meanwhile, a pair of hands reaches out and grabs Alice, pulling her into the shadows.

We cut back to Dick and Gus in their sleeping quarters. The spooky butler continues to unnerve the pair with inappropriate comments: “I trust you will be comfortable… but I doubt it! After all, this was the master’s room and if the master was murdered I am sure his spirit is somewhere about!” This is performed with all the grand flourish and melodrama of say Vincent Price – delivered for maximum spooky effect. Gus and especially Dick register fear in wonderfully funny ways during this speech – making full use of their mastery of facial expressions and body language. The butler delivers “pleasant dreams” as a punch line.

When Gus & Dick realize they are locked in the bedroom, they start checking for other ways out. Gus opens a closet door and inside is the body of McIntyre’s grandfather. When he calls Dick over the body is gone, but when he opens it a third time the corpse reappears – another time-honored horror-comedy gag.

This leads to a barrage of chaos. Gus and Dick run to the window hoping it can provide a way out. When they pull the shade they see the menacing butler there. They then run through the door and get tangled up in chairs and paintings. Gus then barricades himself in a room and when Dick tries to get into the room Gus clonks him over the head with a flower pot.

The pair then stumble across McIntyre tied to a chair and before long her grandfather comes into the room, alive and well and explaining that he was just “playing dead” to expose the hired help who they suspect are planning to break into the family safe.

Gus and Dick dispatch to the home’s library where they do indeed find the villains trying to break into that safe. A chase ensues with the burliest of the bad guys (Dick Wessel) trying to choke Dick. He is only stopped after about 20 blows to the head with sledgehammer from Gus (as in the Stooges shorts, the sound effect is the sound of a bell and not realistic). The femme fatale then enters with a gun but Jarvis the butler subdues her (yes folks, he was a red herring)!

Gus and Dick get the reward money and as they walk down the hall proclaiming they are “sitting pretty,” they decide to take a load off, sitting in the electrical rigged chair for the short’s “shocking” finale!

The Schilling & Lane shorts are among the best hidden gems you’ll ever see. While “Pardon My Terror” was not conceived for the team and is their only horror-comedy, the duo shines. Despite some uncharacteristic touches more suitable to the Three Stooges, and an emphasis on black comedy over the more traditional visceral horror-comedy touches (the tone here is more like “Abbott & Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff” with its merry mix-up of corpses than the haunted house antics of Bud & Lou’s “Hold That Ghost”) the professionalism, creativity and enthusiasm of Gus and Dick puts this short over big-time. The team is more than deserving of a revival, and “Pardon My Terror” is certainly a fine place to start if you’re just discovering them.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: Naturally, “Pardon My Terror” is loaded with classic supporting actors from Columbia’s crew of stock players. I’ll concentrate on what amounts to cameos from two of the most prominent of Columbia's contractees.

First off is Emil Sitka playing Dugan the landlord. Sitka appeared in countless shorts at Columbia with The Three Stooges and many of the studio's other featured stars, playing every conceivable character from authority figures to clerks to waiters to friendly uncles and scientists and more. In feature films he appeared in several entries in the Blondie and Bowery Boys series as well as in dramas like “The Blackboard Jungle.” When the Stooges graduated to features in the late 1950s/early 1960s, Emil was on-board making major contributions, especially in “The Three Stooges in Orbit” which featured a major horror-comedy element. Perhaps the best testament to Sitka’s talent and versatility was the fact that after Larry Fine died, Moe considered making Sitka the third Stooge.

Also on hand is Dudley Dickerson as the janitor. A major talent, you can read more about Dudley in my review of Our Gang/The Little Rascals’ “Spooky Hooky” which you can read here.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

LANE (responding to the beeping monitor): That’s the secret code – take it down. What did it say?”

GUS: Doot-doot-doot-doot!”

GUS (upon entering the estate): “Where’s the corpus delicatessen?”

GUS: I gotta’ go back to the office – I forgot something.

DICK: What’d you forget?

GUS: I forgot to stay there!

DICK: You go ahead and I’ll follow you.

GUS: Oh no!

DICK: Okay we’ll do it your way then – you’ll go ahead and I’ll follow you!

BEST GAGS: Most of the gags at the detective agency office are standouts including the fake eyeballs and the guns as collateral. At the estate, Gus’s encounter with the femme fatale as well as Dick and Gus knocking on opposite ends of the wall and the mysterious fist punching through the bookshelf are highlights.

FURTHER READING: Ted Okuda and Edward Watz wrote an indispensible book called “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” that you can order here:



On the internet, there are several excellent articles on Schilling & Lane. One of the best comes from “In the Balcony.” You can read the article here, and you should be visiting that site anyway – it is an oasis for classic movie fans. You’ll also want to check out Pete Kelly’s Blog here and Thrilling Days of Yesteryear here. The Three Stooges fan site features a quote from director Ed Bernds about the script - read it here. Last but not least, you may want to visit The Columbia Shorts Department – Greg Hilbrich’s excellent site dedicated to the fun and frolics of this studio that gave the world The Three Stooges and so much more.

