Western Stooges!

GOLD RAIDERS-1951-In this B-western former silent screen star George O'Brien plays a former US marshal turned insurance salesman named George O'Brien who comes to the town of Red Mesa to protect gold shipments from unscrupulous saloon owner Lyle Talbott. And he is assisted by The Three Stooges! Yes, Moe, Larry & Shemp co-star in this comedy drama which features lots of shoot-outs and face slapping. A sub-plot involves O'Brien's secretary (Sheila Ryan) and her drunken former doctor grandfather (Clem Bevans).

The Stooges are very funny but when they aren't around it's just another low budget western. The saloon shootout at the end is kind of ridiculous and Talbott's stand-in during the final fist fight is very bad. This is the only Stooges full length movie appearance until their first comeback film (HAVE ROCKET WILL TRAVEL) in 1959. It sort of reminded me of Ed Woods' CROSSROAD AVENGER made two years later and featuring Talbott as the villain.

Harry Thomas did the make-up. Fuzzy Knight has a small role as the do nothing sheriff and Monte Blue is also in it. Stooge vet Edward Bernds directed. Thanks to my friend Tony for giving me this!

Larry: Firecrackers?

Moe: That's shooting you, ignoramus. The men out here are rough and tough and love battles.

Larry: Well, I'm weak and soft and I love the Bronx!

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The Stooges and West Out West

THE OUTLAWS IS COMING!-1965-The Three Stooges reek havoc in the old west!

Adam West (just before the BATMAN TV show) plays a crusading Boston magazine editor who goes to Wyoming to stop the slaughter of the buffalo. Of course he takes his three assistants (Moe, Larry & Curly Joe) along with him. There they run into town boss Rance Roden (Don Lamond) and gunslinger Trigger Mortis (Mort Mills) who are deliberating killing the buffalo to start a war with the Indians. Nancy Kovack is Annie Oakley.

It’s kind of dumb but the Stooges manage a few good laughs. There’s no eye poking but a lot of slapstick and even some pie throwing. Stooge second (or fourth?) banana Emil Sitka plays 3 roles. Henry Gibson plays a hip talking Indian and 1960’s children’s TV host “Officer” Joe Bolton has a small role.

Not counting KOOK’S TOUR (an aborted project that was later re-edited) this was the last of the “new” Stooges feature films (which began in 1959 with HAVE ROCKET-WILL TRAVEL). It was directed by Moe’s son-in-law Norman Maurer (who also directed them in AROUND THE WORLD IN A DAZE two years before). Maurer (along with comic book artist Joe Kubert) created the first 3-D comic book as well as well as the “CineMagic” film process (with producer Sidney Pink). He managed the Stooges from 1957 until Larry Fine’s stroke in the early ‘70’s. He later created the cartoon series THE THREE ROBOTIC STOOGES and worked on other Hanna-Barbera projects. He died in 1986.

It was a comic book too!



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The Stooges In The Sixties!

SNOW WHITE AND THE THREE STOOGES-20th Century-Fox-1961-This is the second of the new Three Stooges “comeback” films after HAVE ROCKET WILL TRAVEL (if you don’t count the mostly compilation STOP! LOOK! AND LAUGH with Paul Winchell).

Snow White (1960 Olympic Gold Medal skater Carol Heiss) is imprisoned by her evil stepmother (Patricia Medina, who later on becomes an ugly broom using witch) after the death of her husband The King (Edgar Barrier). A good 15 minutes passes (after the credits) before The Stooges show up. They are traveling entertainers who saved and adopted Prince Charming (Edson Stroll who was in THE THREE STOOGES IN ORBIT the next year, the “Twilight Zone” episode “The Eye Of The Beholder” and the “McHale’s Navy” TV show) when he was a boy.

They do some slapstick (though the eye poking is kept to a minimum) and get a magic sword that grants wishes. With all the ice skiing and singing, it seems like The Stooges were trying to emulate the early ‘40’s musical comedies of Abbott & Costello!

Guy Rolfe (who was in DR. SARDONICUS and KING OR KINGS the same year) is the queen’s consort. Buddy Baer (GIANT FROM THE UNKNOWN) is the queen’s reluctant executioner. Baer was also in A & C’s JACK AND THE BEANSTALK.

Also with Peter Coe (HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN), Marie Blake (AKA Blossom Rock; Grandmamma on “The Addams Family”), Herbie Faye and Burt Mustin. Scriptwriter Elwood Ullman, who wrote a few of The New Stooges later efforts, also scripted many Bowery Boys movies, perhaps Abbott & Costello’s worst film LOST IN ALASKA and DR. GOLDFOOT AND THE BIKINI MACHINE. Co-writer Noel Langley scripted THE WIZARD OF OZ!

This was the last film from director Walter Lang, who was no stranger to musicals having helmed THE KING AND I and THERE’S NO BUSINESS LIKE SHOW BUSINESS and other titles dating back to 1925! He died in 1972 three years before original Stooges Moe and Larry. Curly Joe said goodbye in 1993.



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