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!

TO HEIR IS HUMAN (1944)

RATING: ** & ½ out of ****

PLOT: Mistaken for a private detective, Una Merkel decides to play along with the charade for the chance to earn a thousand dollars. Her task: find missing heir Harry Langdon within 24 hours. She just doesn’t realize that she’s been hired by one of Harry’s greedy relatives (Lew Kelly), head of a dastardly trio (including Christine McIntyre and Eddie Gribbon) out to do away with Harry so they can be next in line for his inheritance! Can Una and Harry turn the Grim Reaper into a Grinning Reaper and literally survive a night in a spooky house?!

REVIEW: As mentioned in other “Scared Silly” reviews, the Columbia shorts department was constantly trying to hit pay dirt with a comedy duo to rival Laurel & Hardy and Abbott & Costello’s popularity. Some inspired teams came from these attempts – namely (Wally) Vernon and (Eddie) Quillan, (Gus) Schilling and (Dick) Lane and Hugh Herbert and Dudley Dickerson (although that last team was never billed as such – Herbert received top billing).

For this short, Columbia tried pairing vivacious comedienne Una Merkel with Harry Langdon, whose fame as well as box office receipts briefly (about three films briefly) rivaled Chaplin’s, Keaton’s and Lloyd’s in the silent era, and whose merits have been debated ever since (Langdon has many champions and I count myself among them. He also has many detractors). Merkel, the once stand-in for Lilian Gish began as a dramatic actress in silents and appeared in the early-talkie and horror-comedy template “The Bat Whispers” but her funny side (she fell somewhere between Helen Kane and Gracie Allen, but more subdued than either) really flourished in several late 1930s/early 1940s shorts and features (most notably the W.C Fields classic, “The Bank Dick”).

For Una, this was her second and final short for the Columbia unit and her second teaming (she previously appeared in tandem with Gwen Kenyon). For Langdon, this was Columbia short number 17 and not his first as a member of a team (previous teammates included Monty Collins and Elsie Ames); after “Heir” he’d finish up with four more Columbia shorts, teamed-up with but practically playing second banana to Swedish dialect comic, El Brendel. Both Merkel and Langdon had prior horror-comedy experience: she as part of an all-star cast in the pseudo-comedy-horror “Cracked Nuts;” he in a few shorts including “Goodness, a Ghost!” for RKO and another Columbia, “Shivers.”

Interestingly, this particular short received a bigger budget and longer running time than other Columbia shorts, which typically ran between 16 and 18 minutes (this one ran a full 20 minutes). One of the most noticeable differences is that once it hits the second reel, the short has its own score. Although the Columbia comedy shorts were spun off from the “Musical Novelties.” series of shorts, after the Three Stooges’ sing-songy “Woman Haters” hit with audiences the studio recognized it was the gags and jokes that kept audiences coming back for more. They decided it was best to dial down the music in favor of the laughs. In any event, no one has uncovered a reason why this particular short was singled out for special treatment. Maybe Columbia just took notice of the hefty box office receipts brought in by that early ‘40s pair of boy-girl horror-comedies, “The Ghost Breakers” (Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard) and “Whistling in the Dark” (Red Skeleton and Ann Rutherford) and thought they had a launch-pad here for similar success. The music during “Heir’s” scary sequences sure is reminiscent of the feature length horror-comedies of the day.

While Una and Harry are billed as a co-starring team, Una’s name comes first – the result of a simple “ladies first” courtesy, perhaps? Or maybe just the fact that Una’s antics dominate at least the first half of its running time.

The short starts off on uneven footing by putting Una through some slapstick paces. She is distributing new phone books and retrieving those that are out of date. She is bodily thrown out of one office whose owner chides her for “soliciting” and then a phone book is tossed into the hallway right into her posterior. With precision trajectory the flying directory sends Una sailing into the office across the way, which just so happens to be the “Hide & Seek Missing Persons Buereau.” This sets up the plot proper, but unfortunately it doesn’t signal an end to Una’s physical trials.

As Una tries to get her bearings, a man hands her a business card that reads, “A Raven Sparrow, Coo Coo Manor.” He also attempts to secure her services as a private detective. Her protests to the contrary are silenced when the man gives Una a photo of Harry Langdon and offers her one thousand dollars if she finds the “missing heir.” After all, Una muses, “If I had a thousand dollars I could get a permanent wave!”