WATCH THE FILM: Enjoy this clip from the short!

'FRAIDY CAT (1951)

RATING: *** & 1/4 out of ****

PLOT: Joe Besser and Jim Hawthorne are detectives who have slacked on the job and are given one more chance to capture the simian robber pillaging antique shops by night. With nothing but each other and a penchant for sight gags and wordplay, can the daffy detectives cage this ape, or will their hair-trigger fears get the best of them?

AUTHOR’S NOTE #1: Typically, I’ll break down my reviews into a plot synopsis, followed by an overview of the film often including background information on the talents involved, and finishing up by highlighting some of the best verbal and visual gags in the film. This review simply can’t be structured that way because this short is practically ALL verbal and visual gags. There’s very little plot to speak of – it’s all shtick and comic mayhem. Therefore, this review will not include the usual separate sections for Verbal and Visual Gags. This review will also be less of a review than a celebration of the various bits, because the comic timing and energy in this film is splendidly entertaining indeed!

AUTHOR’S NOTE #2: This is a remake of the Three Stooges’ short, Dizzy Detectives, and reuses some gorilla footage in that short. In turn, ‘Fraidy Cat was remade four years later as Hook a Crook (1955), with mostly stock footage from ‘Fraidy Cat and the gorilla bits from Dizzy Detectives, but very little new material, which is noted at the end of this review. Special thanks to Three Stooges historian, Brent Seguine who contributed additional information for this review. Brent has helped provide research on several Scared Silly reviews.

REVIEW: ‘Fraidy Cat is a solo Joe Besser short, but as in many Columbia shorts, it’s really a “comedy duo” short (see the Hugh Herbert-starring shorts in which he’s equally paired with Dudley Dickerson, despite not being equally billed). Columbia was almost always trying to come up with a new Laurel & Hardy or Abbott & Costello... and mostly not succeeding.

Joe Besser tread the boards on vaudeville, honing his comic timing and bag of tricks. He used it to great effect as a supporting player in many films (including Abbott & Costello’s famed jungle spoof, Africa Screams which also featured another “third Stooge,” Shemp Howard), and most famously as “Stinky” on the Abbott & Costello TV show, and as the “third Stooge” in the final group of Three Stooges shorts. Those include a trio of horror-comedy-esque sci-fi themed shorts: Space Ship Sappy, Outer Space Jitters and Flying Saucer Daffy. He also thrived for many years beyond the “classic comedy” period with guest-spots on many TV shows (including a regular role on Joey Bishop’s sitcom) and doing voices for several animated cartoon series right through the early 1980s, stopping on a few years before his death.

Jim Hawthorne was a veritable everyman – not just an actor but also a radio announcer and performer, a disc jockey often cited as a pioneer of free-form radio, a creator of children’s shows, and originator of the first late-night TV talk show. The latter fact is fitting as Hawthorne comes off very much like a Steve Allen-type, particularly in appearance (he also seems a bit of a Stan Freberg-type in performance). ‘Fraidy Cat is not only Hawthorne’s first short, but his first film appearance of any kind.

Besser and Hawthorne have great chemistry, and their size disparity also makes them an appealing duo, reminiscent of tall and short duos such as Abbott & Costello. In many ways, too their interactions mirror Bud and Lou, with Besser impulsive, gullible and prone-to-be scared as Hawthorne plays the straight man. He does get to insert several of his own comedic moments through humorous takes and line readings, but most often is operating as Besser’s foil, setting up Joe’s punchlines.

The action starts right in with Joe and Hawthorne getting chewed out by their boss at the detective agency (as in some Stooges shorts, the door reads “Wide Awake Detective Agency”) for not doing a good job guarding various antique stores they’ve been assigned to protect. Apparently, they stepped out for beer one too many times, which is when all the robberies occurred. Joe protests that they really left their posts for sarsaparilla!

For no other apparent reason than perhaps plot expediency purposes, they mention to their boss the various reports of a “huge ape” having committed the crimes (or as Joe says, “an o-rang-o-tangle”).

The boss rattles off the names of the various stores knocked over and many include colors in their names, prompting Hawthorne to crack, “White, blue, gold, black – it’s a very colorful job, eh boss – they covered the rainbow!”

A great sight gag soon follows – Joe puts a walnut on the boss’s desk so that when the boss pounds his fist on the desk, the nutshell is cracked.

This opening bit sets the tone the for the entire short, as clever dialogue is interspersed with groan-inducing puns at equal intervals. Example:

JOE: “You know what I think? It’s an inside job.”
HAWTHORNE: “Why is it inside?”
JOE: “Because it’s not outside!”

