IDLE ROOMERS (1944)

NOTE: In light of the fact that the big-budget remake of “The Wolf Man” starring Benicio del Toro and Anthony Hopkins is being released to theaters today, I thought it appropriate to review a horror-comedy featuring a werewolf. And since I’ve already reviewed “Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein” (featuring the Wolf Man) the next most prominent entry is this Three Stooges short.

RATING: ** & ¾ out of ****

PLOT: The Three Stooges (Moe Howard, Larry Fine, Curly Howard) are hotel bellhops who deliver a large crate to a hotel room. The crate contains “Lupe the Wolf Man,” the latest addition to Leander’s Carnival, which is run by hotel occupants Mr. and Mrs. Leander (Vernon Dent and Christine McIntyre). While Mrs. Leander is initially shocked at the sight of the creature (Duke York), Mr. Leander assures her that he is harmless except when he hears music. Dent asks the Stooges to tidy up the hotel room while he and McIntyre step out. Naturally, Curly turns on the radio to make the task more bearable, and the fun begins. Will the Stooges be able to get themselves out of their latest hairy predicament?

REVIEW: While Abbott & Costello, Laurel & Hardy, The East Side Kids/Bowery Boys and Our Gang/Little Rascals all made numerous horror-comedies, no comedy team made more than the Three Stooges who top in at somewhere between 20 and 25 entries depending upon your definition of horror-comedy. Strangely, the success of the team in this genre seems to go against the conventional wisdom of head Stooge Moe Howard himself, who once said that the key to the Stooges was to put them in situations where they would be out of place… which was nearly every situation! Think about it – the Stooges would easily wreck havoc doing any sort of job imaginable, being a part of the military, or put into any situation where they had to deal with high society types or authority figures.

The horror-comedies of the Three Stooges go against the grain of their usual films because there is just as much (if not more) havoc being wrecked upon the Stooges by ghosts and monsters (both real and phony) as the Stooges enact upon each other and those who cross their paths.

Like many Stooges shorts, there isn’t much plot to “Idle Roomers” – it’s a case of cause (set-up) and effect (mayhem) which proved to be a tried-and-true formula for the team. As such, it’s a bit critic proof. First off, you either like the Stooges or you don’t (I happen to love them). Many critics of the team find their violent brand of slapstick hard to take, but for me, the addition of the ridiculous sound effects and the fact that the violence was taken to such exaggerated extremes puts them in another category. To me they are more like a live-action cartoon and so they are surreal, just as any cartoon character that suddenly came to life for real would be considered surreal. In fact, to me the Stooges are the reverse of the cat-and-mouse cartoon team Tom & Jerry. The sight of Tom the cat getting whacked over the head by a two-by-four was almost always accompanied by a realistic sound effect whereas Curly could get whacked on the noggin and you’d hear the sound of a bell, just like the “test your strength and ring the bell” challenges at a carnival.

So the Stooges and their robust brand of slapstick are not an issue for me. In fact, I would have given this short a full three stars but I’ve deducted a quarter star just due to the fact that the set-up isn’t quite as quick here as it is in other shorts. It takes too much time to get to the main event. In a short like this, you want the Stooges verses a werewolf antics to kick in at around the three minute mark, not eight and a half minutes in. In fact, if you’re watching this film cold for the first time without any notion of what is to come, you might think it’s going to be a typical Leon Errol/Hugh Herbert marital farce/comedy of errors. On the plus side, however the Stooges deliver some prime tomfoolery in the interim.

The Stooges are delightfully at full-tilt here from their very introduction. We first see them in full bellhop outfits sharing a bench in the lobby. And they’re sleeping! The desk clerk has to rouse them awake by pressing a button that collapses the bench they are sleeping on, sending them crashing to the floor. Of course, just the sight of the Three Stooges waking up and scrambling to get their bearings is hysterical. The manic pace is maintained as the trio vie for the attentions of lovely Christine McIntyre (making her first of many appearances with the Stooges here) – each wants to be the one to carry her bags. Larry takes the elevator, Moe beats him running up the stairs… but Curly is already in her room!

There’s a series of great sight gags concerning the carrying of bags. Curly carries a very large case on his back. Meanwhile, Larry is pulling the rug that Curly is walking on so that Curly never gets anywhere – he’s walking in place! Then comes a great bit where Curly puts the case down, shakes out and spits on his hands, and then reaches back to carry the bag again… but he’s really grabbing the female guest by her shoulders instead! As Curly walks into the room with the woman on his back, her husband spots him and begins throwing knives (!) at Curly with top precision! Curly beats feet and we soon learn why the man is such a good knife-thrower: he owns a carnival!

The next scene sets up the rest of the short. When the wife inquires about the large crate that’s just been delivered, the husband tells his wife “this will put us in the big time” – and then the camera closes in on a flyer for “Leander’s Carnival” featuring “Lupe – the Wolf Man.” It’s a very compact, well-written way to explain who the guests are without using obvious exposition. Mrs. Leander objects to the “horrible creature” but her husband says he’s perfectly harmless “except when he hears music – then he goes insane!”

Now I must mention here that this short really doesn’t have many horror-comedy trappings, but it does have its wolf man, or more precisely its handling of the wolf man. Circuses, freak shows and sideshow acts have always been known for having their “wolf people,” but when depicted in other movies, they tend not to be portrayed as monsters but rather as oddities. Clearly the team behind this Stooges short was trading on both the sensationalism of Lon Chaney Jr.’s “Wolf Man” beast from three years earlier as well as Matt Willis’s werewolf named Andreas in the Bela Lugosi starrer, “Return of the Vampire.” Depending upon your source, that film came out in either 1943 or 1944, but in either case the film was also done at the Stooges’ home studio Columbia, which might explain why Lupe and Andreas look like they could be cousins. And both certainly seem inspired (at least in part) by the look of Chaney Jr’s Wolf Man.



So now the roller coaster begins. As the Stooges set about cleaning the Leanders’ room, Curly is intrigued by the life-size crate. He keeps tapping and rapping on it… and his taps and raps are echoed by the wolf man inside (but Curly doesn’t know that)! Curly makes the mistake of turning on the radio while he’s sleeping and Lupe breaks out of his cage! The wolf man goes crazy and throws the radio into the next room, where it hits Moe in the back and knocks him over. Moe deposits the radio on Curly’s head. He adjusts the knobs to get all sorts of static sounds. With the radio still on his head so he can’t see, Curly approaches the wolf man and says “Hey Moe, get this thing off!” The wolf man obliges by hitting Curly square on top of the head, smashing the radio and sending Curly to the ground. The wolf man then sneaks out the open window, leaving Curly to suspect that it was Moe who hit him and went out the window. But when Moe and Larry walk through the door, Curly realizes it wasn’t Moe and all Three Stooges get scared and run through the door.

