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The Three Stooges: Curly Classics, starring Moe Howard, Larry Fine, Curly Howard - Curly Classics - Men in Black - Micro-Phonies - Punch Drunks - Three Little Pigskins - Woman Haters - A Plumbing We Will Go

The Three Stooges: Curly Classics gives a 108 minutes of six Three Stooges classics, all dealing with the Three Stooges and Curly in particular: A Plumbing We Will Go (1940), Men In Black (1934), Micro-phonies (1945), Punch Drunks (1934), Three Little Pigskins (1934) and Woman Haters (1934).

Most of these are true classics, and some of the funniest Three Stooges shorts of all times, with the exception of Woman Haterstheir first film for Columbia. Famous routines include Curly going crazy at the sound of music (a gimmick re-used many times since), Curly lip-synching to music, the Stooges impersonating well-qualified people (plumbers in A Plumbing We Will Go and football stars in Three Little Pigskins), and of course Curly's trademark "Woo woo woo woo!" (used for the first time in Men in Black.

I rate it 5 clowns - highly recommended.

Three Stooges: Classic Curly DVD features

The 108-minute DVD contains these shorts:

A Plumbing We Will Go (1940): To escape the police, the Three Stooges pose as plumbers and are hired to fix a leak in a fancy mansion. They wind up crossing the electrical system with the plumbing and generally ruin the place. One of their funniest shorts.

Men in Black (1934)
Men in Black (1934): One of the Three Stooges most famous, and funniest, short films. Men in Black was inspired by a medical drama, Men in White (no, it has nothing to do with Will Smith), and features Moe, Larry and Curly as doctors in a hospital - is there anyone who does not remember "Paging Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard" with a smile? This was the only Three Stooges short to be nominated for an Academy Award.

Micro-Phonies (1945)
Micro-Phonies (1945): The Three Stooges are working in a radio station where a pretty girl (played by Christine McIntyre, the same girl that breaks Shemp's nose in Brideless Groom) has just made a recording of "Voices of Spring" under an assumed name. She wants to hide her aspiring singing career from her disapproving society parents while auditioning for Mrs. Bixby's "Krispy Krunchy" radio program. After a run-in with a pompous violinist, the boys find the record and Curly starts mimicking to it, dressed as a woman. Mrs. Bixby witnesses their performance and is impressed enough to hire "Senorita Cucaracha" (Curly) and Señor Mucho (Moe) and Señor Gusto (Larry) for her radio program. The boys show up in their disguises to "sing" at a Mrs. Bixby's party but run into trouble when Moe smashes the record over Curly's head. The real singer tries to help by singing from behind a curtain while Curly mimics, but she is discovered and the Stooges exit to a hail of phonograph records.

Punch Drunks (1946)
Punch Drunks (1946): Moe, a down-and-out boxing promoter, orders lunch at the restaurant where Curly is the waiter. Musician Larry is there, and plays 'Pop Goes the Weasel' on his violin, causing Curly to become crazy whenever he hears the tune -- knocking out a boxing champ. Moe uses this to promote Curly as a great fighter, with Larry providing the music, until at the title fight Larry's violin is accidentally destroyed. How will Larry provide the music in time? An excellent short, one of their best, with more character development than normal.

Three Little Pigskin (1934)
Three Little Pigskin (1934): The Three Stooges are mistaken for the "Three Horsemen of Boulder Dam," famous football players, and hired by a gambler to play for his team. They agree, blow the big game, and get their just deserts. A young Lucille Ball has a part as a gun moll.

Women Haters (1934)
Women Haters (1934): The very first Three Stooges short film made for Columbia - with a few seeming oddities. All of the dialog is spoken in rhyme, the Stooges' character do not share the actors' names, and there's much less slapstick than we're accustomed to -- but over all, a nice beginning. It's interesting to see how the Stooges' characters and films progressed from this. The basic plot is, the Three Stooges swear off women for life, joining the Women Haters club. Larry goes to break up with his girl, only to be frightened by her father, and marries her instead. He then tries to hide the news from his two fellow members of the club.