The short also includes a lot of “déjà vu” bits, as in “haven’t I seen this before?” But Joe and Hawthorne pull them all off seamlessly with expert comic timing.

This includes the old “hello” bit where they both answer two ringing phones at the same time, their backs turned to each other, and then end up answering each other’s greetings, and turning to shake hands and introduce themselves to each other.

The phone antics continue when Joe answers a call saying “yes… yes, oh yes.” Hawthorne asks, “what was it, Joe?” Joe answers, “a friend of mine just gave me a recipe for an upside-down cake”… and Joe proceeds to recite it!

When Hawthorne gets a call with a tip on the ape’s whereabouts, he and Joe are off to the chase… but not before some entanglements with the telephone line that end up knocking their boss out!

When Joe and Hawthorne arrive at the antique shop, they’re not sure what key to use. Joe pulls a huge key chain out of his jacket with dozens and dozens of keys on it – a nice sight gag. There’s also a can opener gadget prompting Joe to ask Hawthorne,” “You haven’t got any beer on ya’, have ya’?”

As they fumble through the keys, the ape opens the door from the inside.

When they realize the door has been opened, Joe tries to leave. “What’s the matter, are ya’ afraid?” bellows Hawthorne. Besser says, “Um… (pause)… YEAH!” It’s these touches of thoughtful comic timing throughout that really help sell the barest of material here, and leave audiences smiling.

Besser also gets to do some signature shtick. When Hawthorne insists, “will you snap out of it?!,” Joe gives Hawthorne a gentle nudge and exclaims, “Not so loud!” (this bit of business would come into play in many of Besser’s Three Stooges and Abbott & Costello outings, often changed to “not so hard!” when Joe was being roughhoused a bit).

Often unfairly maligned for his work as a Stooge in shorts where, in my opinion the blame lies more in the fact those shorts were more ill-conceived and poorly written or directed (I feel Joe is often the best thing in some of those short), here in this solo short Joe’s talents are shown to great advantage. Joe gets a terrific moment alone guarding a room in the antique shop while sitting in a rocking chair and smoking a cigar. As Joe rocks in the chair, telling himself “I’m not afraid – why should I be afraid? Babies are afraid. I’m not a baby… but I’m afraid!” What follows is a classic comedy gag of the leg of the rocking chair just narrowly missing a cat’s tail several times until...

“SCREEEEEEECHHHH!!!!!”

This sends Joe flying out of the rocking chair, practically swallowing his cigar. He retrieves Hawthorne and tells him a woman screamed and clawed his leg.

“A woman? That’s bad? Is she pretty? Where is she?...” inquires Hawthorne.

This begins a series of more “aged-up” dialogue that likely went over the heads of any kids in the theater audience.

When Hawthorne chastises Joe that there’s no woman, Joe protests, “I could swear...”

“No, no Joe – no profanity – swearing’s a bad habit,” chides Hawthorne.

It gets even more outrageous from there. When Hawthorne asks Joe where his revolver is, Joe responds that he gave it to a baby to play with!!! Hawthorne is shocked.

“You gave the baby a revolver?” asks Hawthorne in disbelief.

“What, I should give her a knife so she can cut herself?!” replies Joe.

Meanwhile, the ape is rummaging through the other rooms, and plants a dummy in the room that Hawthorne and Joe are “guarding.”
Naturally, the duo mistake the dummy for the dead woman Joe insists grabbed his leg.

Hawthorne soon realizes their error and exclaims, “that’s not a woman – that’s a dummy – like you!” Joe retorts, “Oh I don’t look nothing like her!”



Another hilarious solo scene for Joe has him tripping over a cat, whose screech sends Joe hiding under the covers of a futon. He kicks a light stand which just happens to have a scary fright mask hanging on it and it lands on his foot. Of course, as Joe peeks over the covers, his foot rises so that it looks like the scary face is rising up to get him! Of course, the punchline has Joe shooting at his own foot!

Ultimately, Joe and Hawthorne come face-to-face with the ape, who handily breaks one of their guns in half! Joe exclaims, “maybe he’s a real chiminy-zanzee!

“That’s no chimp, you chump,” counters Hawthorne. “That’s a gorilla!”

Joe and Hawthorne run from the gorilla, but Joe falls down and again does a hysterical bit: he crawls backwards while on is back, his arms flailing, in a move previously perfected by Curly Howard.



More notable wordplay follows:

HAWTHORNE (huffing and puffing): “Well we’ve sure been running.”
JOE (also huffing and puffing): “When I catch my breath we’re gonna’ run some more!”