Meanwhile, the wolf man has gone into the next room where a pair of women are sleeping and scares them (in a typical “scare” sight gag, one of the girls’ ponytails stands straight up). This scene is a bit of a non-sequitur – it’s almost as if the filmmakers are worried they’ll run out of good Stooge gags before the short is over so they need more padding (silly filmmakers) – another reason this one just misses a full three stars. But soon enough the Stooges have entered this room and become part of the action again. When the girl screams at the wolf man standing behind Curly, he takes offense (“I resemble that remark!”).

This leads into the classic mirror gag (a time-honored classic seen in the Marx Brothers’ movie “Duck Soup” as well as the “I Love Lucy” TV show) where Curly thinks he’s looking into a mirror while the Wolf Man is staring back at him through an open frame. As Curly runs his hands over his bald pate and makes various gestures and faces, the Wolf Man mimics him. “I need a shave but I don’t feel any whiskers,” exclaims Curly. When he rubs his own head he says, “Steel wool! That can’t be me – that mirror glass is dirty” and goes to wipe it off. When Curly’s fingers touch the wolf man’s paws, Curly knows it’s a real monster staring back at him!

Meanwhile, Larry is in the hallway and the wolf man sneaks up behind him, running his fingers through Larry’s hair. Larry runs off. Then the wolf man goes into the room where Moe & Curly are. Moe finds a trombone and asks Curly to play it, reasoning “maybe your music will tame him.” Expectedly the music just sends the wolf man into a rage. He throws the Trombone at Curly and it pins him to the wall, wrapping around his face. This is the last really good gag – yes, it appears the filmmakers have indeed used up all the good stuff as they may have feared – because the ending is a bit weak compared to the hijinks that precede it. Here it is: the Stooges get into an elevator. The wolf man tampers with the elevator so the Stooges don’t know what floor they’re on, then he sneaks onto the elevator with them. The wolf man grabs the throttle and sends the elevator out of control, going up and down until crashing through the ceiling and floating through the clouds. The End.

The supporting cast here is strong. 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. Christine McIntyre makes her first appearance in a Stooges short here, an association that would last for many years to come. Duke York was mostly a stunt man and often played rough-and-tumble bit parts like thugs and cops. He also appeared with Olsen & Johnson and Abbott & Costello, and in other Stooges films (in fact, he was in both Abbott & Costello’s classic feature “Who Done It” and the Stooge’s unrelated short of the same name).

When all is said and done, “Idle Roomers” is one of the most entertaining horror-comedy shorts ever… at least for those receptive of the Stooges. The Stooges work overtime for laughs, and the majority of weak moments in the short occur when the Stooges are off-camera or not the center of attention. While hampered by those non-Stooge moments as well as its weak ending and lack of genuine horror-comedy atmosphere, it is still worth watching for the mastery of the Stooges and holds a special place in the horror-comedy pantheon as being one of the few films in the genre to feature a werewolf.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST:

Esther Howard is one of the women sleeping in the adjoining hotel room. Classic comedy fans may recognize her as Aunt Sophie from Laurel & Hardy’s “The Big Noise” and film noir fans from “Murder My Sweet.” She also appeared in “Detour,” “Dick Tracy vs. Cue Ball,” a couple of “Falcon” entries and Bob Hope’s “My Favorite Blonde,” among others.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

MOE: “Did you lock the door?”

CURLY: “Yeah, twice – once this way, and once that way!”

CURLY (after the girl screams at the sight of the wolf man standing him): “I resemble that remark!

MOE:” I’ve always said your face scares people – why don’t you throw it away!”

CURLY: “Hey lady – I ain’t that ugly – or am I?”

BEST GAGS:

Curly walking in place, Curly picking up and carrying Christine McIntyre instead of the crate, and the mirror routine stand out in a film filled with slapstick and sight gags.

BUY THE FILM:

“Idle Roomers” can be found the “Three Stooges Collection Volume 4: 1943-1945” and you can buy it here:



FURTHER READING:

There are several excellent books available on the Stooges. Among them are “The Three Stooges Scrapbook” by Jeff & Greg Lenburg and Joan Howard-Maurer, “The Complete Three Stooges” by Jon Solomon and “One Fine Stooge” by Steve Cox and Jim Terry. For a great overview of all Columbia short subject series, pick up “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” by Ted Okuda and Edward Watz.

On the internet you should definitely read the article “The Three Stooges Meet the Monsters” from the Monster Kids site which you can read here.

This is a short – there is no trailer, and the clips I’ve found on the internet are too expansive to share here without infringing on copyrights. Therefore, I urge you to buy or rent the Stooges collection containing “Idle Roomers” instead. Since it also includes 20 other Stooges shorts, including additional horror-comedies, it certainly will give you more bang for your buck than the new “Wolfman” movie!

SPOOKS (1953)

RATING: *** out of ****

NOTE: This short subject was originally released to theaters in 1953 in 3-D, and later re-released in the 1980s (and thereafter) in 35mm 3-D. For years it ran on television in 2-D, and was released a time or two on home video in 2-D as well. Recently, it was re-released on DVD in both the 2-D and 3-D formats. This review is based on viewing the 2-D version, but will make note of some of the more obvious (even in 2-D) effects designed to show off the 3-D process.

PLOT: A rich man hires detectives Moe, Larry and Shemp to find his missing daughter. Posing as pie salesmen, the trio go door-to-door until they stumble upon a spooky house… and the mad scientist inside who’s trying to transfer the girl’s brain with a gorilla’s! Can the Stooges dodge bats, cleavers and pies – not to mention Moe’s eye-pokin’ fingers - in time to save the day?