She doesn’t have to look far for Harry – he’s right outside the window, being that he’s a window cleaner. And so we’re back into the slapstick with little rhyme or reason. Harry Langdon once said of his Columbia assignments that “When I play in what I call the O-Ouch-O comedies, where the comedian runs about, is hit on the head, etc., I am just an animated suit of clothes.” Sadly, in this instance it is Una doing most of the running about and being hit, acting as an animated dress if you will. In her attempts to get Harry to come along with her Una is repeatedly stuck in a window pane, nearly (accidentally) drilled by a dentist, knocked to the ground and knocked about in general. It’s all a bit jarring. It’s Una’s bubbly and unflappable personality that gets the viewers through these scenes, like a puppy or kitten that continues to wag its tail no matter how much roughhousing they’ve endured at the paws of the older, larger household pet.

Ultimately this chase sequence draws to a close, helped along by its final setting, which has Una and Harry interrupting a corporation’s big business meeting. They frantically chase one another around but pause long enough for Harry to insert an inspirational speech of his own: “Gentlemen, I propose that we get bigger and better businesses – our customer doors are…” and it trails off into something both unintelligible and nonsensical. Somehow it all ends with Harry sliding chest-first across the boardroom table, papers flying everywhere!



The trio of villains is introduced next, in a fun little sequence that matches the usual horror-comedy formula for scheming villains to a tee. When Una calls A. Raven Sparrow to inform him she’s found Harry, the ringleader informs the others (and the audience) that Harry stands to inherit a fortune if he survives the night… unless he meets an untimely, “accidental” end. Each gets to extol his or her own brand of villainy as being the most effective for the job at hand. Slinky, sexy Velma plans to play the kissing cousin and slip Harry a Mickey. Brutish Bobo wants to use physical violence. But Raven has devised a more “shocking” exit for Harry – literally – with a bed rigged to deliver 100,000 volts of electricity to whoever uses it! Each relative is the perfectly played archetype. Christine McIntyre as Velma essays her classic vampy femme fatale.. Eddie Gribbon as Bobo is as bulky and punch-drunk as Maxie Rosenbloom ever was. Tall, pallid Lew Kelly as Raven is a cross between Boris Karloff and Raymond Massey, and affects the stock diabolical laugh used by countless creepy villains in both animated cartoons and live action productions of the 1930s, ‘40s and ‘50s.

As we move firmly into the second reel portion, Una and Harry approach the house and the spooky background music begins. Unbeknownst to the innocent pair, Bobo has climbed a tree over the garden bench. Every time Una and Harry look away, Bobo throws a rope down to remove objects like tree stumps, Una’s hat (which Bobo both removes and replaces) and a lantern. At first both are scared, but Una abruptly switches gears and brushes it off, insisting they get into the house (perhaps she remembered the thousand dollars and permanent wave).

Harry next gets to do some visual character bits which add weight to the argument that his talent was immense if often (self)misguided. First he crouches down and slips into the house through the bottom half of the door. He does so with such grace and finesse while at the same time in a comical way that his silent film training appears on full display. All the more impressive when you realize how quickly the bit comes and goes. Next comes the most impressively composed shot of the short, as Harry in extreme close-up lights a match to guide his way. Again, all the acting is as if he’s back in a silent, his malleable face telling the audience volumes about his fear. When Velma flips the light switch and Harry sees her seductively lounging in an arm chair, Harry’s version of a double-take response is to leap backwards away from her! As Velma approaches Harry he keeps fluttering backwards, removing his hat while trembling and stuttering. The scene is capped by Harry accidentally spilling the acidic liquid meant to be his demise.

By contrast, Una’s next scene falters by requiring her to do visual comedy. Una was funny – she made goofy faces, had comical body language, and was the perfect combination of quirky and clueless. It was her persona from which her humor derived. By forcing her into stock slapstick and sight gags that depended more upon situation than personality, a little was lost in the translation. Una climbs a trellis to try to enter the house. It teeters and tilts toward Bobo, who almost snatches Una several times. She’s back on firm footing – literally and figuratively – when she enters the home through a bedroom window, wondering aloud where Raven is with her thousand dollars and hiding behind the door in fear when Bobo tells Raven she’s in the house. As the villains exit the room, Una collapses to the ground in typical Merkel fashion.

The climax plays out with a parade of fright gags as is so common to the second reel of horror-comedy shorts (though in this one, the gags are none too scary). Most have a visual touch. We get a frantic hallway scene with characters running in and out of doors and often converging despite their opposition (similar to the scene in Buster Keaton’s horror-comedy silent, “The Haunted House”… and much later parodied to death on the late ‘60s “Scooby Doo” cartoon show). Harry is truly an animated suit in these scenes but in this context, it’s a very funny suit indeed as Langdon extends his arms, legs and facial muscles in kooky contortions. This funny bit is marred by another Una slapstick setpiece as she’s knocked out, placed on the electric bed and shot through the air by its voltage. Harry’s attempts to “get help” put him in the villains’ paths, particularly Velma who sets Harry into a tizzy with a tantalizing liplock. Again, the array of hysterical facial expressions pulled off by Harry in this second reel more than make up for his more inert performance in the first reel.