In a short that already had its share of black humor, it saves one of the blackest pieces for last: Joe accidentally falls into a replica of a guillotine and the “blade” comes crashing down. Not realizing it’s a rubber prop, he implores Hawthorne – who has fainted at the sight – to not just be lazy and lay there but help Joe “nail” his head back on! Then Joe realizes, “Hey, if I’m dead how come I’m talkin’?”

Hawthorne is beside himself. “Poor Joe – I can’t look.” Just then a dummy head the gorilla has punched across the room lands at Hawthorne’s feet and he passes out all over again, thinking it’s Joe’s head!

Ultimately, a couple of mugs arrive to retrieve their “trained circus gorilla” and do a bit of pillaging themselves. A slapstick melee ensues, and somehow our heroes triumph.

A particularly satisfying parting shot – literally – evokes a similar gag Stan Laurel employed in the film, Blockheads. Joe is getting pummeled right and left by one of the crooks when he merely steps back from the punches and asks, “this is getting monotonous, isn’t it?” Joe makes a fist and draws the crook’s attention to it, and while the crook gazes at Joe’s right hand, Joe clocks him in the chin with his left!

Overall, this short is... well... short on typical darkly spooky or ghostly gags. It falls squarely into the realm of the “scary gorilla” sub-genre of horror-comedies – but it’s likely audiences seeing this in a theater were literally rolling in the aisles. The energy and chemistry in the pairing of Besser and Hawthorne brings a lot of good will, making even some of the many recycled gags and ripe puns amusing. This short proves that, with the right performers at the forefront, the slightest of material can be pulled off to entertaining effect.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: Let’s start with the gorillas. Two of the most famous gorilla suit men, Steve Calvert and Ray Corrigan are both in this short. Calvert is in the new footage, while Corrigan’s simian scenes are lifted from Dizzy Detectives. Footage of both, from both Dizzy Detctives and ‘Fraidy Cat, made its way into Hook a Crook.

Tom Kennedy plays the head of the detective agency, I. Katchum. A veteran of comedy shorts and features, he worked alongside Laurel & Hardy, the Marx Brothers, the Three Stooges, W.C. Fields, Abbott & Costello and many more.

Eddie Baker features in the Jimmie Adams horror-comedy, Goofy Ghosts, and also appeared alongside W.C. Fields, Laurel & Hardy, the Marx Brothers and more.

Our old pal Joe Palma is also here. He, of course, in addition to being a frequent supporting player in Three Stooges shorts also has the distinction of being the “Fake Shemp” – doubling for Shemp in from-behind and obscured shots AFTER Shemp had passed away, which enabled Columbia Pictures to make four “new” (read: mostly stock footage) Stooges shorts with Shemp! A mainstay at Columbia, Palma worked alongside many of the players there, including an appearance in one of Andy Clyde’s horror-comedies, One Spooky Night. He also appears in the Joe E. Brown feature starrer, Beware Spooks.

THE REMAKE: Hook a Crook features much of the same footage as ‘Fraidy Cat, but adds a couple new touches. One is the addition of a scene with horror-comedy stalwart Dudley Dickerson, and another where the gorilla knocks out Joe and Hawthorne, but is finally taken down by a socialite’s kiss.

It’s been reported that the new gorilla footage in Hook a Crook features Dan Blocker of Bonanza fame, but film historian Brent Seguine has put this into question for understandable reasons: “Yes, he's listed on a production call sheet for new footage. But the gorilla suit is clearly the Corrigan/Calvert Naba outfit, which would not fit Blocker. New scenes, even with the actor in a crouched position, show someone shorter than Blocker.”

THE TRAUMA OF IT ALL!

Hello, Scared Silly fans! Just a quick note to inform you that Unkle Lancifer of the blog Kinder Trauma was kind enough to interview me for his ongoing segment, "It's a Horror to Know You." Just click here to read it.

You may be saying to yourself, "So what - you've read one Paul Castiglia interview, you've read them all!" Ah, but this one is different. I'm known for waxing rhapsodic over films from the 1920s through the 1960s, but in this interview, you'll get to hear me sing the praises of films from the 1970s, '80s and today as well!

One of the films I single out for special mention is that of my fellow Jerseyan and one of my favorite directors, certainly an influence on my sense of humor, the great Joe Dante and his underrated film, "The 'Burbs." I only just saw it for the first time recently.

Remember my essay, "The Old Dark Anachronism" where I theorized that it may be just about impossible to do a plausible "old dark house" film set in contemporary times without it feeling like a throwback? Well, turns out Dante pulled it off in 1989.

If all goes as planned, next up from me will be a review of a more traditional horror-comedy short from 1945 that may not break any new ground but manages to pull out all the stops due to its leads, Andy Clyde and our old friend Dudley Dickerson - look for a review of "Spook to Me" here soon.

...and right now, look for the trailer to Joe Dante's deserving-of-rediscovery horror-comedy, "The 'Burbs":