REVIEW: “Spooks” belongs to a select group of what I call “quintessential Stooges horror-comedy shorts.” By that I mean it places them in a spooky old house with trappings that had become stocks-in-trade for the team – namely all manner of objects flying at them and scaring them to bits. Mind you this wasn’t new territory for the team – they had previously tread similar ground in several shorts with Curly. The results of mixing the Stooges brand of comedy with creepy surroundings were so popular that when Shemp Howard replaced the ailing Curly as “third Stooge” the scare comedies continued. In fact, they made at least four such shorts with Shemp before they even got to “Spooks.”

Given this penchant for things “coming at you” in Stooges shorts, it’s no wonder that when the 3D process became an option, the producers of the Stooges shorts decided the trio would be a natural to test it out (the commitment is there right from the opening credits – instead of the usual still shot of Moe, Larry and Shemp we see moving film of their disembodied heads, which swirl around and come toward the camera – with Larry’s head moving forward more than the others). Beyond that I think there were both economical and marketing considerations at work, which I will get to later in the review.

If many of the gags seem familiar here, it’s because they are. This is true of nearly all the comedians who appeared in short subject series, but probably more true of those who made their films for Columbia Pictures, especially the Stooges. One has to remember that these short films were made for theaters and that each new entry was separated by months and sometimes years. When viewed on TV on a regular basis, the repetitive use of certain gags stands out more, but audiences seeing the films in theaters may have been seeing some of the gags for the first time. In cases where they were seeing a gag that they had previously seen, there may have been so much time elapsed that they had a vague or even no memory of seeing it originally.

I mention this because the opening of The Stooges in their detective agency recalls not only other Stooges shorts but those of other comedians at Columbia Studios, and even some that worked for other studios. But the bottom line is (and this is especially true of The Stooges): the gags are usually tried-and-true and funny every time. As this short opens, we see the door to the “Super Sleuth Detective Agency.” Superimposed on the door is the slogan “Divorce Evidence Manufactured to Your Order” and hand-scrawled on the door (in backwards letters) is “also trap criminals.” The familiarity continues as a man enters the office and sees all manner of traps on the wall from bear traps to mouse traps… and finds the Stooges sleeping, emphasized by a classic snoring gag.

The Stooges didn’t just excel at visual gags, however. The man tries to rouse the Stooges awake and that leads to a classic verbal favorite of the trio: when the man calls out “Gentlemen,” Larry replies, “Where?” When the man introduces himself as “George B. Bopper,” he sets off an hysterical litany of ‘40s jive and ‘50s beatnik phraseology from Shemp. Shemp’s non-stop banter is quelled only by a carefully thrown pen from Moe… and the film’s first 3D gag as we get close-ups of both Moe throwing the pen and of the pen landing head-on (nose-on?) Shemp’s proboscis.

Often accused by their critics of being the lowest of the lowbrow comics, in this short the Stooges retort by adhering to such lofty literary devices as “Chekhov’s gun” – the idea that if a gun (or any other object) is introduced in the first act of a story (or play or movie) then it better go off by the third. Here, the “gun” is represented by pies. Explaining that his daughter is missing, the Stooges agree to take the man’s case… and they’re going to take some pies along as they’ve decided their best strategy is to pose as door-to-door pie salesmen. As they make their way Larry tosses off a very funny throw-away aside, “Don’t wreck the pies” (maybe he’s just being respective of Chekhov)…

In true Columbia short fashion, the set-up simply acts as a clothesline to hang a barrage of gags upon. There’s not much plot left once the Stooges get to the house – it’s just a matter of them being scared by tricks and devices set up by the villains as distractions and deterrents while they search for the girl (although a couple of the scares they face can’t easily be explained). Many of these gags are executed to maximize the 3D effect. But with only 16 minutes to play with and the cameras trained on Moe, Larry and particularly Shemp, you don’t really need much plot. You just need laughs, and the Stooges are more than obliging.

Being a horror-comedy, you also need some spooky trappings, and this one delivers, even though some of the trappings are slightly askew and out of the norm (but that just elevates the film in my opinion). Start with the villains – not only are they a typical mad scientist and his creepy assistant; they are also assigned the names of “Dr. Jeckyl & Mr. Hyde!” And they have a gorilla named Congo – every mad scientist needs a gorilla to transfer a human’s brain into (Shemp refers to Congo as a “chimney-panzee” that looks “just like my mother-in-law”)! A howling wind is heard blowing throughout, shadows abound , there are secret panels in the wall and even (literally!) a skeleton in the closet.

There is also a self-aware attitude at work here. Before the Stooges even enter the creepy house, Larry exclaims “What a crummy neighborhood” to which Shemp replies, “ Yeah, it’s spooky!” Once inside, we get this exchange between Moe and Shemp:

SHEMP: This place gives me the spooks – it feels like its haunted!

MOE: Don’t be ridiculous – haunted house have bats!

…just then a bat flies in and gets in their faces. But it’s not just any bat, it’s a bat with Shemp’s face, doing Shemp’s eeb-eeb noises and imitating one of Curly’s barks! It may singularly be the most bizarre moment in the whole short, and in a sense, it’s scariest. At least for any kids in the audience. And at least until Shemp comes face-to-barking-face with a mounted trophy on the wall. It has the face of a dog, the ears of a kangaroo and the bite of a hungry rat.



Let’s talk a little about the 3D effects. I mentioned above that the film was used to highlight the process and that the Stooges’ visual gags lent themselves perfectly to 3D. This was just one component, however. The studio also benefitted in terms of marketing and economics. From the marketing standpoint, the Stooges were surefire gold. Their shorts consistently were among the top moneymaking shorts year after year. There was no reason for Columbia to think that this new 3D short would be any different. It was a case where the 3D process had more to gain from being associated with the Stooges than vice versa. The extra added bonus for Columbia was that it cost a lot less to apply 3D effects to a 16 minute short than to a 90 minute feature, so the economic risk to try it out was much less.

Plus, you haven’t been Moe-poked until you’ve been Moe-Poked in 3D!

When watched in 2D instead of 3D, the short inadvertently comes off as almost a satire on 3D movies. There are very deliberate movements leading into each 3D shot, but their goofiness when watching the film in 2D adds to the comedy rather than detracting.

