Trivia: See "Three Stooges"

Trivia: The "middle stooge" in the various incarnations of the Three Stooges, Larry Fine was most recognizable across his four decades in show business by his eccentric frizzed out hair. He occupied the awkward and often ill-defined position of "middle man," his presence necessary to give a gag body and a boost of action, and to keep it going to its conclusion. As an actor in the group's sketches, he was most often characterized as the wide-eyed nebbish, often nearly as surprised as any by-stander character by the physical comedy (and mayhem) taking place. His most memorable catch-phrases included "Moe, I didn't mean it" (usually followed by a slap from Moe), and "I'm a victim of circumstance" (which was used by Curly on occasion as well).And "victim of circumstance" might define his whole entre to the world of performing. He was born Louis Feinberg in Philadelphia, the son of a jeweler. One day while at his father's shop, an accident took place that resulted in his forearm being badly burned with aqua regia, the acid used to test the purity of gold. The doctor who treated him warned his parents that he would have to do something to strengthen the arm or he would lose it. That led to his taking up the violin, an instrument at which he became so proficient that the family considered sending him to Europe for advanced study, a plan that fell apart with the advent of the First World War He began playing the violin in vaudeville under the name Larry Fine, developing a routine in which he would play from a nearly sitting, knees-bent position, kicking his legs alternately. In 1925, he crossed paths with Moe Howard, who was already working, in tandem with his brother Shemp Howard as part of a comedy act with Ted Healy. He became part of the act and remained when Shemp left, to be replaced by another Howard brother, Curly (aka Jerome). The trio eventually left Healy's employ and struck out on their own as the Three Stooges. Over the course of 25 years and 190 short films at Columbia Pictures, they became one of the longest running movie comedy acts (if not always the most respected or beloved, especially by women) in history. Larry Fine's contribution was a mix of violin virtuosity (on display at various times across their history, from Punch Drunks, Disorder In The Court, and "Violent Is The Word For Curly" in the early/middle 1930s to Sweet And Hot in the late 1950s) and zany cluelessness, mixed with an occasional out-of-left-field ad-lib. Larry usually played the wide-eyed middle-stooge, but occasionally the plots of the trio's movies would allow him some variation on this characterization. In "Sweet And Hot," he plays a small-town boy who has made good as a stage producer, and whose intervention sets the plot (focused on characters played by Muriel Landers and Joe Besser) in motion; and in Rockin' In The Rockies, a full-length feature, as a result of a plot that split Moe Howard's character off from the trio, Larry plays the aggressive "head stooge," and is surprisingly good at it. But he was best known as the clueless middle stooge, often referred to by Moe as "porcupine" because of his hair-style. He kept on with the Stooges into the 1960s, but was forced to retire as his health -- damaged by a series of strokes -- deteriorated later in the decade. He passed away in 1975. He was so familiar, that in 1980, five years after his death, his name still turned up in popular culture. In episode two of the sitcom Bosom Buddies, when women's hotel manager Lucille Benson finds Tom Hanks' Kip Wilson in a female tenant's room, she pulls him by the ear down the hall, causing him to exclaim, "Who am I -- Larry Fine?" And in 1983, SCTV presented "Give 'Em Hell, Larry," a short bit (done as a TV promo spot) in which Joe Flaherty portrays James Whitmore (who had previously enjoyed major success playing President Harry Truman in the one-man show "Give 'Em Hell, Harry") performing the one-man show as Larry Fine -- it was among the funniest 60 seconds of television that season.

Trivia: Brooklyn-born comedian Shemp Howard was the oldest of five sons of a Lithuanian immigrant couple. Shemp was a prankish kid who used humor to obscure the fact that he lived in mortal fear of practically everything, from automobiles to oceans. It is fortunate that he chose show business as profession, since he proved time and again to be utterly incapable of succeeding in any other line of work. Following the lead of his younger brother Moe, Shemp went into vaudeville with a blackface act. In 1922, Shemp and Moe were hired as stooges for comedian Ted Healy; three years later, Larry Fine joined the act, which graduated from vaudeville to Broadway. Since Healy liked his stooges to look as ridiculous as possible, he insisted that they each adopt an eccentric hairstyle. Shemp chose to part his hair down the middle and slick it into place with vaseline, a style he'd retain for the rest of his career. Shemp struck out on his own in 1932. Throughout the '30s, he was starred or featured in dozens of Vitaphone 2-reel comedies, where his growly delivery of lines, his incessant adlibbing and his homely "kisser" never failed to elicit loud laughter. In 1940, he signed a contract with Universal pictures, appearing in such films as Hellzapoppin' (1941), Pittsburgh (1942) and Arabian Nights (1942). Shemp was invariably hilarious in these films -- too hilarious for the tastes of such comedians as W.C. Fields and Lou Costello, who insisted that many of Shemp's best bits be consigned to the cutting room floor. While headlining his own series of Columbia 2-reelers in 1946, Shemp was asked by his brother Moe and Larry Fine to rejoin their old act, which by now had gained fame as The Three Stooges. Shemp's replacement in the act, his kid brother Curly, had suffered a stroke, and a new "patsy" was required to act as the target of Moe's physical assaults. Shemp remained with the Three Stooges from 1946 thorugh 1955, appearing in two-reelers, stage presentations, TV guest spots, and one feature film (Gold Raiders [1951]). Shemp Howard died of a sudden heart attack at the age of 60; even after his death, Shemp "starred" in four Three Stooges comedies, courtesy of stock footage from earlier films and a stand-in by the name of Joe Palma.

