WEEKEND STOOGEFEST

‘Dizzy Doctors’ (1937) is the 21st short comedy made by The Three Stooges for Columbia Pictures. It was photographed from Wednesday, December 9 through Saturday, December 12, 1936 and was released on Friday, March 19, 1937. I consider it in the top-tier of the Curly shorts, with pacing, jokes and plot all working together in splendid concert. (Bet you never thought you’d hear the words ‘splendid’ and ‘concert’ used in conjunction with the Three Stooges). The Stooges best director, Del Lord, is in charge and we get appearances from two of their greatest supporting players, Bud Jamison and Vernon Dent. I like the art-deco corner pharmacy with Alka-Seltzer receiving some very prominent product placement (perhaps the Columbia Studio executives all got a case of the stuff to cure their after-lunch indigestion?). The final four minutes is one of the best Stooge chase scene wrap-ups, most of it taking place in hospital hallways with inventive hidden jumpcuts and clever sound effects as well as an excellent finale on the Columbia backlot ‘New York street’. To top things off, Moe and Curly’s father Sol Horowitz can be seen as an extra at 17:05 looking on as the Stooges crash their gurney into a car. He wears a Fedora and sports a (fake?) mustache and glasses. He’s also in the courtroom audience in ‘Disorder in the Court’ (1936), a spectator in ‘Grips, Grunts, and Groans’ (1937), a pedestrian in ‘False Alarms’ (1936), and a man in the crowd in ‘Half Shot Shooters’ (1936). Solomon and his wife Jenny were in town visiting their famous sons, and Sol was given these small parts when he visited the boys on the set. Moe later said that his dad was “kind of a ham” and enjoyed being in the films.

MOVIES
'TIL
DAWN

Sign up for news & updates so you don't miss a thing!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More
articles