Highlights among the 3D mayhem include the aforementioned pen Moe throws at Shemp and the flapping bat with Shemp’s face, plus such gems as Dr. Jeckyl aiming his hypodermic needle right at the audience as he closes in on the gorilla… and later Shemp and the girl, Moe winding up to give Shemp a big kick in the pants, Dr. Jeckyl hurling a cleaver at Shemp (which pins his baker hat to the wall) and then another at Larry, the skeletons head lurching toward the audience as Shemp tangles with it, Mr. Hyde lights a flamethrower in the Stooges (and the audience’s) direction while Moe fights back by spraying a fire extinguisher at him, Mr. Hyde then charges the Stooges with a pitchfork, and of course… many pies are tossed as the Stooges try to subdue the villains!:

In my review of the Stooges' “Idle Roomers” I spoke of how most of the supporting cast was extraneous and didn’t add much to the film. Most of this was due to the fact that they didn’t even interact with the Stooges. In “Spooks,” however the supporting cast directly engages with the Stooges. Both Philip Van Zandt as Dr. Jeckyl and Tom Kennedy as Mr. Hyde lend their considerable comedic talents to terrorizing the boys. Both had extensive appearance appearing alongside classic comedians. Some of the other Stooge horror-comedies Van Zandt appeared in include “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. Tom Kennedy’s resume was just as impressive if not more so, as he appeared in numerous shorts and features alongside the likes of Laurel & Hardy, the Marx Brothers, Bob Hope, the Bowery Boys, Wheeler & Woolsey, Lupe Velez, Brown & Carney, Clark & McCullough, Mae West, W.C. Fields and Abbott & Costello.

Frank Mitchell plays George B. Bopper. He was half of the comedy team Mitchell & (Jack) Durant, and often played comic relief roles in Alice Faye movies. He had a long career stretching to 1980, including several comedies. Some other classic horror-comedies he appeared in include the Boris Karloff-Peter Lorre starrer “The Boogie Man Will Get You” and Olsen & Johnson’s manic “Ghost Catchers.” As his daughter, Norma Randall isn’t required to do much other than look scared and be pretty, and she succeeds with flying colors on both counts. Her short career consisted primarily of bit parts, and she managed to appear in four Three Stooges shorts along the way.

BEST GAGS: I’ve already mentioned most of the gags, and let’s face it, if you’re a fan of the Stooges once this gets rolling they’re all pretty good. A couple chestnuts that got away from the rest of my review:

• Moe exclaims that he thinks someone is trying to scare them out of the house, and Mr. Hyde (who has snuck up behind the Stooges) says “You can say that again!” So Moe does say it again… and the trio scatter in panic when they realize they’re cornered!

• As Dr. Jeckyl chases Shemp, the phone rings and Shemp hands it to him, claiming “it’s for you”… and buying himself time to get away.

• The classic scenario of Shemp going on and on talking tough about how he’s going to take down the gorilla, not realizing the gorilla has escaped its cage and is standing right behind him.

• Larry telling everyone to calm down and have a cigarette as he nervously spills them all over, and tosses a lit match onto a desk full of fireworks.

• The grand finale… where the gorilla throws pies at the Stooges, much to everyone’s delight!

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

Again, I’ve already mentioned some great dialogue – this short is loaded with as many verbal gems as visual. While nothing quite matches the hilarity of Shemp’s hep jive near the beginning of this short, there are plenty of other great lines. Among the quips I haven’t previously mentioned:

SHEMP (eyes shut after being Moe-poked): I can’t see! I can’t see!

MOE: Whatsamatter?

SHEMP: I got my eyes shut!

GIRL: No, no Dr. Jeckyl!

SHEMP: Dr. Jeckyl? We must HIDE!

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: Steve Calvert, once again cavorting in the gorilla suit he bought from that other famous simian thespian, Ray “Crash” Corrigan. Calvert also played gorillas in a few other horror-comedies including the Joe Besser short "Fraidy Cat" and the features, "The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters" and the infamous “Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla.” He also appeared along in stock footage as an ape in Besser's "Hook a Crook" (which also utilized stock footage of Corrigan as an ape along with new footage of Dan "Hoss from Bonanza" Blocker for triple the simian fun)!

BUY THE FILM: “Spooks” is currently available in both 2D and 3D formats on “The Three Stooges Collection Volume 7” which you can purchase here:



FURTHER READING: There are several excellent books available on the Stooges. Among them are “The Three Stooges Scrapbook” by Jeff & Greg Lenburg and Joan Howard-Maurer, “The Complete Three Stooges” by Jon Solomon and “One Fine Stooge” by Steve Cox and Jim Terry. For a great overview of all Columbia short subject series, pick up “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” by Ted Okuda and Edward Watz.













On the internet you should definitely read the article “The Three Stooges Meet the Monsters” from the Monster Kids site which you can read here.

Since this is a short, there is no trailer for it. Nor could I find a short clip, nor an authorized upload of the complete short. There are unauthorized uploads of the complete short online, however I will not post to those due to copyright infringement laws. However, under section 7 of that law which states that short trailers or clips used for the purpose of criticism can be posted, I will post the following music video that utilizes short, non-sequential clips from “Spooks” to give you the flavor of the film’s sight gags:

THE THREE STOOGES IN ORBIT (1962)

RATING:  ** & 3/4* out of ****

PLOT: In one of their later films, the Three Stooges put a modern twist on the “old dark house” genre by renting rooms in a spooky old mansion inherited by a kooky scientist. The twist is the addition of aliens from another world, who look like diminutive cousins of the Frankenstein monster! But even with this atom-age addition, the film manages to conjure up the traditional hallmarks of the horror-comedy genre including hooded and masked figures, secret passages, dark shadows and creepy catacombs. Can the Stooges not just survive a night in a haunted house but stave off an alien invasion as well?! 

REVIEW: I began my review of the Three Stooges short, Outer Space Jitters (which I invite you to read by clicking here) by exploring the various actors who took on the role of “third Stooge” up to that point. Now comes the fourth to take on that mantle, Curly Joe DeRita. When I was a child, I was a little uncertain about him. He looked like Curly but sounded like Larry, and yet he had mannerisms and a delivery all his own. Only later as an adult did I realize he was “the right ‘third Stooge’ for the right time.” By the final decade of the Stooges’ act, the actors portraying the Stooges got older while their audience got younger. A funny but less violent and frenetic team fit the bill for this generation, and in retrospect Curly Joe was the perfect fit. The team had moved on from short subjects aimed at adults to begin making both feature films and TV appearances that were specifically targeted to appeal to the “kiddie” market that had made TV airings of their vintage two reel shorts such a success. The Three Stooges in Orbit is exemplary of the approach the trio took in their later years.

