Though Harry Cohn, president and chief of production at Columbia Pictures was widely praised and greatly talented in terms of his abilities to produce high quality films, ultimately building Columbia Pictures into one of the largest known movie enterprises in Hollywood, he is also infamously known as a largely unlikeable, manipulative, greedy man. His disagreeable nature is reflective of one remark made by Cohn, who once remarked that running his studio was “better than being a pimp.” Along his road to success, he quickly earned a highly unfavorable reputation in the Hollywood. For those in the movie business, he was known as a man who was highly combative, and an overall generally unpleasant individual; one who took pleasure in terrorizing his workers. While widely known as one of the leading figures in the Stooges’ rise to fame, the successful Stooge trio was not immune to the wrath of Cohn.
As an actor employed under Cohn, Curly witnessed the cruelty of the chief of Columbia production firsthand. Even after suffering from multiple, debilitating strokes, Cohn completely disregarded the physical and emotional well-being of the actor, and still forced the weakened actor to continue working in his highly weakened state. In addition to his notoriously unrealistic expectations for both his actors and his employees, Cohn was also regarded as a “master manipulator,” and was known to take advantage of the Stooges finances on multiple occasions. Despite the Stooges’ great success, still Cohn kept the stars largely underpaid for the entirety of their career. Even when the Stooges’ short films experienced a television resurgence, generating millions in profits, still Cohn gave little of these profits to any one of the Stooge trio.
“The Man of a Thousand Voices”
In addition to his voice role in the film “Snow White,” Mel Blanc, the late legendary voice artist, famously known as “The Man of a Thousand Voices,” also lent his vocal talents to the work of the Three Stooges, giving life to a puppet named Quinto the Jester, the Stooges’ ventriloquist dummy in their 1961 movie, Snow White and the Three Stooges.
In addition to Blanc, during the filming of this movie, the Stooges were also accompanied by co-stars Edson Stroll, Patricia Medina, and Guy Rolfe.
Stooge Reboot
Though for years famed filmmakers Bobby and Peter Farrelly, most known for their work on the comedy “Dumb and Dumber”, first tried to replicate the Three Stooges’ in 2009—a reboot which would have involved actor Sean Penn, playing the role of Larry, Benicio del Toro as Moe, and Jim Carrey as Curly (a role which would lead Carrey to gain 40 pounds of extra weight for the part)—this attempt eventually fell apart.
Eventually, in 2012, the Farrelys were finally able to bring the Stooges back to life in “The Three Stooges: The Movie”, a film which was uniquely composed of three short, stand-along Stooge stories. The final movie starred Chris Diamantopolous as Moe, Sean Hayes as Larry, and Will Sasso as Curly. “It’s by far the riskiest project we’ve ever done, without question, but it is also the one closest to our hearts,” said Farelly brothers Peter and Bobby, in one statement released about their movie.
Throwing Pies in the Face of Adversity
Many credit The Three Stooges' appeal largely to their ability to relate to the general public. For fans, the Stooges and their comedy served as an escape for many, providing them with comic relief during the harsh economic challenges so many Americans faced during the times of the Great Depression. Especially as tensions between social classes rose following the stock market’s crash, and as the country, as well as the world, fell deeper and deeper into a period of great sadness and despair, the Stooges emerged at a seemingly perfect time. With their whimsical antics, ability to relate to the working class and the common man, and their unwillingness to quit despite economic adversity, made them the perfect act for this point in US history.
As opposed stories of glamorous and lavish on-screen lifestyles, the Stooges were greatly successful in there ability to relate to those of the working class, and often mocked the wealthy, “hoity-toity” social elitists. During the Stooges’ on screen performances, the elite, upper class society was victimized and mocked, often times with a pie thrown in their faces. Of the main recurring themes in the The Three Stooges’ acts, ideas of anti-aristocracy and anti-wealth were prevalent, and thus appealed to the general masses, as these ideas were widely popular among the common classes during this era of the Depression. The stooges silly antics and references to the socio-economical issues of that time provided much needed distraction for those experiencing great losses and debt. The comedic acts of the Stooges significantly uplifted the moral of the majorly disheartened population of Depression-ridden America.
Cinema Killed The Vaudeville Star… But Not The Stooges
Despite the decrease in Vaudeville comedy with the rise of Cinema, because the Three Stooges transitioned their live Vaudeville act over to film, the arrival of the movie only made The Stooges and their work stronger. Though Ted Healy & His Stooges made their first film debut in Soup to Nuts (1930)—a Fox Studios feature film—the movie was considered a huge flop.
Though Healy’s act, which relied largely on ad libs and improvisation, was popular on stage, unfortunately this style of performance did not translate well onto the big screen. Despite Healy’s failed attempt at film, Fox Studios was largely impressed by the performance of the Stooges, and offered the three Stooges a contract. Healy was not included in this film contract; a decision which created tension and hostility between the furious Healy, and the three Stooges (Larry, Moe and Shep).