Quotes from The Three Stooges - Curly Classics:

Memorable Quotes from Men in White (1934)

Hiccupping Nurse: Oh, Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard! Is it true that an apple a day keeps the doctor away?
Dr. Moe Howard: Yes, that's true.
Hiccupping Nurse: Well, then, why don't the patients eat an apple a day and save hospital expenses?
Dr. Curly Howard: Pardon me if I laugh. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, nyuk! That's a pippin!
Hiccupping Nurse: Oh, I know what a pippin is.
Dr. Larry Fine: You do, eh? What's a pippin?
Hiccupping Nurse: Uh, a pippin is an apple with a skin on the outside.
Dr. Moe Howard: Did you ever see an apple with a skin on the inside?
Hiccupping Nurse: Oh, sure I did.
Dr. Larry Fine: You did?
Hiccupping Nurse: Uh-huh.
Dr. Larry Fine: Where?
Hiccupping Nurse: In homemade apple pie.

PA announcer: Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard...

Dr. Moe Howard: How is she, doctor?
Doctor with 'Tiny Patient': A slight hope.
Dr. Curly Howard: That's too bad. What's the matter?
Doctor with 'Tiny Patient': She's in a coma.
Tiny Patient: [sitting up] I am not! I'm in a bed!

Tiny Patient: Say, doctor, do you really think I'm gonna get better?
Dr. Moe Howard: I'm very sorry, but I'm afraid you are.
Tiny Patient: Oh, thanks, doctor. You don't know how I really appreciate it.

[after being asked where they found their respective patients]
Dr. Larry Fine: Under the bed!
Dr. Moe Howard: Up on the chandelier!
Dr. Graves: What did you do for him?
Dr. Curly Howard: Nothing! What'd he ever do for us?

Dr. Moe Howard, Dr. Curly Howard, Dr. Larry Fine: For Duty and Humanity!

Memorable quotes from Punch Drunk (1934)

Girl: Could you help me? I'm in a terrible dilemma.
Moe: Yeah, I don't care much for these foreign cars myself.
Girl: No, I mean I'm stuck . . .
Moe: On me? Aw, that's what all the girls say.
Girl: No, silly. Stuck in the mud.
Moe: Uh, yeah.

[KO Stradivarius tries to leave the boxing ring but gets caught in the ropes]
KO Stradivarius: Time out! Time out!
Moe: I suppose you'll want the afternoon off.

Curly: What'll ya have?
Moe: I'll have four pieces of burnt toast and a rotten egg.
Curly: Why do you want that?
Moe: I gotta tapeworm and it's good enough for him.

Trivia about The Three Stooges - Curly Classics:

The Three Stooges' Men in Black (1934)
- The bizarre medical terminology used by the Stooges was ad-libbed.
- Curly Howard's famous line "Woo-woo-woo-woo" was used when he forgot his lines, but soon became a standard.
- The third Columbia short for the Stooges and their only short to be nominated for an Academy Award. They lost to the animated short La Cucaracha (1934).
- Title is a spoof of Men in White (1934).
The Three Stooges' Punch Drunk (1934)
- In the original script, it was "Stars and Stripes Forever" that drove Curly Howard crazy, but it was changed when it was decided that Larry Fine would play the tune on the violin. Larry himself chose "Pop-Goes-the-Weasel" because the other song didn't sound right when played on the violin.
- This is the only Three Stooges short that the stooges (Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Curly Howard) wrote entirely themselves.
The Three Stooges' Three Little Pigskins (1934)
- Curly Howard broke a leg after riding down the dumbwaiter.
- Larry Fine lost a tooth when a punch was mistimed.
- In the scene where the Stooges as football players pile on to some photographers, director Ray McCarey wanted the Stooges to do the stunt themselves. They refused, saying it was too dangerous and to get stuntmen to do it. McCarey assured them they wouldn't be hurt, but they still refused. McCarey got three stuntmen to do it, and two of the three, as well as the actors playing the photographers, wound up with broken arms and legs.
The Three Stooges' Women Haters (1934)
- This was the first short the Three Stooges made with Columbia, explaining why certain aspects of the short are very different from what they normally did.
- All of the dialogue rhymes.
- Out of the 190+ shorts the Stooges made, this is one of the few in which their characters aren't called by the Stooges' real names (or variations of their real names).