This film comes with some trivia: in 1960 the Stooges set out to create a new full color TV show called The Three Stooges Scrapbook that would include some routines/scenarios of one to two reels in length as well as animated cartoons based on the characters. For the pilot, the first live-action bit was the Stooges in a haunted house. The pilot failed to get an airing but was divided into two shorts for theatrical release.

Scrapbook’s haunted house bits were re-purposed for Orbit – the picture reverted to black and white and the laugh track removed. Ultimately, a TV show did transpire – The New Three Stooges whose format was mostly cartoons with very short live-action wrap-around bits from the Stooges. Some of the animation was also re-purposed for this movie, too and in a way, whether intended or not the movie ended up serving as an introduction to the retooled cartoon series.

Alas, the haunted house elements really only comprise a third of the film, but they hearken back to those halcyon days where the Stooges routinely tussled with things that go bump in the night. This review will concentrate both on those “old dark house” trappings and on the aliens (who as we saw in such Joe Besser Stooges entries as Outer Space Jitters can be plenty scary, too).

The film starts with a mock-serious voice-over expounding upon mankind’s fascination with life on Mars and what it might look like.  It’s less mock and more serious, however – if you came in the middle of the narration not knowing what film you were watching, you might think it’s a serious film.  This of course is quickly shattered with some humor promising that “at last you will learn the simple truth about life on Mars… as Normandy Productions lights the fuse… that puts The Three Stooges in Orbit!” The joke is all the more funny because of the serious buildup, although at a certain point, the punchline is telegraphed by the increasingly comic book style illustrations.

The film is playful from the get-go, because after it reveals the joke about the title, it also promises that within the film we’ll “meet the true image of the men from Mars.”  This is accompanied by said Mars men (complete with Frankenstein Monster flat-tops) in animated form, ray-gunning their way through the opening credits.

The mock serious tone continues after the opening credits, as the narrator introduces us to “Hollywood, California – glamour capital of the world – where movie history was first written by such greats as Valentino, Pickford.”  After acknowledging that television is charting new waters, the narrator intones that “carrying on in the tradition of the immortals”… are of course, none other than the Three Stooges!

They’re in fine form from the start, shown in a hotel room as Curly Joe wears a chef’s hat and serves up some food to Moe and Larry.  As he serves he sings, resulting in a reprimand from Moe and Larry, nervous that the landlord will toss them out for cooking. 

Curly Joe gets an early spotlight, practicing his speech for a TV appearance the following day.  “It gives me great pleasure on this monotonous occasion”… he begins, only to have Moe correct him.

“Hey, hey… it’s “momentous.  MOE-mentous,” Moe slowly repeats, emphasizing (of course) the “Moe” part! Curly Joe retorts, “What are you giving me two words for when I have enough trouble with one?!”

(Later, when the trio’s Professor friend laments that his life is lonely and “monotonous,” Curley Joe corrects him: “It’s ‘momentous.’ Ha – I said it!”)

Four decades and four line-ups after the team’s start in movies, the personalities remain spot-on.  Moe is the bossy leader, Larry the nebulous-minded middle-man and Curly Joe the bumbling yet often creative third.  There is bickering among the three and surprisingly, still at least a small bit of roughhousing as well.  To be sure the Stooges have aged and mellowed somewhat, but a concerted effort seems to have been made to not stray too far from the knockabout clowns of olde.

And just like the 17 minute Columbia Pictures two-reelers of yore where the Stooges honed their trade, this feature film utilizes the flimsiest of premises as plot points to move the trio from point A to point B.  The fact that the Stooges cook their own food gets them kicked out of their apartment and keeps them from renting eleven others (including one in a complex cleverly named, “Costa Plenty DeLuxe Suites”).  Until Larry conveniently spots a classified ad reading, “Lonely retired gentleman desires boarders.  Home cooking.”

And thus, the Stooges meet the kooky Martian-obsessed scientist… who just so happens to also live in a haunted house!  And what a house it is.  Big and cavernous, with every manner of antique furnishing and accessories… often on the dark and musty side of things, of course!

After niceties are exchanged the professor reveals he is working on a new invention: an all-purpose military vehicle.  He explains how the invention can operate underwater, on land or in the air (and can even be propelled into the titular “orbit!).  Of course everyone who’s ever seen a movie knows Chekhov’s adage that “if you introduce a gun in the first act it better go off in the third act” is going to come into play with the military vehicle.

The military vehicle is not the only “reveal” as the professor exclaims to his guests that “it will be so nice to have earthlings in the house for a change!”

The scientist exclaims that horrible alien spies are routinely out to steal his plans.  Moe writes the scientist off as a “kook,” but Larry and Curly Joe are a bit more frightened of the prospect.

This all dovetails into the film’s most horror-comedy-friendly set-piece as the trio spend the night in the house.  Larry and Curly Joe share a bed.  When Curly Joe goes to turn out the light, a monstrous, clawed hand reaches through the wall to turn it off for him!

Curly runs screaming from the room only to be told by Moe “you’re off your rocker.”

Meanwhile, a hooded figure that looks like a grim reaper crossed with the emperor from the Star Wars saga, sporting a lobster claw hand a la District 9 shows up to bedevil Larry. As it scoops Larry up out of his bed and carries him away, Larry swoons in his sleep for the lover he imagines is sweeping him off his feet – an imaginary girlfriend named Mabel!

When Curly Joe returns to the bedroom with Moe to investigate, he’s further chastised by Moe. Seeing someone he assumes is Larry under the covers, Moe wonders why Curly Joe can’t just sleep soundly like his friend. Moe orders Curly Joe back into bed, not knowing it’s really the hooded figure lying under the covers!

Shortly ensues a funny bit where Curly Joe and the hooded figure fight over the covers. This is a time-honored style of gag – since Moe has established that it’s really “Larry” under the covers, Curly Joe never bothers to look at his bed-mate. Back and forth the unlikely duo pull the covers away from each other… until the fateful (inevitable?) moment where Curly Joe’s hand touches the monster’s claw and Curly finds himself staring face-to-face with the hideous beast!

This gag is topped by Curly Joe racing for the door again, where the agitated Moe waits on the other side. Startled by the sight of Moe, Curly Joe slams the door – and this sends Moe ricocheting back-and-forth along the hallway walls!