True to form, you have to take the good with the bad in “To Heir is Human.” After some nice reaction comedy from Harry, a very dark gag ensues: roped from above by Bobo, a noose is knotted around Harry’s neck and as Bobo pulls Harry up, he clutches at the rope while making distorted faces. Depending upon your tolerance for black humor, this particular gag may be too much or just right. I personally find it a little too close to reality to laugh at it. Thankfully the off-putting mood is shattered… and so is a statue, right on top of the villain’s heads and Harry wrangles out of the rope to rout the bad guys! The short would have done well to fade out right there, but one last bit is squeezed into the proceedings. Unfortunately, it’s spectacularly unfunny: as Una and Harry run off the property, Bobo once again lassos them. Their fear is so great they pull Bobo (obviously a stuffed dummy) from the tree and drag him behind them. The End.

Like so many efforts in the horror-comedy genre, particularly horror-comedy shorts, the good work of the players is simply undone by other elements. Here it’s the direction and production. Director Harold Godsoe was a second unit or assistant director on nearly 20 films, but only a full-fledged director twice: on “To Heir is Human” as well as an Italian-American film featuring more Italian than English. By this point Langdon’s career was considered to be in sad decline and his El Brendel team-ups to come lack the fire of his early efforts. But something about “Heir” livened Langdon up. While rather subdued and even lackluster in the short’s first few scenes, Langdon’s vigor returns with a vengeance for the scare scenes, resulting in one great take after another (for example, the faces he makes when he catches a whiff of the poisoned drink he’s been served are priceless). Likewise, Una’s energy and cute, perky-quirky qualities carry along the majority of her scenes with appealing whimsicality. The supporting cast is game, with the villains in particular adding zest to the proceedings. Unfortunately the flat direction, awkward pacing and weak compositions and too many knockabout gags at the expense of Una are a bit unnerving (it's difficult seeing a woman thrown and bashed about - the comedy factor is diminished to practically non-existent as opposed to when some goofy male schlub is on the receiving end). Last but certainly not least, for a horror-comedy this one is devoid of traditional scare scenes and trappings - sure, it's got the spooky house bit down but one wishes to see a skeleton dangling, giant cobwebs or the villains wearing ghostly sheets. All these factors combine to lessen the impact. It’s an average film at best, elevated to slightly above average status due to its performers and their performances.

SPOTTED IN THE CAST: Heine Conklin plays the dentist. A member of the famed Keystone Kops from the silent comedy era, Conklin had a long career spanning over 400 films and appeared alongside such legendary movie clowns as Charlie Chaplin, W.C. Fields, Mae West, Wheeler & Woolsey, Hugh Herbert, The Three Stooges, Olsen & Johnson, Andy Clyde and Abbott & Costello (including a role in “Abbott & Costello Meet the Keystone Kops,” of course). He turned up in series films like the Blondie, Charlie Chan and Lone Wolf films, the Green Hornet serial and classics ranging from Marilyn Monroe’s romantic comedy “Monkey Business” to Richard Widmark’s film nor “Pickup on South Street” to the Lon Chaney biopic, “Man of a Thousand Faces.”

BEST DIALOGUE EXCHANGES:

UNA: You’re the missing heir to a fortune – you’ve gotta’ come with me!

HARRY: A fortune?! I don’t want a fortune – I can’t afford one of those things.

UNA (frustrated that Harry has run off): He’s not going to get away with my permanent!

HARRY: (pointing to the smoking floor after accidentally pouring corrosive acid on it): Lady, your floor's got a hot foot!

BEST GAGS:

When Una realizes the man she’s looking for is right outside the window, she rushes at Harry, but Harry comes through the next window. They then confer about who Una is seeking, until Una realizes she’s talking to him.

As Raven sits down on the bed to explain how the electric booby trap works, Bobo pulls the switch, sending watts and volts through Raven and catapulting him through the air!

Unnerved by the frightening atmosphere at the house, Harry doesn’t realize he’s clinging to (and slightly raising) Una’s hemline.

When Harry raises his poisoned glass to toast his fortune, he knocks it into a statuette, which punctures the glass so the corrosive liquid leaks to the floor, setting it on fire.

As Harry pours another poisoned drink into a plant vase, the plant goes through its death throes, playing out a death scene worthy of a hack actor.

BEST COMBO VERBAL/VISUAL GAG:

UNA (running down the stairs): Where are you going?

HARRY (running up the stairs): I’m going upstairs to get you!

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.

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:

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!