Trivia: Although she starred in scores of B-Westerns opposite the likes of Buck Jones, Buster Crabbe, and Johnny Mack Brown, blonde American actress/singer Christine McIntyre is almost solely remembered for her energetic appearances opposite that zaniest of comedy teams, the Three Stooges. With a Bachelor of Music degree from the Chicago Musical College, McIntyre began her professional career on radio. She entered films around 1937, graduating to leading roles the following year opposite singing cowboy Fred Scott. Appearances in a large number of B-Westerns followed and McIntyre would probably have remained just another prairie flower had she not caught the eye of Columbia producer Hugh McCollom. Not so different at first from the host of pretty girls who decorated the Columbia comedy shorts, McIntyre soon developed into a first-rate comedienne, with an operatic voice to boot. The erudite McCollum persuaded Stooges director Edward Bernds to create Micro-Phonies (1945) for her, with McIntyre was perfectly cast as an aspiring vocalist whose rendition of "The Voice of Spring" is spoiled by the irreverent trio. Micro-Phonies proved one of the year's best Stooges shorts and the die was cast. Alternately playing ingenues and femme fatales, Christine McIntyre was almost regarded as the fourth Stooge and stayed with the department until 1954, longer if one counts her many subsequent appearances via stock footage. "Of all the people I worked with, Christine was one of my favorites," Stooges veteran Emil Sitka said, not long before his death in 1998. Director Edward Bernds concurred: "She was so nice, so sweet; a real joy. She had the rare ability of indulging in the zany antics and still remaining a real lady, which is what she was." The seemingly indefatigable McIntyre also managed to squeeze a series of Johnny Mack Brown Westerns into her busy schedule, but mainstream stardom eluded her and she retired in the mid-'50s to marry J. Donald Wilson, a radio director/producer. Although she relished talking about her many B-Westerns, McIntyre flatly refused to discuss her work with the Stooges.

Trivia: A stage actor since the 1920s, Kenneth MacDonald found the going rough in Hollywood until he published and distributed a pamphlet titled "The Case of Kenneth MacDonald." This little self-promotional book brought him to the attention of studio executives, and throughout the 1930s MacDonald could be seen as a mustachioed, mellifluous-voiced villain in scores of westerns and melodramas. His work in the Charles Starrett westerns at Columbia led to a lengthy association with that studio. From 1940 through 1954, MacDonald played featured roles in such Columbia productions as Island of Doomed Men (1940), Power of the Whistler (1945) and The Caine Mutiny (1954); he was also prominently cast in the studio's short subjects, especially in the comedies of the Three Stooges and Hugh Herbert, his most familiar role being that of a society criminal or shyster lawyer. During the 1960s, Kenneth MacDonald was a semi-regular on the Perry Mason TV series, playing a solemn judge.

Trivia: American character actor Emil Sitka spent many years as a comic foil for the Three Stooges, first appearing with the Stooges in Half-Wits Holiday. He himself was about to become a Stooge in 1975 when Moe Howard passed away and broke up the trio forever. Sitka started out working odd jobs in mid-'30s Hollywood to support his family. Tiny acting roles were among those jobs. Sitka continued to appear in over 500 short films working with some of Hollywood's brightest stars, including Lucille Ball, Milton Berle, and Red Skelton. In addition to his acting career, Sitka was also a structural engineer.

Trivia: Like most African-American performers of his generation, comic actor Dudley Dickerson played more than his fair share of Pullman porters, bell-boys, waiters, and shoe-shine boys. But from the late '30s until the mid-'50s, Dickerson was the most prominent black actor working in two-reel comedies. Contracted by Columbia's short subject department, the roly-poly supporting comic brought a refreshing energy to his portrayals of, yes, Pullman porters, shoe-shine boys, and the always demeaning "frightened Negro domestic." Closer in type to Mantan Moreland than Stepin Fetchit, Dickerson was especially good opposite Charley Chase in His Bridal Fright (1940) and the Three Stooges in A-Plumbing We Will Go (1940). Dickerson played a Pullman porter once again in his final film The Alligator People (1959), after which he concentrated on television work. The veteran comic died of cerebral thrombosis.

Trivia: Her pompous Grande Dame ego constantly deflated by having a pie hurled in her face, brunette American comedy actress Symona Boniface became for the Three Stooges what Margaret Dumont was for the Marx Brothers. Surprisingly, Boniface had been a noted stage actress and playwright before the 1929 stock market crash wiped her out financially. Moving to Hollywood, she toiled in anonymity doing bit parts and extra work until signing a stock contract with Columbia Pictures in 1935. A major addition to the studio's thriving short subject department, Boniface popped up in two-reelers all over the place but is today mostly associated with the Stooges, who regularly flattened her haughty demeanor. The quintessential Boniface characters were the snobbish Mrs. Van Bustle of Crash Goes the Hash (1944) and the conceited dowager Mrs. Smythe-Smythe in 1947's Half-Wits Holiday, the latter featuring her being furiously pelted with pies dropped from the ceiling. A talented but much overlooked part of the Stooges legacy, Symona Boniface died less than three years later at the Motion Picture Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, CA, but continued, eerily, to figure prominently in Stooges shorts through the middle of the decade due to the generous doses of stock footage added to keep mounting costs down.