Trapped in the room with the ghoul, Curly Joe gets a momentary burst of bravery and uses the old trick of pointing and shouting “look!” When the hooded figure turns to look, Curly Joe knocks him out with a shotgun handle!  Once unmasked, the culprit is revealed to be the butler (“It’s always the butler,” exclaims Moe).

Victory is short-lived. As the Professor and the Stooges congregate around the fallen figure, it rises and points a space gun at them! The seemingly human figure is really one of the aliens in disguise. Getting another brave moment, Curly Joe points the rifle back at the alien only to have the weapon zapped into nothingness!

As the Stooges flee, the Professor follows the faux alien into a catacomb where it communicates with other Martians via a giant TV monitor. It’s here where we discover the normal appearance of the aliens is somewhat akin to that of the Frankenstein monster – flatheads and high foreheads with wrinkled skin that suggests rigor mortis has set in. Their outfits are standard issue for the period: shiny garb, boots and flowing capes.

The spy explains that the Professor’s weapon may be more powerful than anything the Martians have, but when asked when it will be completed he has no idea. The filmmakers slip in some topical political satire a la Rocky and Bullwinkle’s jabs at the cold war: the agitated Martian leader lets off a string of strongly-voiced utterances accompanied by vigorous finger waving that are clearly meant to remind the parents of early 1960s kiddie matinee attendees of Khrushchev. The punchline? The subtitle accompanying the verbal barrage is merely, “Idiot!”

The plot zips into high gear from this point as the Martian leader appoints his two top men, Ogg and Zogg to the assignment. The Professor slips off to alert the F.B.I., but they think he’s crazy, too! The F.B.I. chief snarkily informs The Professor that his men are too busy “rounding up a herd of man-eating caterpillars from Venus” to deal with his plight.

Undeterred, the Professor finds a copy of a script with the inscription, “Hollywood Studio Stage One: the Three Stooges.” “Somebody’s gotta’ listen,” he intones as he sets off to find the comical trio. Of course, the team have to get to the studio first and that’s no small feat, as we’re treated to a mostly silent montage that finds the team trying a variety of means to do so, including helicopter-hiking!

Finally, the Stooges locate the studio from above and leap out of the copter, their parachutes billowing behind them. They walk into the studio just in time to be announced and hit the stage. One time-honored gag they manage to slip in right beforehand: still in their jammies, the Stooges duck into their dressing room and immediately duck back out all decked-out in fancy tuxes! The Stooges’ TV show-within-the-film takes its lead from their real-life failed pilot right down to its name, The Three Stooges Scrapbook and features the team introducing animated cartoon adventures of themselves.

There’s still the matter of a plot to prop up the cross-promotion, so now in addition to a real threat from Mars the Stooges themselves receive a real threat from their sponsor: stop arriving late for their show and come up with a unique-and-improved cartoon!

The Stooges are ready to concede defeat when the Professor reveals he can help, claiming he has invented “Electronic cartoons – the most startling new process since the Magic Lantern!” He’ll share his invention with the Stooges as long as the trio help him finish his land-sea-air contraption to stave off the Martians.

Anyone can see where this is going from here, how the two threads will collide and shower down a confetti of kiddie matinee goodness to all the mop-topped moppets below.

…But not before a rather scary and unsettling scene unfolds. Back at the Professor’s place, Ogg and Zogg have arrived and located the spy. The spy is genuinely terrified and I imagine kids in the audience were, too as the intimidating Ogg and Zogg force him into the yard while scary music plays. The dark mood prevails as the Martians force the spy into their ship so he can return to Mars. The spy actually grabs one of the Martian’s ray guns and mimes that the Martian should just kill him – he’d take death over returning to Mars! It’s a very creepy encounter.

An interesting aspect of this film is the Martian make-up. As mentioned above, the creatures are very Frankenstein monster-esque, but the makeup actually works in two ways: in ominous scenes like the one described above, they come off as downright frightening; in scenes to come that are played off more for comedy, the Martians come off humorously.

A rather curious verbal bit for a kid’s cartoon comes courtesy of the Professor. When he reveals his special vehicle to the Stooges, Moe asks what he calls it. The Professor replies, “I don’t know whether to call it a seagoing heli-tank, a land-going heli-sub or an airborne what-in-the-hel—“

As for the Professor’s new process that he claims will revolutionize cartoons: a whole animation cell drawing rendered by a computer! Who knew the “prof” in “professor” was an abbreviation for “prophet?!” Alas, a still drawing is all The Professor has – he has no idea how to make it move, much to the Stooges’ chagrin.

A few scenes later, an Air Force captain comes calling to witness the Professor’s tests on the vehicle (and to provide the love interest for the Professor’s daughter). When the model of the Professor’s vehicle takes flight, it knocks repeatedly into a door and reels back each time, almost hitting Larry in the head and prompting him to exclaim, “Wait a minute – I gotta’ open the door.” Soon the model is tangled in Larry’s hair!

Larry’s run-in with the model vehicle is soon followed by a comical encounter with Curly Joe. The model vehicle has found its way into the bathroom where Curly Joe is showering! It manages to trap Curly Joe in the shower curtain. Curly Joe reaches for the shower head to try to climb out but only manages to point it in the direction of Larry, Moe and the Professor, a gusher of water dousing the trio! Of note here is a subtle gag – the close-cropped Curly Joe actually wears a shower cap!

The model also supplies one of the film’s more “adult” moments as well – it zooms out of the Professor’s house and lands in the bathtub of a beautiful bathing neighbor. Moe tells Larry and Curly Joe to cover their eyes, but of course, they peek! The camera lingers as the gorgeous woman gets out of the tub and wraps a towel around herself, while the wacky soundtrack music incorporates a couple of skewed notes reminiscent of Hitchcock’s Psycho shower scene!

One of the big payoff scenes for the kiddie audience soon follows. The Professor actually has the Stooges doing mechanic work on the vehicle! Inevitably, we know chaos will soon ensue… and it does. Unable to get the oil out of a tin funnel, Larry violently hits it until a gusher of oil smacks Curly Joe in the eye! This sends Curly Joe reeling backward and onto the control panel, where he accidentally sets off some levers! Of course, Moe is perched atop the vehicle’s propeller at the time!

