Meet the Stooges
Larry Fine
It was during a playdate in Chicago, in 1925, at a night club called the Rainbow Gardens, that Larry was first asked to become a stooge. Ted Healy, Moe and Shemp Howard took in Larry's performance one evening, at which time Shemp informed Healy that he planned to leave the act. Moe suggested that perhaps Larry could replace Shemp. Healy liked the idea and at the conclusion of the show the trio went backstage to meet with Fine. Ted made him an offer: $90 a week to become a stooge and an extra $10 a week if he’d throw away his fiddle. The next day, Larry accepted the offer and this was the beginning of what would eventually be “The Three Stooges”. Shemp would return later, as his stint away from Healy did not pan out.
Moe Howard
In his younger days, he enjoyed going to the fights, football games, and midget auto racing and had hobbies that including hooking rugs and stamp and coin collecting. Moe even tried the art of wine making. His daughter Joan, about ten at the time, recalls what happened:
“Never one for reading directions carefully, he made a radical mistake somewhere down the line. Something to do with not removing the bung from the wine barrel at the right time… or maybe not removing it at all. When the day arrived for my father to taste his wine, he pulled out the bung and all hell broke loose. The entire contents of the barrel — wine, skins and seeds — exploded out like they were shot out of a cannon. The room, which had white walls, was splashed with vivid red, but the strangest sight of all was my father. He was wine red from head to toe and peppered with grape seeds. They were stuck to him everywhere: his ears, his nostrils, his hair. Even the walls of the room were plastered with seeds. My dad was able to take a bath after and clean himself up, but that house must still have telltale signs of what went on that fateful day.”
Curly Howard
Curly’s wacky style of comedy started to emerge, first on stage and then on screen when Healy and his Stooges starred in numerous features and comedy shorts for MCM. Later in 1934, Curly played an integral part in the team’s rise to fame as the Three Stooges at Columbia Pictures, where he starred as a Stooge in 97 two-reel comedies.
But success virtually destroyed Curly. He started to drink heavily, feeling that his shaven head robbed him of his sex appeal. Larry Fine once remarked that Curly wore a hat in public to confirm an image of masculinity, since he felt like a little kid with his hair shaved off Curly was also unable to save a cent. When he received his check he’d rush out to spend it on life’s pleasures: wine, women, a new house, an automobile or a new dog —Curly was mad about dogs. Since Curly was certainly no businessman, Moe usually handled all of his affairs, helped him manage his money and even made out his income tax returns.
Shemp Howard
Moe once recalled how his brother acquired the name Shemp:
“Shemp was given the Hebrew name Schmool, after his mother’s grandfather. Schmool was Anglicized to Samuel and then shortened to Sam. When his mother, with her broad European accent, would call him, the name ‘Sam’ came out ‘Sams’, and if you weren’t listening carefully it could sound like Shemp… which it did! So from the time he was seven that’s what his family called him. It was Shemp in school and in the world of the theater. In later years, no one knew it was anything else.”
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