Some time ago, I wrote about, and showed, the only known time that the 3 Howard Brothers appeared in a publicity photo.
Only 2 ever appeared at any one time in the troupe. Shemp was an original member, left for his own career, and returned when Curly became ill and had to leave. Shemp remained until his death in 1955. The Stooges still had 4 films left in their contract, so they hired someone to stand in for Shemp in those films. They mostly show this "fake Shemp" with his face covered.
Someone stitched together pieces from these 4 films, showing many (maybe all!) of the footage with Joe Palma, the poor guy who had to fill-in for Shemp Howard.
After these films, the Stooges got another contract for more short films, and made them. For whatever reason, they hired an actor named Joe Besser to be the third Stooge. Few people today know these films exist. They just assume that the Stooges always consisted of Larry, Moe and Curly. Shemp and Besser, and even "Curly" Joe Derita have pretty much been expunged from memory, which is quite sad, especially for poor Shemp, who deserved so much better.
Herewith: A clip from a Joe Besser Stooge film.
Bev
2 comments:
Hey Bevboy! I'm just a stranger on the internet that found a 2010 snippet of your blog. I assumed that your blog would have been long inactive by now.
But much to my surprise you're still quite active and update on a well enough schedule. I figured that I would go back, and find February 22, 2009. Exactly ten years ago today (for me). Under the hopeful assumption that Blogspot notifies people of a comment and links them to the post, I hope you get a nice look back at yourself a decade prior.
In fact I'm a really sort of jealous of your 12 year old blog. It gives you a clear cut, almost daily window of your thoughts for nearly 12 years! That's an amazing thing for a human to have. Most of us forget the little things that pop in our heads but with this, you can access over 3,845 snippets of your life and interviews. That's brilliant, wouldn't you agree?
Hello, anonymous. Thanks so much for writing.
Yeah, the blog keeps ticking along. I try to write on a regular basis, but my day job and my night job conspire to make that not always possible.
Please keep reading. You have thousands of posts to read. Go ahead and comment on all of 'em.
Cheers!
Bevboy
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