The film continues to intermittently alternate between kid-targeted scenes and those adults would appreciate more. A scene where the Martian TV communicator transmitter malfunctions leads to a montage of faux commercials that cleverly skewer advertising conventions. This segues into a pastiche of unrelated images that totally baffle the Martian leaders – from silent movie footage (in a nice nod to their slapstick roots Keystone Kops scenes are used) to teenagers doing the twist – although Ogg and Zogg are more intrigued and start rotating their hips!  

The Martian leaders really can’t take all the disparate and frenetic television images they’re seeing and exclaim, “If this is earth, we don’t want it! Invasion canceled! Destroy the planet instead!” In a further allusion to Khrushchev, the head Martian pounds something (it’s hard to tell what) hard against the desk a la the famous Russian leader’s shoe-banging incident.

From here, plot complications designed to put tools in the hands of the Stooges (always a sure-fire laugh-getter) ensue. Tasked with getting the Professor’s vehicle in top-working order and out of the lab, the Stooges assume they need to take it through a small door. Following this illogic, Moe now insists they must increase the size of said door! Curly Joe goes to work with a hand chisel (!) and this leads to a nice visual set-piece where one of the Martians on the other side of the wall keeps pushing the chisel back through the hole, inevitably clonking Curly Joe in the head or eye each time! After the Martian gets a face full of exhaust pipe dust he retaliates by shooting a laser through the hole in the wall… which effectively evaporates the opposite wall, allowing the Stooges to set forth in the vehicle!

This should lead into the film’s highlight but alas it begins a third act that is hit-and-miss in spots. As the Professor, his daughter and the army officials eagerly await the arrival of the vehicle at the military base, the Stooges finally show up in it. I can’t put my finger on just why but in this scene – of the Stooges having a hard time operating the vehicle and nearly running over the Professor with it – the action plays rather inert, while the Stooges overdo their histrionics and bravado. It falls rather flat. And then, almost instantly, it picks up again as the Stooges narrowly avoid a hangar full of explosives (Larry, seeing the word “Magazines” on the side of the hangar tells Moe to “watch out for the bookstore!”), followed by an entanglement with a clothesline that sees them picking up… and dropping down ladies garments (right on top of the military officials – the general ends up with a bra draped around his shoulders).

Again, we have an instance where the film pushes the envelope past kiddie humor into PG material (perhaps this was one of the films to inspire the ratings, which had not been invented yet?). When Curly Joe warns Moe that’s he headed right toward the general, Larry replies, “Look out – you’ll land him on his brass!”

Many critics, when writing reviews of classic comedy films by the likes of the Three Stooges would mention the pie fight as being a stock-in-trade. This has always perplexed me because the number of Stooges films featuring pie fights are only a fraction of their overall body of work. Audiences do get some pie action in Orbit, though as a baker inexplicably emerges from some barracks to randomly place an array of pies on an outdoor table. You know how this will go: the vehicle’s massive propeller blades will blow the pies right into the army officials’ faces! It is in its way a novel twist on the pie fight – people still end up covered in pie, even if it’s at the hands (blades) of a machine instead of a person!

A truly bizarre sequence finds the Stooges driving the vehicle into a restricted area of the army base – but they can’t tell because a windstorm is obscuring their vision. Cut to officials in a meeting room discussing their latest atomic bomb explosive, activated by water and designed to disintegrate all submarines within a close radius! When the vehicle stalls, Curly Joe disembarks in search of the carburetor – and mistakes the bomb for it!

This is the film’s biggest telegraph, of course but it’s still fun to ride along with the Stooges as they have no idea what they’ve done. When Moe suggests they fly over a lake, Larry encourages him to try submarine mode. “You lamebrain, you saw what happened with sand in the distributor,” Moe admonishes, “whaddaya’think will happen with water in the carburetor,” never realizing that making contact with water would have cataclysmic results!

Before that can happen, the film has to deliver on its title’s promise, and boy does it ever. Moe warns, “Keep your cotton-picking fingers off that ‘orbit’ button,” but a scuffle that finds Moe landing a slap across Curly Joe’s face send the portly one aback… and his hand lands right on the “orbit” button, rocketing the trip into space! Finally, the payoff everyone’s been waiting for, as the Stooges really do go into orbit! In one of the funnier sight gags (so funny the footage is used repeatedly) the trio, knocked unconscious are hurled about the interior of the vehicle as if they are pinballs hitting bumpers. The monitoring Martians are amazed that the craft really works!

A scene reminiscent of Abbott & Costello Go to Mars follows where the boys end up back in earth’s atmosphere. Just like in the Bud and Lou film, the Stooges pass the Statue of Liberty but also add in other landmarks, like the pyramids and the Coliseum. When two airplane pilots spot them, the co-pilot is ready to report what his pilot refers to as a “flying submarine” but the latter vetoes the idea to avoid being labeled crazy!

Plot elements keep loosely colliding. The boys return to the professor’s lab with the vehicle intact while the Martians prepare their giant laser to destroy the vehicle… but the Professor has moved on and is making good on his promise to help the Stooges improve their cartoon show. He starts by smearing what looks like plaster of Paris (the Professor calls his special makeup “quick-drying polyunsaturated titanium) across the Stooges’ faces then gives them special black and white costumes to wear. Moe has some good old-fashioned violent Stooge fun by adding extra “makeup” and really letting Larry and Curly Joe have it as he slaps it across their faces. The Stooges then proceed to do “the latest dance craze,” which appears to be “The Twist.”

A merry mix-up soon ensues as the Martians encounter the Stooges in their costumes and makeup and mistake them for Martians, while the Stooges think the Martians are additional actors the Professor hired (and “Foreign” actors at that). This leads into a gag that was still fresh back in 1962 though may invoke less laughs today: the Stooges start to “read the subtitles” and learn that the Martians plan to destroy the Earth!

Now we get the finale we’ve been waiting for: the Martians hijack the vehicle but before it can take off the Stooges have climbed onto it and hang perilously to the outside! The Professor alerts the military about the hijacking but has no idea the Stooges are on-board. The boys narrowly escape a barrage of gunfire from air force fighters but refuse to give up the ship.

More pointed satire for the adults follows as one of the Martians instructs the other to “Hit them where it hurts the most” and we cut to a shot of Disneyland, complete with Mickey Mouse flora! Moe won’t stand for that and the trio grab the muzzle so it can only shoot into space.

The Stooges ultimately realize the ship is not being powered by a carburetor but by the atom bomb and set forth to douse it with water to “decommission” it.” Meanwhile, the Professor is leaving the chaos of imminent world destruction to everyone else while he dutifully reveals his new animation process to the Stooges’ TV producer and investor. The result is both backward-and-forward looking: it evokes both the “roto-scope” technique pioneered by Max Fleischer in the 1930s while also looking ahead to today’s motion-capture technology! All the Stooges have to do to stay on the air is show up on time…

Of course the boys are a bit busy. After some frantic antics they manage to re-direct the ship’s cannon directly to Mars. Then they detach the top cabin of the ship from the rest of the vehicle so that the Martians... and the atom bomb… go hurtling into the ocean for an explosive finish! The Stooges power on via propeller power and land back on earth to be declared heroes… and also arrive just in time to save their cartoon contract! A silly shot of the Martian leader and his men doing the twist follows, with the leader declaring, “if you can’t lick ‘em, join ‘em!”

There are cuts in the finale that have the same excitement as some of the actual 1950s “alien invasion” films – scenes of dead serious military personnel operating the controls of computers, artillery being marched out to reach the threat, and masses of screaming, running civilians. So authentic feeling are these clips that I have to wonder if Columbia actually borrowed them from their back-catalog of ‘50s sci-fi flicks!

The Three Stooges in Orbit features a lot of silly humor aimed at the kiddie audience who embraced the Stooges via their original shorts being rerun on TV, but there are also some time-tested sight gags and verbal exchanges that will make classic comedy fans chuckle. Not to mention the few extra “winking” bits aimed at adults but certain to go over young kids’ heads. Despite Moe and Larry’s advanced ages being apparent, both are game and give energetic performances, and Joe DeRita is more lively here than in some of his other Stooge outings. It also benefits greatly from wonderfully comic supporting work by longtime Stooges foil Emil Sitka as the scientist (who somehow appears younger than he did in the Stooges’ classic shorts!).

One of the joys of the film is just seeing how the Stooges carry themselves. More was asked of them in their features in terms of acting – moments where they had to roll with the plot dramatically and in a perfunctory fashion – handling scene transitions and the like. Despite this new wrinkle, the Moe and Larry characters as honed in the shorts remain intact. A key example is when the Professor commands, “Prepare for the water test!” Moe parrots the Professor in a mock-authoritative voice, followed by Larry parroting Moe and pointing in the air! Then Larry scoots off to prepare for the water test. It’s not just the “chain of command” aspect but also the vocal inflections and body language here that are vintage Stooges.

The movie has so much charm and light-hearted fun and laughs to offer that it is hard to resist.  If you consider the team’s age at this point, the fact that Curly Joe is the most mild of the “third Stooges” and the fact that the film is child-directed and a plug for the act’s animated series, you may find yourself saying, “This shouldn’t be as good as it is… I’m laughing despite myself.”  But ultimately (and especially with the “meta” aspect of the animated series thrown in) I think that’s really the whole point of the movie… just sit back and enjoy!

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: Edson Stroll, who in the same year started his regular role as Gunner’s Mate Virgil Edwards on the classic sit-com, McHale’s Navy.

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

PROFESSOR: William will show you to your rooms… er, I mean rooms!

MOE – “Looks like a country club for zombies!” 

LARRY: You oughtta’ know!

CURLY JOE: Hey Moe – it’s the Butler!

MOE: It’s always the butler!

MOE: Do you mean to tell me you’re going to let fear stand in the way of our careers?

LARRY AND CURLY JOE: Yes!

MOE: Do you mean to tell me that you’re too chicken to face up to that kooky butler?

LARRY AND CURLY JOE: Yes!

MOE: With three against one?

LARRY AND CURLY JOE: Absolutely!

MOE: Oh, absolutely, eh? Don’t you know that we absolutely left all our clothes and our only absolutely car up there, and you still refuse!

LARRY AND CURLY JOE: Absolutely!

MOE (after slapping Larry and Moe across their faces): We just took a vote, Professor. It’s unanimous. We’re going.

MOE (after a model of the Professor’s invention is demonstrated): It’s going to revolutionize the art of warfare!

LARRY: It’ll even revolutionize revolutions!

LARRY (alluding to the Professor): What a team! He’s got the brains and we’ve got…

MOE (sternly): What?!

LARRY: The enthusiasm!

MOE: That’s better!

MOE: How’re we fixed for gas?

CURLY JOE: Well the arrow’s pointing half-way – I don’t know if it’s half-empty or half-full!

CURLY JOE: Whaddaya’ think – I’m dumb?

MOE: I don’t think, I know!

CURLY JOE: I don’t think you know either!

(Later, after the boys are launched into orbit and start drifting back down to normal speed the entire exchange is repeated, with Curly Joe scratching his head and saying, “hey, didn’t we just do that?” to himself).

VISUAL GAGS:

The afore-mentioned mayhem with both the Professor’s small-scale model vehicle and the full-size craft provides most of the visual delights as the Stooges engage all sorts of tried-and-true slapstick buffoonery.

BEST COMBINATION VERBAL AND VISUAL GAGS:

CURLY JOE (after the propeller incident): I’m sorry Moe – it was an accident.

MOE (after banging Curly Joe on the head with an iron pipe): Oh, well this is on purpose!

MOE (as the trio drive through a windstorm): How d’ya like that? Invisibility – zero!

CURLY JOE: Yeah, and you can’t see, either!

ONE FROM THE STOOGES’ CLASSIC GAG BOOK – Moe tells Curly Joe to clean up the mess. Curly Joe retorts, “I’ll clean it when I’m ready.” Moe then shows a plate of pancakes in Curly Joe’s face. “So?,” Moe asks. “So I’m ready!”

FURTHER READING: There are several excellent books available on the Stooges. Among them are “The Three Stooges Scrapbook” by Jeff and Greg Lenburg and Joan Howard-Maurer, “The Complete Three Stooges” by Jon Solomon and “One Fine Stooge” by Steve Cox and Jim Terry. For a great overview of all Columbia short subject series, pick up “The Columbia Comedy Shorts” by Ted Okuda and Edward Watz.

On the internet you should definitely read the article “The Three Stooges Meet the Monsters” from the Monster Kids site which you can read here.

BUY THE FILM: The Three Stooges in Orbit is available on DVD from a variety of online retailers.

WATCH THE FILM: You can watch the trailer right here: