This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2007)

Edward Francis McLaughlin, Jr. (August 18, 1920 – January 21, 2005) was an American attorney and politician who served as a Boston city councilor,^[4] president of the Boston City Council,^[1] and the 60th Lieutenant Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts from 1961 to 1963.

References[link]

This section is empty. You can help by adding to it.

Bibliography[link]

• Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1961-1962 Public officers of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, p. 23, (1961).
• Long, Tom.: EDWARD F. MCLAUGHLIN JR., 84, FORMER LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR, The Boston Globe (January 22, 2005).
• The Boston Globe, McLAUGHLIN, The Honorable Edward F., Jr. (January 24, 2005).
• The Boston Herald, Obituary; Edward McLaughlin funeral rites today. Page 32 (January 25, 2005).
• Massachusetts Board of Bar Overseers McLaughlin's Bar Record.
• McLaughlin, Peter.: My Grandfather: Edward F. McLaughlin Jr. The Life of a Lieutenant Overseas, (accessed 21 January 2009).

Footnotes[link]

This article about a Massachusetts politician is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Henry Purcell by John Closterman

Engraved portrait of Henry Purcell by R. White after Closterman, from Orpheus Britannicus

Henry Purcell ( /ˈpɜrsəl/;^[1] 10 September 1659 (?)^[2]– 21 November 1695), was an English composer. Although incorporating Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, Purcell's legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music. He is generally considered to be one of the greatest English composers; no other native-born English composer approached his fame until Edward Elgar.

Early life and career[link]

Purcell was born in St Ann's Lane Old Pye Street, Westminster. Henry Purcell Senior,^[3] whose older brother Thomas Purcell (d. 1682) was also a musician, was a gentleman of the Chapel Royal and sang at the coronation of King Charles II of England.^[4] Henry the elder had three sons: Edward, Henry and Daniel. Daniel Purcell (d. 1717), the youngest of the brothers, was also a prolific composer who wrote the music for much of the final act of The Indian Queen after Henry Purcell's death. Henry Purcell's family lived just a few hundred yards west of Westminster Abbey from the year 1659 and onward.^[5]

After his father's death in 1664, Purcell was placed under the guardianship of his uncle who showed him great affection and kindness.^[6] Thomas was himself a gentleman of His Majesty's chapel, and arranged for Henry to be admitted as a chorister. Henry studied first under Captain Henry Cooke (d. 1672),^[7] Master of the Children, and afterwards under Pelham Humfrey (d. 1674), Cooke's successor.^[8] Henry was a chorister in the Chapel Royal until his voice broke in 1673, when he became assistant to the organ-builder John Hingston, who held the post of keeper of wind instruments to the King.^[5]

Purcell is said to have been composing at nine years old, but the earliest work that can be certainly identified as his is an ode for the King's birthday, written in 1670.^[9] (The dates for his compositions are often uncertain, despite considerable research.) It is assumed that the three-part song "Sweet tyranness, I now resign" was written by him as a child.^[6] After Humfrey's death, Purcell continued his studies under Dr. John Blow. He attended Westminster School and in 1676 was appointed copyist at Westminster Abbey.^[4] Henry Purcell's earliest anthem "Lord, who can tell" was composed in 1678. It is a psalm that is prescribed for Christmas Day and also to be read at morning prayer on the fourth day of the month.^[10]

In 1679, he wrote some songs for John Playford's Choice Ayres, Songs and Dialogues and also an anthem, the name of which is not known, for the Chapel Royal. From a letter written by Thomas Purcell, and still extant, we learn that this anthem was composed for the exceptionally fine voice of the Rev. John Gostling, then at Canterbury, but afterwards a gentleman of His Majesty's chapel. Purcell wrote several anthems at different times for Gostling's extraordinary basso profondo voice, which is known to have had a range of at least two full octaves, from D below the bass staff to the D above it. The dates of very few of these sacred compositions are known; perhaps the most notable example is the anthem "They that go down to the sea in ships." In gratitude for the providential escape of King Charles II from shipwreck, Gostling, who had been of the royal party, put together some verses from the Psalms in the form of an anthem and requested Purcell to set them to music. The work is a very difficult one, opening with a passage which traverses the full extent of Gostling's range, beginning on the upper D and descending two octaves to the lower.

Later career and death[link]

Another portrait of Henry Purcell

In 1679, Blow, who had been appointed organist of Westminster Abbey in 1669, resigned his office in favour of his pupil.^[11] Purcell now devoted himself almost entirely to the composition of sacred music, and for six years severed his connection with the theatre. However, during the early part of the year, probably before taking up his new office, he had produced two important works for the stage, the music for Nathaniel Lee's Theodosius, and Thomas d'Urfey's Virtuous Wife.^[11] Between 1680 and 1688 Purcell wrote music for seven plays.^[12] The composition of his chamber opera Dido and Aeneas, which forms a very important landmark in the history of English dramatic music, has been attributed to this period, and its earliest production may well have predated the documented one of 1689.^[11] It was written to a libretto furnished by Nahum Tate, and performed in 1689 in cooperation with Josias Priest, a dancing master and the choreographer for the Dorset Garden Theatre. Priest's wife kept a boarding school for young gentlewomen, first in Leicester Fields and afterwards at Chelsea, where the opera was performed.^[13] It is occasionally considered the first genuine English opera, though that title is usually given to Blow's Venus and Adonis: as in Blow's work, the action does not progress in spoken dialogue but in Italian-style recitative. Both works run to less than one hour. At the time Dido and Aeneas never found its way to the theatre, though it appears to have been very popular in private circles. It is believed to have been extensively copied, but only one song was printed by Purcell's widow in Orpheus Britannicus, and the complete work remained in manuscript until 1840, when it was printed by the Musical Antiquarian Society under the editorship of Sir George Macfarren. The composition of Dido and Aeneas gave Purcell his first chance to write a sustained musical setting of a dramatic text. It was his only opportunity to compose a work in which the music carried the entire drama.^[12] The story of Dido and Aeneas derives from the original source in Virgil's epic the Aeneid.^[14]

Soon after Purcell's marriage, in 1682, on the death of Edward Lowe, he was appointed organist of the Chapel Royal, an office which he was able to hold simultaneously with his position at Westminster Abbey.^[15] His eldest son was born in this same year, but his life was short lived.^[16] His first printed composition, Twelve Sonatas, was published in 1683.^[17][18] For some years after this, he was busy in the production of sacred music, odes addressed to the king and royal family, and other similar works.^[19][20] In 1685, he wrote two of his finest anthems, "I was glad" and "My heart is inditing", for the coronation of King James II.^[15] One of Purcell's most elaborate, most important and most magnificent works was a birthday ode for Queen Mary. It is titled Come ye Sons of Art, and was written by Nahum Tate and set by Purcell.^[21]

In 1687, he resumed his connection with the theatre by furnishing the music for Dryden's tragedy, Tyrannick Love. In this year, Purcell also composed a march and quick-step, which became so popular that Lord Wharton adapted the latter to the fatal verses of Lillibullero; and in or before January 1688, he composed his anthem "Blessed are they that fear the Lord" by express command of the King. A few months later, he wrote the music for D'Urfey's play, The Fool's Preferment. In 1690, he composed the music for Betterton's adaptation of Fletcher and Massinger's Prophetess (afterwards called Dioclesian)^[22] and Dryden's Amphitryon. During the first ten years of his mastership, Purcell composed much- precisely how much we can only guess. In 1691, he wrote the music for what is sometimes considered his dramatic masterpiece, King Arthur, with the libretto by Dryden and first published by the Musical Antiquarian Society in 1843. Another one of Purcell's operas is King Arthur, or The British Worthy in 1691.^[13] In 1692, he composed The Fairy-Queen (an adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream), the score of which (his longest for theatre)^[23] was rediscovered in 1901 and published by the Purcell Society.^[24] The Indian Queen followed in 1695, in which year he also wrote songs for Dryden and Davenant's version of Shakespeare's The Tempest (recently, this has been disputed by music scholars^[25]), probably including "Full fathom five" and "Come unto these yellow sands". The Indian Queen was adapted from a tragedy by Dryden and Sir Robert Howard.^[23] In these semi-operas (another term for which at the time was "dramatic opera"), the main characters of the plays do not sing but speak their lines: the action moves in dialogue rather than recitative. The related songs are sung "for" them by singers, who have minor dramatic roles.

Purcell's Te Deum and Jubilate Deo were written for Saint Cecilia's Day, 1694, the first English Te Deum ever composed with orchestral accompaniment. This work was annually performed at St Paul's Cathedral until 1712, after which it was performed alternately with Handel's Utrecht Te Deum and Jubilate until 1743, when both works were replaced by Handel's Dettingen Te Deum.^[26]

He composed an anthem and two elegies for Queen Mary II's funeral.^[27] Besides the operas and semi-operas already mentioned, Purcell wrote the music and songs for Thomas d'Urfey's The Comical History of Don Quixote, Boudicca, The Indian Queen and others, a vast quantity of sacred music, and numerous odes, cantatas, and other miscellaneous pieces. The quantity of his instrumental chamber music is minimal after his early career, and his keyboard music consists of an even more minimal number of harpsichord suites and organ pieces.^[28] In 1693, Purcell composed music for two Comedies: The Old Bachelor, and The Double Dealer. Purcell also composed for five other plays within the same year.^[11] In July 1695, Henry Purcell composed an ode for the Duke of Gloucester for his sixth birthday. The ode is titled Who can from joy refrain?^[29] Purcell's four-part sonatas were issued in 1697.^[11] In the remaining six years of his life, Henry Purcell wrote music for forty two plays.^[11]

Purcell died in 1695 at his home in Dean's Yard, Westminster, at the height of his career. He is believed to have been 35 or 36 years old at the time. The cause of his death is unclear: one theory is that he caught a chill after returning home late from the theatre one night to find that his wife had locked him out. Another is that he succumbed to tuberculosis.^[30] The beginning of Purcell's will reads:

"In the name of God Amen. I, Henry Purcell, of the City of Westminster, gentleman, being dangerously ill as to the constitution of my body, but in good and perfect mind and memory (thanks be to God) do by these presents publish and declare this to be my last Will and Testament. And I do hereby give and bequeath unto my loving wife, Frances Purcell, all my estate both real and personal of what nature and kind soever..."^[31]

Purcell is buried adjacent to the organ in Westminster Abbey. The music that he had earlier composed for Queen Mary's funeral was performed during his as well. Purcell was universally mourned as 'a very great master of music.'  Following his death, the officials at Westminster honoured him by unanimously voting that he be buried with no expense in the north aisle of the Abbey.^[32] His epitaph reads: "Here lyes Henry Purcell Esq., who left this life and is gone to that blessed place where only his harmony can be exceeded."^[33]

Henry Purcell fathered six children by his wife Frances, four of whom died in infancy. His wife, as well as his son Edward (1689–1740) and daughter Frances, survived him.^[11] Frances the elder died in 1706, having published a number of her husband's works, including the now famous collection called Orpheus Britannicus, in two volumes, printed in 1698 and 1702, respectively. Edward was appointed organist of St Clement Eastcheap, London, in 1711 and was succeeded by his son Edward Henry Purcell (d. 1765). Both men were buried in St Clement's near the organ gallery.

Influence and reputation[link]

"The Flowering of the English Baroque", bronze memorial sculpture by Glynn Williams in a small park on Victoria St, Westminster.

After his death, Purcell was honoured by many of his contemporaries, including his old friend John Blow, who wrote "An Ode, on the Death of Mr. Henry Purcell (Mark how the lark and linnet sing)" with text by his old collaborator, John Dryden. More recently, the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote a famous sonnet entitled simply "Henry Purcell", with a headnote reading: "The poet wishes well to the divine genius of Purcell and praises him that, whereas other musicians have given utterance to the moods of man's mind, he has, beyond that, uttered in notes the very make and species of man as created both in him and in all men generally."

Purcell also had a strong influence on the composers of the English musical renaissance of the early 20th century, most notably Benjamin Britten, who created and performed a realisation of Dido and Aeneas and whose The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra is based on a theme from Purcell's Abdelazar. Stylistically, the aria "I know a bank" from Britten's opera A Midsummer Night's Dream is clearly inspired by Purcell's aria "Sweeter than Roses", which Purcell originally wrote as part of incidental music to Richard Norton's Pausanias, the Betrayer of His Country.

Purcell is honoured together with Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on 28 July.^[34] In a 1940 interview Ignaz Friedman stated that he considered Purcell as great as Bach and Beethoven. In Victoria Street, Westminster, England, there is a bronze monument to Purcell (right), sculpted by Glynn Williams and erected in 1994.

Purcell's works have been catalogued by Franklin Zimmerman, who gave them a number preceded by Z. A Purcell Club was founded in London in 1836 for promoting the performance of his music, but was dissolved in 1863. In 1876 a Purcell Society was founded, which published new editions of his works. A modern day Purcell Club has been created, and provides guided tours and concerts in support of Westminster Abbey.

So strong was his reputation that a popular wedding processional was incorrectly attributed to Purcell for many years. The so-called Purcell's Trumpet Voluntary was in fact written around 1700 by a British composer named Jeremiah Clarke as the Prince of Denmark's March.

In 2009 Pete Townshend of The Who, an English rock band that established itself in the 1960s, identified Purcell's harmonies as an influence on the band's music (in songs such as "Won't Get Fooled Again" (1971), "I Can See for Miles" (1967) and the very Purcellian intro to "Pinball Wizard").^[35]

Michael Nyman, at the request of the director, built the score of Peter Greenaway's 1982 film, The Draughtsman's Contract on ostinati by Purcell from various sources, one misattributed. He credited Purcell as a "music consultant." Another of Purcell's ostinati, the Cold Genius aria from King Arthur, was used in Nyman's Memorial.

In popular culture[link]

Purcell is among the Baroque composers who has had a direct influence on modern rock and roll; according to Pete Townshend of The Who, Purcell was among his influences, particularly evident in the opening bars of The Who's "Pinball Wizard".^[36] The processional section from Purcell's "Music for the Funeral of Queen Mary," was also adapted for the synthesiser by Wendy Carlos to serve as the theme music for the 1971 film A Clockwork Orange, the music is also featured in the final scene of the 1995 film The Young Poisoner's Handbook. Noted cult New Wave artist Klaus Nomi regularly performed "The Cold Song" from King Arthur during his career, including a version on his debut self-titled album, Klaus Nomi, from 1981; his last public performance before his untimely death was an interpretation of the piece done with a full orchestra in December 1982 in Munich. Purcell wrote the song for a bass, but numerous countertenors have performed the piece in homage to Nomi. Sting recorded it on his 2009 album If On a Winter's Night....

In the 1995 film England, My England, the life of Purcell (played by Michael Ball) was depicted as seen through the eyes of a playwright in the 1960s who is trying to write a play about him.

In the 21st century, the soundtrack of the 2005 film version of Pride and Prejudice features a dance titled "A Postcard to Henry Purcell." This is a version by composer Dario Marianelli of Purcell's Abdelazar theme. In the German-language 2004 movie, Der Untergang ([the] Downfall (film), the music of Dido's Lament is used repeatedly as the end of the Third Reich culminates.

I was Glad Ode 1 – Sinfonia Ode 2 – Welcome to All Ode 3 – Hail to this Happy Assembly Ode 4 – Here the Deities Approve Ode 5 – While Joys Celestial Ode 6 – Then Lift Up Your Voices Ode 7 – Beauty, Thou Scene of Love Ode 8 – In a Consort of Voices Hear my prayer, O Lord (1.9 Mb)

	Toccata in A major Performed by Sylvia Kind on a harpsichord of the type made in the early 20th century
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

	"The Queen's Dolour (A Farewell)" Realised by Ronald Stevenson (1958), performed live by Mark Gasser
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

See also[link]

• List of compositions by Henry Purcell

References[link]

Notes

Bibliography

• Burden, Michael, ed. Performing the Music of Henry Purcell, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1996.
• Burden, Michael, ed. Henry Purcell's Operas; The Complete Texts, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000.
• Dent, Edward J. Foundations of English Opera, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1928.
• Duffy, Maureen, Henry Purcell, Fourth Estate Ltd, Londen, 1994.
• Holman, Peter and Robert Thompson. "Henry Purcell (ii)," Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed 17 March 2006), grovemusic.com (subscription access).
• Holman, Peter, Henry Purcell, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1994.
• Holst, Imogen, ed. Henry Purcell 1659–1695: Essays on His Music, Oxford University Press, London, 1959.
• Keates, Jonathan, Purcell, Chatto & Windus, Londen, 1995
• Moore, R. E., Henry Purcell and the Restoration Theatre, Greenwood Press, Westport CT, 1961.
• Muller, Julia, Words and Music in Henry Purcell's First Semi-Opera, Dioclesian, Edwin Mellen Press, New York, 1990.
• Orrey, Leslie and Rodney Milnes, Opera: A Concise History, World of Art, Thames & Hudson. ISBN 0-500-20217-6.
• Price, Curtis A., Henry Purcell and the London Stage,Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1984.
• Shay, Robert, and Robert Thompson, Purcell Manuscripts: The Principal Musical Sources Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2000.
• Westrup, Jack A., Purcell, Dent & Sons, Londen 1980
• Zimmerman, Franklin B., Henry Purcell, 1659–1695, His Life and Times, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia PA, 1983
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Henry Purcell

Listen to this article (info/dl)

This audio file was created from a revision of the "Henry Purcell" article dated 2006-08-15, and does not reflect subsequent edits to the article. (Audio help)

More spoken articles

• Purcell by John F. Runciman, a biography forming part of Bell's Miniature Series of Musicians published in 1909, from Project Gutenberg
• Free scores by Henry Purcell in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
• Works by or about Henry Purcell in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Free scores by Henry Purcell in the Werner Icking Music Archive (WIMA)
• Free scores by Henry Purcell at the International Music Score Library Project
• The Mutopia Project has compositions by Henry Purcell
• Short biography, audio samples and images of Purcell
• Monument to Purcell
• Harpsichord Suites played on virtual harpsichord
• Dido's Lament – Research leading to a narrative account of how Henry Purcell’s opera Dido and Aeneas was created.
• Henry Purcell at Allmusic

Marie McLaughlin (born Hamilton, South Lanarkshire 2 November 1954) is a Scottish operatic soprano.

A light lyric soprano, McLaughlin is noted for her performances as Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro), Zerlina (Don Giovanni), Despina (Cosi fan tutte), Norina (Don Pasquale), Marzelline (Fidelio), Nannetta (Falstaff), Micaëla (Carmen) and Tytania (A Midsummer Night's Dream}.

International career[link]

She studied in Glasgow and at the London Opera Centre, making her debut as Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro. After singing with Scottish Opera and the Welsh National Opera, she then appeared with the English National Opera from 1978, and at the Royal Opera House in London from 1980. Her international career has included guest roles at the Hamburg State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Paris Opéra, Bavarian State Opera, and the Metropolitan Opera of New York.

Selected recordings[link]

• Despina in Così fan tutte conducted by James Levine (Deutsche Grammophon CD, DGG 4238972 1989)
• Micaëla in Carmen conducted by Bernard Haitink (Kultur Video DVD, KUL 2843)
• Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro conducted by Claudio Abbado (Sony Classics DVD).
• Zerlina in Don Giovanni conducted by Neville Marriner (Philips CD)
• Zdenka in Arabella conducted by Christian Thielemann (Deutsche Grammophon DVD)
• Soloist in Suor Angelica conducted by Richard Bonynge (Decca CD, DEC 2894582182)
• Soloist in Mozart Requiem conducted by Leonard Bernstein (Deutsche Grammophon CD, DGG 4273532 1989)
• Schubert Lieder with Graham Johnson (Hyperion Schubert Edition 13, CD, HYP 33013, 1992)
• Richard Strauss Lieder with Graham Johnson (Hyperion CD, HYP 55202, 2005)

Sources[link]

• Warrack, John and West, Ewan (1992), The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5

External links[link]

• Hyperion Records Artist page featuring Marie McLaughlin

Robert Wagner
Wagner in 1969
Born	Robert John Wagner (1930-02-10) February 10, 1930 (age 82) Detroit, Michigan, United States
Occupation	Actor, producer
Years active	1950–present
Spouse	Natalie Wood (1957–62) (divorced); (1972–81) (her death) Marion Marshall (1963–71) (divorced) Jill St. John (1990–present)
Children	Katie Wagner (with Marion Marshall) Courtney Wagner (with Natalie Wood)
Awards	Best Ensemble – Method Fest Film Festival (2007) Man in the Chair

Robert John Wagner (born February 10, 1930) is an American actor of stage, screen, and television, best known for starring in the television shows It Takes a Thief (1968–70), Switch (1975–78), and Hart to Hart (1979–84). In movies, Wagner is known for his role as Number Two in the Austin Powers films (1997, 1999, 2002). He also had a recurring role as Teddy Leopold on the TV sitcom Two and a Half Men.

Wagner's autobiography, Pieces of My Heart: A Life, written with author Scott Eyman, was published on September 23, 2008.

Early life and career[link]

Jean Peters with Wagner in Broken Lance (1954)

Wagner was born in Detroit, Michigan. He is the son of Hazel Alvera (née Boe), a telephone operator, and Robert John Wagner Sr., a traveling salesman who worked for the Ford Motor Company. His paternal grandparents were born in Germany.^[1][2] Wagner has a sister, Mary. He graduated from Santa Monica High School in 1949.^[3]

He made his film debut in The Happy Years (1950). He was signed by agent Henry Willson and put under contract with 20th Century-Fox, where he gained attention with a small but showy part as a shellshocked soldier in With a Song in My Heart (1952). This led to star roles in a series of films including Beneath the 12-Mile Reef (1953) and Prince Valiant (1954), and White Feather (1955, with Debra Paget and Jeffrey Hunter), A Kiss Before Dying (1956, a rare villainous role) and Between Heaven and Hell (1956).

Wagner appeared with veteran actor Clifton Webb in Stars and Stripes Forever (1952) and Titanic (1953). Wagner starred opposite Steve McQueen in The War Lover (1962). Roles soon followed in The Condemned of Altona and The Pink Panther.

Career rise[link]

In 1967, Wagner signed with Universal Studios. In 1968, Lew Wasserman convinced Wagner to make his television series debut in It Takes a Thief. While the success of The Pink Panther and Harper began Wagner's comeback, the successful two and a half seasons of his first TV series completed it. In this series, he acted with Fred Astaire, who played his father. Wagner was a long-time friend of Astaire's, having gone to school with Astaire's eldest son, Peter. Wagner was suggested to play James Bond after On Her Majesty's Secret Service was released.^[4]

In 1972, he produced and cast himself opposite Bette Davis in the television movie Madame Sin, which was released in foreign markets as a feature film.^[5] and was a regular in the BBC/Universal World War II prisoner-of-war drama Colditz until its end in 1974. He reunited with McQueen, along with Paul Newman and Faye Dunaway, in the disaster film The Towering Inferno released in the same year.

By the mid-1970s, Wagner's television career was at its peak with the television series Switch opposite Eddie Albert, after re-signing a contract with Universal Studios in 1974. Before Switch, Albert was a childhood hero of Wagner's, after he watched the movie Brother Rat along with a few others. The friendship started in the early 1960s, where he also co-starred in a couple of Albert's movies. After the series' end, the two remained friends until Albert's death on May 26, 2005. Wagner spoke at his funeral, and gave a testimonial about his longtime friendship with him.

In part payment for starring together in the Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg production of the TV movie The Affair, Wagner and Natalie Wood were given a share in three TV series that the producers were developing for ABC.^[6] Only one reached the screen, the very successful TV series Charlie's Angels, for which Wagner and Wood had a 50% share, though Wagner was to spend many years in court arguing with Spelling and Goldberg over what was defined as profit.^[7]

Wagner and Wood acted with Laurence Olivier in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (as part of Olivier's UK television series Laurence Olivier Presents). Wood also made a small cameo appearance in the pilot episode of Wagner's own television series, Hart to Hart.

His third successful series was Hart to Hart, which co-starred Stefanie Powers. Before those roles, Wagner also made guest appearances in the pilot episode of The Streets of San Francisco. He would later be nominated for an Emmy Award for Best TV Actor for his performance in It Takes a Thief and for four Golden Globe awards for his role as Jonathan Hart in Hart to Hart.

Return to film and television[link]

Wagner's film career received a revival after his role in the Austin Powers series of spy spoofs starring Mike Myers. Wagner played Dr. Evil's henchman Number 2 in all three films: Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997), Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) and Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002).

He also became the host of Fox Movie Channel's Hour of Stars, featuring original television episodes of The 20th Century-Fox Hour (1955), a series which Wagner had appeared on in his early days with the studio.

In 2005, Wagner became the television spokesman for the Senior Lending Network, a reverse mortgage lender and in 2010 began as a spokesman for the Guardian First Funding Group, also a reverse mortgage lender. As of June 2011, Guardian First Funding was acquired by Urban Financial Group, who continue to use Mr. Wagner as their spokesperson.^[8][9]

In 2007, Wagner had a role in the BBC/AMC series Hustle. In season four's premiere, Wagner played a crooked Texan being taken for half a million dollars. As Wagner is considered "a suave icon of American caper television, including It Takes a Thief and Hart to Hart", Robert Glenister (Hustle's fixer, Ash Morgan) commented that "to have one of the icons of that period involved is a great bonus for all of us".^[10]

Wagner also played the pivotal role of President James Garfield in the comedy/horror film Netherbeast Incorporated (2007). The role was written with Wagner in mind. He had a recurring role of a rich suitor to the main characters' mother on the sitcom Two and a Half Men. His most recent appearances on the show were in May 2008.

Wagner's radio and television career was recognized by the Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters on January 30, 2009, when they presented him with their Art Gilmore Career Achievement Award.

Wagner has guest-starred as Tony's father, Anthony DiNozzo Sr., in three episodes of NCIS: "Flesh and Blood" (2010), "Broken Arrow" (2010), and "Sins of the Father" (2011). He was set to star as Charlie in the 2011 reboot of Charlie's Angels, but due to scheduling conflicts, had to exit the project.^[11]

Personal life[link]

Wagner at age 23

In his memoirs, Wagner claims to have had affairs with Yvonne de Carlo, Joan Crawford, Elizabeth Taylor, Anita Ekberg, Shirley Ann Field and Joan Collins.^[12] He had a four-year romantic relationship with Barbara Stanwyck after they acted together in the movie Titanic (1953).^[13] Because of the age difference – he was 22, she was 45 – they kept the affair secret to avoid damage to their careers.^[14]

On December 28, 1957, Wagner married Natalie Wood when he was 27 and she was 18. They separated in June 1961 and divorced on April 27, 1962.

While working on location in Europe, Wagner reconnected with an old acquaintance, actress Marion Marshall. In the spring of 1963, after a brief courtship, Wagner, Marshall, and her two children from her marriage to Stanley Donen moved back to America.^[4] Wagner and Marshall married on July 22, 1963, in the Bronx Courthouse. Soon after, they had a daughter, Katie Wagner (born May 11, 1964). The two were together for nearly nine years before they separated in late 1970. They were divorced on April 26, 1971. Wagner's only grandchild is Katie's son, Riley John Wagner-Lewis (born 21 September 2006).

In 1971, Wagner was briefly engaged to Tina Sinatra.^[4]

Wagner kept in contact with Natalie Wood, whose short-lived marriage to Richard Gregson ended in early 1972. Wagner remarried her on July 16, 1972. Their only child, Courtney Wagner, was born on March 9, 1974. On November 29, 1981, Natalie Wood drowned near their yacht Splendour while it was moored near Catalina Island; also on board were Wagner and Christopher Walken, who was co-starring with her in the motion picture Brainstorm. Wagner subsequently became the legal guardian of Wood's daughter Natasha Gregson. He is estranged from Natalie Wood's sister Lana Wood,^[15] who claims Wagner refused to let her see her nieces after Natalie Wood's death.^[16] In November 2011, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department reopened its investigation into Wood's death.^[17][18] Wagner is not considered a suspect.^[19]

In early 1982, Wagner began a relationship with actress Jill St. John, who coincidentally was a childhood acquaintance of Natalie Wood and Wagner's Hart to Hart co-star Stefanie Powers, as well as starring alongside Natalie's sister Lana Wood in Diamonds Are Forever. The couple had first met in the late 1950s when Wagner was an up-and-coming actor and St. John was a teenage starlet. After an eight-year courtship, they were married on May 26, 1990.

Filmography[link]

Movies[link]

• 1951: Halls of Montezuma as Pvt. Coffman
• 1951: Let's Make It Legal as Jerry Denham
• 1952: With a Song in My Heart as GI Paratrooper
• 1952: Stars and Stripes Forever as Willie Little
• 1952: What Price Glory? as Private Lewisohn
• 1953: Beneath the 12-Mile Reef as Tony Petrakis
• 1953: Titanic as Gifford "Giff" Rogers
• 1954: Broken Lance as Joe Devereaux
• 1954: Prince Valiant as Prince Valiant
• 1955: White Feather as Josh Tanner
• 1956: A Kiss Before Dying as Bud Corliss
• 1956: Between Heaven and Hell as Sam Gifford
• 1956: The Mountain as Christopher Teller
• 1957: The True Story of Jesse James, directed by Nicholas Ray as Jesse James
• 1958: The Hunters as Lt. Pell
• 1958: In Love and War as Frank "Frankie" O'Neill
• 1958: Mardi Gras (cameo)
• 1959: Say One for Me as Tony Vincent
• 1960: All the Fine Young Cannibals as Chad Bixby (based on Chet Baker)
• 1961: Sail a Crooked Ship as Gilbert Barrows
• 1962: The War Lover as Lt Ed Boland
• 1963: The Pink Panther as George Lytton
• 1966: Harper as Allan Taggert
• 1967: Banning as Mike Banning
• 1969: Winning as Luther Erding
• 1974: The Towering Inferno as Dan Bigelow
• 1976: Laurence Olivier Presents: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof as Brick Pollitt (with then wife Natalie Wood and Laurence Olivier)
• 1976: Midway as Lieutenant Commander Ernest L. Blake
• 1979: The Concorde ... Airport '79 as Kevin Harrison
• 1983: Curse of the Pink Panther as George Lytton
• 1987: Love Among Thieves as Mike Chambers
• 1988: Windmills of the Gods as Mike Slade
• 1991: Delirious as Jack Gates (uncredited)
• 1993: Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story as Bill Krieger
• 1997, 1999, 2002: the Austin Powers movies as Number Two
• 1998: Wild Things as Tom Baxter
• 1999: Fatal Error as Albert Teal
• 2001: Sol Goode as Sol's Dad
• 2005: Man of Faith as Amos
• 2007: Netherbeast Incorporated as President James Garfield
• 2007: Man in the Chair as Taylor Moss
• 2007: A Dennis the Menace Christmas as Mr. Wilson
• 2009: The Wild Stallion as Novak, the illegal mustang-buyer

Selected television appearances[link]

• 1953: Jukebox Jury as himself
• 1963: The Eleventh Hour, episode: "And God Created Vanity" as Kenny Walsh
• 1968–70: It Takes a Thief as Alexander Mundy
• 1970–71: The Name of the Game as David Corey
• 1971: City Beneath the Sea as Brett Matthews (movie)
• 1972–74: Colditz as Flight Lieutenant Phil Carrington
• 1975–78: Switch as Pete T. Ryan
• 1979–84: Hart to Hart as Jonathan Hart
• 1980: The Jacques Cousteau Odyssey narrator (2 episodes)
• 1994: Parallel Lives as the sheriff
• 1997: Seinfeld, episode: "The Yada Yada" as Mr. Abbot
• 2003: Hope & Faith as Jack Fairfield (7 episodes)
• 2006: Las Vegas, episode: "Cash Springs Eternal" as Alex Avery
• 2006: Boston Legal as Barry Gold (2 episodes)
• 2007: Two and a Half Men as Teddy Leopold (5 episodes)
• 2010: NCIS as Anthony DiNozzo Sr. (3 episodes)

Books[link]

• Wagner, Robert (2008). Pieces of My Heart - A Life. New York: Harper Collins. pp. 324. ISBN 978-0-06-137331-2. 

References[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Robert Wagner

External links[link]

• Official website
• Robert Wagner at the Internet Movie Database
• Robert Wagner on Yahoo! Movies
• Robert Wagner on Charlie Rose
• Works by or about Robert Wagner in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Articles about Robert Wagner, a Malibu resident, can be found at The Malibu Times

The Three Stooges
The Three Stooges in 1938's Healthy, Wealthy and Dumb. L to R: Moe Howard, Curly Howard, Larry Fine
Also known as	"Ted Healy and His Southern Gentlemen" "Ted Healy and His Stooges" "Ted Healy and His Three Lost Souls"
Genre	Slapstick comedy
Format	Short subject Feature film
Created by	Ted Healy
Starring	Moe Howard Curly Howard Larry Fine Shemp Howard Joe Besser Joe DeRita
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
External links
threestooges.net

The Three Stooges were an American vaudeville and comedy act of the early to mid–20th century best known for their numerous short subject films. Their hallmark was physical farce and extreme slapstick. In films, the Stooges were commonly known by their first names: "Moe, Larry, and Curly" or "Moe, Larry, and Shemp," among other lineups. They started as "Ted Healy and his Southern Gentlemen" which comprised Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Shemp Howard. This original trio did one feature film entitled Soup to Nuts after which Shemp left the group to pursue a solo career, and was replaced by his brother Curly Howard. This incarnation of the team was the first to be known on film as The Three Stooges.

Shemp rejoined the group after Curly suffered a debilitating stroke in May 1946, reinstating the original line-up until November 1955, when Shemp died of a heart attack. In order to complete four Shemp-era shorts, film actor Joe Palma was used as a temporary body double to Shemp, before Joe Besser became the long-term replacement as the third Stooge. Ultimately, Joe DeRita (nicknamed "Curly Joe") replaced Joe Besser by 1958. The act regained momentum throughout the 1960s as popular kiddie fare until Larry Fine's paralyzing stroke in January 1970 effectively marked the end of the act proper. Moe tried, unsuccessfully, one final time to revive the Stooges with longtime supporting actor Emil Sitka filling in for Larry. Larry ultimately succumbed to a series of additional strokes in January 1975, followed by Moe, who died of lung cancer in May 1975.

History[link]

Ted Healy and his stooges[link]

The Three Stooges started in 1925 as part of a raucous vaudeville act called 'Ted Healy and His Stooges' (a.k.a. 'Ted Healy and His Southern Gentlemen', 'Ted Healy and His Three Lost Souls' and 'Ted Healy and His Racketeers'—the moniker 'Three Stooges' was never used during their tenure with Healy). In the act, lead comedian Healy would attempt to sing or tell jokes while his noisy assistants would keep "interrupting" him. Healy would respond by verbally and physically abusing his stooges. Brothers Moe and Shemp were joined later that year by violinist-comedian Larry Fine, and Fred Sanborn joined the group as well.^[1]

In 1930, Ted Healy and His Stooges (including Sanborn) appeared in their first Hollywood feature film, Soup to Nuts, released by Fox Film Corporation. The film was not a critical success, but the Stooges' performances were singled out as memorable, leading Fox to offer the trio a contract minus Healy. This enraged the prickly Healy, who told studio executives that the Stooges were his employees. The offer was withdrawn, and after Howard, Fine and Howard learned of the reason, they left Healy to form their own act, which quickly took off with a tour of the theatre circuit. Healy attempted to stop the new act with legal action, claiming they were using his copyrighted material. There are accounts of Healy threatening to bomb theaters if Howard, Fine and Howard ever performed there, which worried Shemp so much that he almost left the act; reportedly, only a pay raise kept him on board.^[2] Healy tried to save his act by hiring replacement stooges, but they were inexperienced and not as well-received as their predecessors.^[2] In 1932, with Moe now acting as business manager, Healy reached a new agreement with his former Stooges, and they were booked in a production of Jacob J. Shubert's The Passing Show of 1932. During rehearsals, Healy received a more lucrative offer and found a loophole in his contract allowing him to leave the production.^[2] Shemp, fed up with Healy's abrasiveness,^[2] decided to quit the act and found work almost immediately, in Vitaphone movie comedies produced in Brooklyn, New York.^[1]

With Shemp gone, Healy and the two remaining stooges (Moe and Larry) needed a replacement, so Moe suggested his younger brother Jerry Howard. Healy reportedly took one look at Jerry, who had long chestnut red locks and a handlebar mustache, and remarked that he did not look like he was funny.^[2] Jerry left the room and returned a few moments later with his head shaved (though his mustache remained for a time), and then quipped "Boy, do I look girly." Healy heard "Curly," and the name stuck.^[1] (There are varying accounts as to how the Curly character actually came about.)

In 1933, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) signed Healy and his Stooges to a movie contract. They appeared in feature films and short subjects, either together, individually, or with various combinations of actors. The trio was featured in a series of musical comedy shorts, beginning with Nertsery Rhymes. The short was one of a few shorts to be made with an early two-strip Technicolor process, including one featuring Curly without Healy or the other Stooges, Roast Beef and Movies (1934). The shorts themselves were built around recycled film footage of production numbers cut from MGM musicals, such as Children of Pleasure, Lord Byron of Broadway, and the unfinished March of Time (all 1930), which had been filmed in early Technicolor. Soon, additional shorts followed (sans the experimental Technicolor), including Beer and Pretzels (1933), Plane Nuts (1933), and The Big Idea (1934).^[1]

Healy and company also appeared in several MGM feature films as comic relief, such as Turn Back the Clock (1933), Meet the Baron (1933), Dancing Lady (1933), Fugitive Lovers (1934), and Hollywood Party (1934). Healy and the Stooges also appeared together in Myrt and Marge for Universal Pictures.^[1]

In 1934, the team's contract with MGM expired, and the Stooges parted professional company with Healy. According to Moe Howard's autobiography,^[3] the Stooges split with Ted Healy in 1934 once and for all because of Healy's alcoholism and abrasiveness. Their final film with Healy was MGM's 1934 film, Hollywood Party. Both Healy and the Stooges went on to separate successes, with Healy dying under mysterious circumstances in 1937.^[1]

The Columbia years[link]

Moe, Larry and Curly[link]

In 1934, the trio – now officially christened "The Three Stooges" – signed on to appear in two-reel comedy short subjects for Columbia Pictures. In Moe's autobiography, he said they each got $600 per week on a one-year contract with a renewable option;^[3] in the Ted Okuda–Edward Watz book The Columbia Comedy Shorts, the Stooges are said to have received $1,000 among them for their first Columbia effort, Woman Haters, and then signed a term contract for $7,500 per film (equal to $130,299 today), to be divided among the trio.^[4]

Within their first year at Columbia, the Stooges became wildly popular. Realizing this, Columbia Pictures president Harry Cohn used the Stooges as leverage, as the demand for their films was so great that Columbia eventually refused to supply exhibitors with the trio's shorts unless they also agreed to book some of the studio's mediocre B movies. Cohn also saw to it that the Stooges remained ignorant of their popularity. During their 23 years spent at Columbia, the Stooges were never completely aware of their amazing drawing power at the box office. As their contracts with the studio included an open option that had to be renewed every year, Cohn would tell the boys that the short subjects were in decline, which was not a complete fabrication (Cohn's yearly mantra was "the market for comedy shorts is dying out, fellas.") Thinking their days were numbered, the Stooges would sweat it out each and every year, with Cohn renewing their contract for another year at the eleventh hour. This cruel deception kept the insecure Stooges unaware of their true value, resulting in them having second thoughts about asking for a better contract without a yearly option. Cohn's scare tactics worked for all 23 years the Stooges were at Columbia; the team never once asked for — nor were they ever given — a salary increase. It was not until after they stopped making the shorts in December 1957 did Moe learn of Cohn's underhanded tactics, what a valuable commodity the Stooges had been for the ailing studio, and how many millions more the act could have earned.^[4]

The Stooges were required to churn out up to eight short films per year within a 40-week period; for the remaining 12 or so weeks, they were free to pursue other employment. Usually, the Stooges would either spend this time with their families or tour the country promoting their live act.^[5] The Stooges appeared in 190 film shorts and five features while at Columbia. Del Lord directed more than three dozen Stooge films; Jules White directed dozens more, and his brother Jack White directed several under the pseudonym "Preston Black". Silent film star Charley Chase also shared directorial responsibilities with Lord and White, with more than pleasing results.^[4]

The Stooge films made between 1935–1941 captured the team at the peak, according to film historians Ted Okuda and Edward Watz, authors of The Columbia Comedy Shorts. Nearly every film produced became a classic in its own right. 1935's Hoi Polloi utilized the classic premise of a stuffy professor waging a bet that he can transform the uncultured trio into refined gentlemen; the plotline worked so well that it was reused twice, as Half-Wits Holiday and Pies and Guys. Three Little Beers featured the team employed at a brewery who then run amuck on a local golf course to win prize money. 1936's Disorder in the Court is considered a quintessential entry in the series, featuring the team as star witnesses to a murder trial. 1938's Violent is the Word for Curly was a quality Chase-directed short that featured the musical interlude, "Swingin' the Alphabet". In the 1940 film A Plumbing We Will Go, the trio were cast as inadvertent plumbers who nearly destroy a socialite's mansion, causing water to exit every appliance in the home.^[4] Other entries of the era, like Uncivil Warriors, A Pain in the Pullman, False Alarms, Grips, Grunts and Groans, The Sitter Downers, Dizzy Doctors, Tassels in the Air, We Want Our Mummy, Nutty but Nice, An Ache in Every Stake and In the Sweet Pie and Pie are considered among the team's finest work.^[4]

With the onset of World War II, the Stooges released several entries that poked fun at the rising Axis powers. You Nazty Spy! and its sequel I'll Never Heil Again burlesqued Hitler and the Nazis at a time when America was still neutral and resolutely isolationist. Moe is cast as "Moe Hailstone", an Adolf Hitler-like character, with Curly playing a Hermann Göring character (replete with medals), and Larry a Ribbentrop-type ambassador. Though revered by Stooge fans, as well as the Stooges themselves (Moe, Larry and director Jules White considered You Nazty Spy! their best film),^[6] the efforts indulged in a deliberately formless, non-sequitur style of verbal humor that was not the Stooges' forte, according to Okuda and Watz. Other wartime entries, like They Stooge to Conga, Higher Than a Kite, Back From the Front, Gents Without Cents and the controversial The Yoke's on Me have their moments, but taken in bulk, the wartime films are decidedly substandard.^[4] No Dough Boys ranks as the best of these farces. The team, made up as Japanese soldiers for a photo shoot, is mistaken for genuine saboteurs by a Nazi ringleader (Vernon Dent). The highlight of the film features the Stooges engaging in nonsensical gymnastics (the real spies are renowned acrobats) for a skeptical group of enemy agents.^[4]

The Stooges made occasional guest appearances in feature films, though generally they stuck to short subjects. Columbia offered theater owners an entire program of two-reel comedies (15 to 25 titles annually) featuring such stars as Buster Keaton, Andy Clyde, Charley Chase, and Hugh Herbert, but the Three Stooges shorts were the most popular of all.^[2]

The World War II era also brought on rising production costs that resulted in a reduced number of elaborate gags and outdoor sequences, Del Lord's stock and trade; as such, the quality of the teams' films (particularly those directed by Lord) began to slip after 1942. According to Okuda and Watz, entries like Loco Boy Makes Good, What's the Matador?, Sock-A-Bye Baby, I Can Hardly Wait and A Gem of a Jam are considered to be less quality work than previous efforts, and in a different class than their earlier films.^[4] The 1943 film Spook Louder, a remake of Mack Sennett's The Great Pie Mystery, is often cited as their worst film. The story of a phantom pie-thrower (later revealed to be the detective on the case) is repetitious and relying on the same jokes, which many Stooge fans consider to be far less humorous than their past work.^[4] Three Smart Saps, a film considered to be an improvement, features a reworking of a routine from Harold Lloyd's The Freshman, in which Curly's loosely basted suit begins to come apart at the seams while he is on the dance floor.^[4]

Film critics and stooge fans alike have cited Curly as the most popular member of the team.^[2] His childlike mannerisms and natural comedic charm (he had no previous acting experience) made him a hit with audiences, particularly children and women (the latter usually finding the trio's humor juvenile and uncouth). The fact that Curly had to shave his head for the act led him to feel unappealing to women. To mask his insecurities, Curly ate and drank excessively and caroused whenever the Stooges made personal appearances, which was approximately seven months out of the year. His weight ballooned in the 1940s, and his blood pressure was dangerously high.^[1] His wild lifestyle and constant drinking eventually caught up with him in 1945, and his performances suffered. In his last dozen shorts (ranging from 1945's If a Body Meets a Body through 1947's Half-Wits Holiday), he was seriously ill, struggling to get through even the most basic scenes.^[2]

It was during the final day of filming Half-Wits Holiday on May 6, 1946, that Curly suffered a debilitating stroke on the set, ending his 14-year career. Curly's health necessitated a temporary retirement from the act, and while the Stooges hoped for a full recovery, Curly never starred in a film again, except for one brief cameo appearance in the third film after Shemp returned to the trio, Hold That Lion! It was the only film that contained all four of the original Stooges (the three Howard brothers and Larry) on screen simultaneously; Jules White recalled Curly visiting the set one day, and White had him do this bit for fun. (Curly's cameo appearance was recycled in the 1953 remake Booty and the Beast.)^[3] In 1949, Curly was supposed to play a cameo role in the Stooge comedy Malice in the Palace, but he was physically unable to perform. His chef role was played by Larry.^[1]

Shemp returns[link]

Moe Howard turned to his older brother Shemp Howard to take Curly's place. Shemp, however, was hesitant to rejoin the Stooges, as he had a successful solo career at the time of Curly's untimely illness. However, he realized that Moe and Larry's careers would be finished without the Stooge act. Shemp wanted some kind of assurance that his rejoining was indeed temporary, and that he could leave the Stooges once Curly recovered. Curly remained gravely ill after 1950, dying of a cerebral hemorrhage caused by additional strokes on January 18, 1952.^[1]

Shemp appeared with the Stooges in 76 more shorts and a quickie Western comedy feature titled Gold Raiders.

During this period, Moe, Larry, and Shemp made a pilot for a Three Stooges television show called Jerks of All Trades in 1949. The series was never picked up, although the pilot is currently in the public domain and is available on home video, as is an early television appearance from around the same time on a vaudeville-style comedy series, Camel Comedy Caravan, originally broadcast live on CBS-TV on March 11, 1950, and starring Ed Wynn. Also available commercially is a kinescope of Moe, Larry, and Shemp's appearance on The Frank Sinatra Show, broadcast live over CBS-TV on January 1, 1952. Frank Sinatra was reportedly a big fan of the Stooges and slapstick comedy in general. On this broadcast, the Stooges are joined by one of their longtime stock-company members, Vernon Dent, who plays "Mr. Mortimer", a party-goer who requests a drink. The Stooges oblige with disastrous results.^[1]

The Three Stooges during the Shemp years (1947–1956), as represented in Malice in the Palace

Columbia's short-subject division downsized in 1952. Producer Hugh McCollum was discharged and director Edward Bernds resigned out of loyalty to McCollum, leaving only Jules White to both produce and direct the Stooges' remaining Columbia comedies. Almost overnight, the quality of the Stooge shorts declined. Production was significantly faster, with the former four-day filming schedules now tightened to two or three days. In another cost-cutting measure, White would create a "new" Stooge short by borrowing footage from old ones, setting it in a slightly different storyline, and filming a few new scenes often with the same actors in the same costumes. White was initially very subtle when recycling older footage: he would reuse only a single sequence of old film, re-edited so cleverly that it was not easy to detect. The later shorts were cheaper and the recycling more obvious, with as much as 75% of the running time consisting of old footage. White came to rely so much on older material that he could film the "new" shorts in a single day. Plus, any new footage filmed in order to link older material suffered from White's wooden directing and his penchant for telling his actors how to act. Shemp in particular disliked working with White.^[4]

Three years after Curly's death, Shemp died of a sudden heart attack at age 60 on November 22, 1955. Recycled footage of Shemp, combined with new footage utilizing Columbia supporting player Joe Palma as Shemp's double (only filmed from the back), were used to complete the last four films originally planned with Shemp: Rumpus in the Harem, Hot Stuff, Scheming Schemers, and Commotion on the Ocean.^[1]

Joe Besser replaces Shemp[link]

Joe Besser replaced Shemp in 1956, appearing in 16 shorts. Besser, noting how one side of Larry Fine's face seemed "calloused",^[7] had a clause in his contract specifically prohibiting him from being hit too hard (though this restriction was later lifted). Besser was the only "third" Stooge that dared to hit Moe back in retaliation and get away with it; Larry Fine was also known to hit Moe on occasion, but always with serious repercussions. "I usually played the kind of character who would hit others back," Besser recalled.^[8]

At that time, the Stooge films began to resemble sitcoms. Sitcoms, though, were now available for free. Television was the new popular medium, and by the time Besser joined the act, the Stooges were generally considered throwbacks to an obsolete era. The Besser films have long been considered the worst of the Stooge films. Though Besser was a very funny comedian (he was very popular on The Abbott and Costello Show), his whining mannerisms ("Not so harrrrd!") did not quite jell with the roughneck Stooge humor. However, Besser was not solely to blame for the lackluster quality of these final entries: the scripts were tired rehashes of earlier efforts (7 of the 16 films were remakes) and Moe and Larry's performances lacked energy. Both comedians were growing older, and could no longer perform pratfalls and physical comedy as they once had.^[4]

The final Stooge films had few bright moments, according to Okuda and Watz: Hoofs and Goofs, A Merry Mix Up, Rusty Romeos and Oil's Well That Ends Well are amusing, while the musical Sweet and Hot (long detested by fans) deserves some credit for straying from the norm. Muscle Up a Little Closer most resembled the sitcoms of the era, while Pies and Guys was a scene-for-scene remake of both Hoi Polloi and Half-Wits Holiday. The space craze also took hold of the American public at the time, resulting in three entries focusing on space travel: Space Ship Sappy, Outer Space Jitters and Flying Saucer Daffy.^[4]

The inevitable occurred soon enough. Columbia was the last studio still producing shorts, and the market for such films had all but dried up. As a result, the studio opted not to renew the Stooges' contract when it expired in late December 1957. The final comedy produced was Flying Saucer Daffy, filmed on December 19–20, 1957.^[5] Several days later, the Stooges were unceremoniously fired from Columbia Pictures after 24 years of making low-budget shorts. Joan Howard Maurer, daughter of Moe, wrote the following in 1982:

The boys' careers had suddenly come to an end. They were at Columbia one day and gone the next—no 'Thank yous,' no farewell party for their 24 years of dedication and service and the dollars their comedies had reaped for the studio. Moe Howard recalled that a few weeks after their exit from Columbia, he drove to the studio to say goodbye to several studio executives when he was stopped by a guard at the gate (obviously, not a Stooges fan) and, since he did not have the current year's studio pass, was refused entry. For the moment, it was a crushing blow.^[1]

Although the Stooges were no longer working for Columbia, the studio had enough completed films on the shelf to keep releasing new comedies for another 18 months, and not in the order they were produced. The final Stooge release, Sappy Bull Fighters, did not reach theaters until June 4, 1959. With no active contract in place, Moe and Larry discussed plans for a personal appearance tour; meanwhile, Besser's wife had a minor heart attack, and he preferred to stay local, leading him to withdraw from the act. For the first time in nearly 30 years, the Stooges hit a dead end.^[1]

The comeback: Larry, Moe and Curly Joe[link]

Seeing the success of how television, in its early years, allowed movie studios to unload a backlog of short films thought unmarketable, the Stooge films seemed perfect for the burgeoning genre. ABC television had even expressed interest as far back as 1949, purchasing exclusive rights to 30 of the trio's shorts.^[9] However, the success of television revivals for such names as Laurel and Hardy, Woody Woodpecker, Tom and Jerry and the Our Gang series in the late 1950s led Columbia to cash in again on the Stooges. In January 1958, Columbia's television subsidiary Screen Gems offered a package consisting of 78 Stooge shorts (mainly from the Curly era), which were well received.^[10] Almost immediately, an additional 40 shorts hit the market, and by 1959, all 190 Stooge shorts were airing regularly. Due to the massive quantity of Stooge product available for broadcast, the films were broadcast Monday through Friday, leading to heavy exposure aimed squarely at children. This led parents to watch alongside of their offspring, and before long, Howard and Fine found themselves in high demand.^[4] Moe quickly signed movie and burlesque comic Joe DeRita for the "third Stooge" role; DeRita adopted first a crew cut and then a completely shaven hairstyle and became "Curly Joe" because of his resemblance to the original Curly Howard (also to make it easier to distinguish him from Joe Besser, the earlier Stooge called Joe).

This Three Stooges lineup went on to make a series of popular full-length films from 1959 to 1965, most notably Have Rocket, Will Travel, The Three Stooges Meet Hercules and The Three Stooges Go Around the World in a Daze. The films were aimed at the kiddie-matinee market, and most were farce outings in the Stooge tradition, with the exception of Snow White and the Three Stooges, a children's fantasy in Technicolor. They also appeared as firemen (the role that helped make them famous in Soup to Nuts) in the film It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Throughout the 1960s, The Three Stooges were one of the most popular and highest-paid live acts in America.^[8]

The Stooges also tried their hand at another weekly television series in 1960 titled The Three Stooges Scrapbook. Filmed in color and with a laugh track, the first episode, "Home Cooking," featured the boys rehearsing for a new television show. Like Jerks of All Trades, the pilot did not sell. However, Norman Maurer was able to reuse the footage (reprocessed in black and white) for the first 20 minutes of the feature film The Three Stooges in Orbit.^[1]

The trio also filmed 41 short comedy skits for The New Three Stooges, which features a series of 156 animated cartoons produced for television. The Stooges appeared in live-action color footage, which preceded and followed each animated adventure in which they voiced their respective characters.^[1]

Final years[link]

In 1969, the Three Stooges filmed a pilot episode for a new TV series entitled Kook's Tour, a combination travelogue-sitcom that had the "retired" Stooges traveling around the world, with the episodes filmed on location.^[1]

On January 9, 1970, during production of the pilot, Larry suffered a paralyzing stroke, ending his acting career, as well as plans for the television series.^[1]

Plans were in the works for longtime foil Emil Sitka to replace Larry as the "Middle Stooge" in 1971, but nothing ever came of that idea other than the proposed publicity still reproduced here.^[1] Three years later, just before Christmas of 1974, Larry Fine suffered yet another stroke at the age of 72 and four weeks later, suffered a more massive one. Slipping into a coma, he died a week later of a stroke-induced cerebral hemorrhage on January 24, 1975.^[1]

Devastated by his friend's death, Moe nevertheless decided that the Three Stooges should continue. Several movie ideas were considered, one of which according to critic and movie historian Leonard Maltin, (who also uncovered a pre-production photo) was entitled Blazing Stewardesses. Before pre-production could begin, Moe fell ill from lung cancer, and died three months later on May 4, 1975.^[3]

However, Blazing Stewardesses, the last film idea that the Three Stooges had ever seriously considered, was eventually made, starring the last of the surviving Ritz Brothers comedy troupe and released to moderate acclaim later that year.^[1]

Joe DeRita continued to perform live into the mid-1970s with Mousie Garner and Frank Mitchell as "The New Three Stooges" enjoying recognition well into old age, before retiring by 1979.

Of the remaining "original-replacement" Stooges, Joe Besser died of heart failure on March 1, 1988, followed by Joe DeRita of pneumonia on July 3, 1993.

Legacy and perspective[link]

Over half a century since their last short film was released, the Three Stooges remain wildly popular with audiences. Their films have never left the television airwaves since first appearing in 1958, and they continue to delight old fans while attracting a new legion of fervent admirers. A hard-working group of working-class comedians who were never the critic's darlings, the durable act endured several personnel changes in their careers that would have permanently sidelined a less persistent act.^[4] The Stooges would not have lasted as long as they did as a unit without Moe Howard's guiding hand.^[1]

The Ted Okuda/Edward Watz-penned book The Columbia Comedy Shorts puts the Stooges legacy in critical perspective:

Many scholarly studies of motion picture comedy have overlooked the Three Stooges entirely—and not without valid reasoning. Aesthetically, the Stooges violated every rule that constitutes "good" comedic style. Their characters lacked the emotional depth of Charlie Chaplin and Harry Langdon; they were never as witty or subtle as Buster Keaton. They were not disciplined enough to sustain lengthy comic sequences; far too often, they were willing to suspend what little narrative structure their pictures possessed in order to insert a number of gratuitous jokes. Nearly every premise they have employed (spoofs of westerns, horror films, costume melodramas) has been done to better effect by other comedians. And yet, in spite of the overwhelming artistic odds against them, they were responsible for some of the finest comedies ever made. Their humor was the most undistilled form of low comedy; they were not great innovators, but as quick laugh practitioners, they place second to none. If public taste is any criterion, the Stooges have been the reigning kings of comedy for over fifty years.^[4]

Beginning in the 1980s, the Stooges finally began to receive long-overdue critical recognition. The release of nearly all their films on DVD by 2010 has allowed critics of Joe Besser and Joe DeRita—often the recipients of significant fan backlash—to appreciate the unique style of comedy both comedians brought to the Stooges. In addition, the DVD market in particular has allowed fans to view the entire Stooge film corpus as distinct periods in their long, distinguished career instead of comparing one Stooge to the other (the Curly vs. Shemp debate continues to this day^[11][12][13]).

The team appeared in 220 films. In the end, it is the durability of the 190 timeless short films the Stooges made at Columbia Pictures that acts as an enduring tribute to the comedy team. Their continued popularity worldwide has proven to even the most skeptical critics that their films—quite simply—are funny.^[4] American television personality Steve Allen went on record in the mid-1980s saying "though they never achieved widespread critical acclaim, they achieved exactly what they had always intended to do: they made people laugh."^[14]

Line-ups[link]

Years	Moe	Shemp	Larry	Curly	Joe	Curly Joe
1925–1932 (7)	Y	Y	Y
1932–1946 (14)	Y		Y	Y
1946–1955 (9)	Y	Y	Y
1956–1958 (2)	Y		Y		Y
1958–1971 (13)	Y		Y			Y

Moe Howard
Real Name: Moses Harry Horwitz
Born: (1897-06-19)June 19, 1897
Died: May 4, 1975(1975-05-04) (aged 77)
Stooge years: 1922–1975

Larry Fine
Real Name: Louis Feinberg
Born: (1902-10-05)October 5, 1902
Died: January 24, 1975(1975-01-24) (aged 72)
Stooge years: 1925–1971

Curly Howard
Real Name: Jerome Lester Horwitz
Born: (1903-10-22)October 22, 1903
Died: January 18, 1952(1952-01-18) (aged 48)
Stooge years: 1932–1946

Shemp Howard
Real Name: Samuel Horwitz
Born: (1895-03-11)March 11, 1895
Died: November 22, 1955(1955-11-22) (aged 60)
Stooge years: 1922–1932, 1946–1955

Joe Besser
Born: (1907-08-12)August 12, 1907
Died: March 1, 1988(1988-03-01) (aged 80)
Stooge years: 1956–1958

Joe DeRita ("Curly Joe")
Real Name: Joseph Wardell
Born: (1909-07-12)July 12, 1909
Died: July 3, 1993(1993-07-03) (aged 83)
Stooge years: 1958–1975

Shorts[link]

The Three Stooges appeared in 220 films throughout their career. Of those 220, 190 short films were made for Columbia Pictures between 1934 and 1959, for which the trio are best known. Their contract was extended each year from 1934 until the final one expired on December 31, 1957. The last 8 of the 16 shorts with Joe Besser were released soon afterward.

C3 Entertainment, Inc.[link]

Throughout their career, Moe acted as both their main creative force and business manager. Comedy III (C3) was formed by Moe, Larry and Joe DeRita in 1959 to manage all business and merchandise transactions for the team. C3 was basically in the background, with Moe's son-in-law Norman Maurer managing the comedy teams' film interests under Normandy Productions, and merchandising affairs under Norman Maurer Productions (NMP). Norman Maurer died of cancer in 1986.

In 1994, the heirs of Larry Fine and Joe DeRita filed a breach-of-contract lawsuit against Moe's family, particularly Joan Howard Maurer and her son Jeffrey, who had inherited the NMP/Normandy business. The lawsuit alleged that the Howards had cheated the DeRita and Fine families out of their share of royalties. Howard was ordered to pay $2.6 million in damages; $1.6 million was for compensatory damages to Jean DeRita, while the remaining $1 million was divided between four of Fine's grandchildren. The Fine and DeRita families were represented by California attorney Bela G. Lugosi. Jr.^[15]

The resulting 1994 lawsuit led to the reestablishment of C3 as a three-way interest of Fine/[Moe]Howard/DeRita. The DeRita heirs received the proxy to the Howard share, giving them majority control on the company's management. Joe DeRita's stepsons, Robert and Earl Benjamin, became the senior management of C3, with Lugosi, Jr. serving as an executive board member for several years. The Benjamins later incorporated the company, and C3 is currently the owner of all Three Stooges trademarks and merchandising. Larry's grandson Eric Lamond is the representative of the Fines' one-third interest in the company.^[16]

Since 1995, C3 has authorized and provided the services of veteran actors Jim Skousen, Alan Semok, and Dave Knight (as Moe, Larry, and Curly respectively) for numerous "personal appearances" by the Stooge characters for a variety of merchandising and promotional events. This latter day trio has also provided voices for the characters in a variety of radio spots, merchandising tie-ins, and most recently for the first new Three Stooges short in fifty years. A CGI animation by Famous Frames Mobile Interactive, a first-wave "new media" company, entitled The Grate Debate, has Moe, Larry and Curly running for President.

Television broadcasts and rights issues[link]

A handful of Three Stooges shorts first aired on television in 1949, on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) network. It was not until 1958 that Screen Gems packaged 78 shorts for national syndication; the package was gradually enlarged to encompass the entire library of 190 shorts. In 1959, KTTV in Los Angeles purchased the Three Stooges films for air, but by the early 1970s, rival station KTLA began airing the Stooges films, keeping them in the schedule until early 1994. The Family Channel (now ABC Family) ran the shorts as part of their Stooge TV block from February 19, 1996, to January 2, 1998. In the late 1990s, AMC had held the rights to the Three Stooges shorts, originally airing them under the Stooges Playhouse block, but replacing it in 1999 with N.Y.U.K. (New Yuk University of Knuckleheads). Featuring host Leslie Nielsen in the form of a college instructor, the block aired several shorts often grouped by a theme, such as similar schtick used in different films. Although the block was discontinued after AMC revamped their format in 2002, the network still ran Stooges shorts occasionally. The AMC run ended when Spike TV picked them up in 2004, airing them in their Stooges Slap-Happy Hour. By 2007, the network had discontinued the block. Although Spike did air Stooges shorts for a brief period of time after the block was canceled, as of late April 2008, Three Stooges has disappeared from the network's schedule entirely. The Three Stooges returned on December 31, 2009, on AMC, starting with the "Countdown with the Stooges" New Year's Eve marathon. AMC planned to put several episodes on their website in 2010.

Since the 1990s Columbia and its television division's successor, Sony Pictures Television, has preferred to license the Stooges shorts to cable networks, precluding the films from being shown on local broadcast TV. Two stations in Chicago and Boston, however, signed long-term syndication contracts with Columbia years ago and have declined to terminate them. Thus, WMEU-CA in Chicago currently airs all 190 Three Stooges shorts on Stooge-a-Palooza, hosted by Rich Koz, and WSBK-TV in Boston airs Stooge shorts and feature films. KTLA in Los Angeles dropped the shorts in 1994, but brought them back in 2007 as part of a special retro-marathon commemorating the station's 60th anniversary. Since that time, the station's original 16mm Stooges film prints have aired occasionally as part of mini-marathons on holidays. Antenna TV, a network broadcasting on the digital subchannels of local broadcast stations (owned by Tribune Broadcasting, who also owns KTLA), began airing the Stooges shorts upon the network's January 1, 2011 launch, which run in multi-hour blocks on weekends; most of the Three Stooges feature films are also broadcast on the network, through Antenna TV's distribution agreement with Sony Pictures Entertainment (whose Columbia Pictures subsidiary released most of the films).

Some of the Stooge films have been colorized by two separate companies. The first colorized DVD releases, distributed by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, were prepared by West Wing Studios in 2004. The following year, Legend Films colorized the public domain shorts Malice in the Palace, Sing a Song of Six Pants, Disorder in the Court and Brideless Groom. Disorder in the Court and Brideless Groom also appears on two of West Wing's colorized releases. In any event, the Columbia-produced shorts (aside from the public domain films) are handled by Sony Pictures Entertainment, while the MGM Stooges shorts are owned by Warner Bros. via their Turner Entertainment division. Sony offers 21 of the shorts on their web platform Crackle, along with eleven Minisodes. Meanwhile, the rights to the Stooges' feature films rests with the studios that originally produced them (Columbia/Sony for the Columbia films, and 20th Century Fox for the Fox films).

International airings[link]

• Japan - NTV
• Germany - ARD

Home video release and public reception[link]

Between 1984 and 1985, RCA Columbia Pictures Home Video released a total of thirteen Three Stooges volumes on VHS, Beta and Laserdisc, each containing three shorts. These titles were later reissued on VHS by its successor, Sony Pictures Entertainment, between 1995 and 1997, with a DVD reissue between 2000 and 2004.

[edit] The Three Stooges Collection

On October 30, 2007, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released a two-disc DVD set entitled The Three Stooges Collection, Volume One: 1934–1936. The set contains shorts from the first three years the Stooges worked at Columbia Pictures, marking the first time ever that all 19 shorts were released in their original theatrical order to DVD. Additionally, every short was remastered in high definition, a first for the Stooge films. Previous DVD releases were based on themes (wartime, history, work, etc.), and sold poorly. Fans and critics alike praised Sony for finally giving the Stooges the proper DVD treatment. One critic states "the Three Stooges on DVD has been a real mix'n match hodgepodge of un-restored titles and illogical entries. This new...boxset...seems to be the first concerted effort to categorize their huge body of work chronologically with many shorts seeing the digital light for the first time."^[17] Videolibrarian.com critic added "finally, the studio knuckleheads got it right! The way that the Three Stooges have been presented on home video has been a real slap in the face and poke in the eye to fans. They've been anthologized, colorized, and public domain-ed, as their shorts have been released and re-released in varying degrees of quality. Highly recommended."^[18] Critic James Plath of DVDtown.com added, "Thank you, Sony, for finally giving these Columbia Pictures icons the kind of DVD retrospective that they deserve. Remastered in High Definition and presented in chronological order, these short films now give fans the chance to appreciate the development of one of the most successful comedy teams in history."^[19]

The chronological series proved very successful and wildly popular, and Sony wasted little time preparing the next set for release. Volume Two: 1937–1939 was released on May 27, 2008, followed by Volume Three: 1940–1942' three months later on August 26, 2008. Demand exceeded supply, proving to Sony that they had a hit on their hands. In response, Volume Four: 1943–1945 was released on October 7, 2008, a mere two months after its predecessor.^[20] The global economic crisis slowed down the release schedule after Volume Four, and Volume Five: 1946–1948 was belatedly released on March 17, 2009. Volume Five is the first in the series to feature Shemp Howard with the Stooges.^[21] Volume Six: 1949–1951 was released June 16, 2009,^[22] and Volume Seven: 1952–1954 was released on November 10, 2009.^[23] The eighth and final volume was released on June 1, 2010, bringing the series to a close. For the first time in history, all 190 Three Stooges short subjects became available to the public, uncut and unedited.

A new 20-disc DVD boxed set entitled The Three Stooges: The Ultimate Collection, reported to include all 190 shorts from volumes 1-8 and additional bonus material, is scheduled to be released in June 2012.

Music[link]

• Several instrumental tunes were played over the opening credits at different times in the production of the short features. The most commonly used themes were:
  • The verse portion of the Civil War era song "Listen to the Mockingbird", played in a comical way, complete with sounds of birds and such. This was first used in Pardon My Scotch, their ninth short film, in 1935. (Prior to that comedic short, the opening theme varied and was typically connected to the storyline in some fashion.)
  • "Three Blind Mice", beginning in 1939 as a slow but straightforward presentation (dubbed the "sliding strings" version), often breaking into a "jazzy" style before ending. In mid-1942, another more driving version, complete with accordion was played fast all the way through.
• The Columbia short subject Woman Haters was done completely in rhyme, mostly recited (not sung), in rhythm with a Jazz-Age underscore running throughout the film, but with some key lines sung. It was sixth in a Musical Novelties short subject series, and appropriated its musical score from the first five films. The memorable "My Life, My Love, My All," was originally "At Last!" from the film Um-Pa.
• "Swinging the Alphabet" (a.k.a. B-A-bay, B-E-be, B-I-bicky-bi…) from Violent Is the Word for Curly is perhaps the best-known song performed by the Stooges on film.
• The Stooges broke into a three-part harmonized version of "Tears" ("You'll Never Know Just What Tears Are") in Horses' Collars, A Ducking They Did Go (in which the melody was sung by Bud Jamison) and Half Shot Shooters. The song, which was written by Moe, Larry, Shemp, and one-time Ted Healy Stooge Fred Sanborn, first appeared in the 1930 feature film Soup to Nuts.
• The "Lucia Sextet" (Chi mi frena in tal memento?), from the opera Lucia di Lammermoor by Gaetano Donizetti (announced by Larry as "the Sextet from Lucy"), is played on a record player and lip-synched by the Stooges in Micro-Phonies. The same melody re-appears in Squareheads of the Round Table as the tune of "Oh, Elaine, can you come out tonight?". Micro-Phonies also includes the Johann Strauss II waltz "Voices of Spring" ("Frühlingsstimmen") Op. 410. Another Strauss waltz, "The Blue Danube", is featured in Ants in the Pantry and Punch Drunks.
• The song "Fredric March" (named after the actor) was a favorite of director Jules White; it appeared in at least seven different Columbia shorts:
  • Termites of 1938 – The Stooges "play" this song on a violin, flute, and string bass at a dinner party in an attempt to attract mice.
  • Dutiful But Dumb – Curly is hidden inside a floor-standing radio, and plays the song on a modified harmonica.
  • Three Little Twirps – Heard as background music at the circus while Moe and Curly sell tickets.
  • Idle Roomers – Curly plays the song on a trombone to calm a wolf man.
  • Gents Without Cents – Three girls perform acrobatics on stage while this song is playing.
  • Gents in a Jam – Shemp and Moe have a problem with a radio that will not stop playing this song.
  • Pardon My Backfire – The song plays on a car radio.
• The Moe–Larry–Curly Joe lineup of the Stooges recorded several musical record albums in the early 1960s. Most of their songs were adaptations of nursery rhymes. Among their more popular recordings were "Making a Record" (a surreal trip to a recording studio built around the song "Go Tell Aunt Mary"), "Three Little Fishes", "All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth", "Wreck the Halls with Boughs of Holly", "Mairzy Doats" and "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas".
• In 1983, a group called the Jump 'N the Saddle Band recorded a track called "The Curly Shuffle", which featured the narrator singing about his love of the Stooges mixed with a chorus of many of Curly's catchphrases and sound effects. In the mid-1980s, the song became a popular mid-game hit for New York Mets fans in the Shea Stadium bleachers, who would dance in small groups to the tune whenever the song was played between innings. The music video, which featured clips of the classic Stooges shorts, was also included as a bonus feature on one of the 1984 VHS releases.

Feature motion pictures[link]

The Three Stooges also made appearances in many feature length movies in the course of their careers:

Film	Year	Moe	Larry	Curly	Shemp	Joe	Curly Joe
Soup to Nuts	1930	Y	Y		Y
Turn Back the Clock	1933	Y	Y	Y
Meet the Baron	1933	Y	Y	Y
Dancing Lady	1933	Y	Y	Y
Broadway to Hollywood	1933	Y		Y
Myrt and Marge	1933	Y	Y	Y
Fugitive Lovers	1934	Y	Y	Y
Hollywood Party (cameos)	1934	Y	Y	Y
The Captain Hates the Sea (cameos)	1934	Y	Y	Y
Start Cheering	1938	Y	Y	Y
Time Out for Rhythm	1941	Y	Y	Y
My Sister Eileen (cameos)	1942	Y	Y	Y
Rockin' in the Rockies	1945	Y	Y	Y
Swing Parade of 1946	1946	Y	Y	Y
Gold Raiders	1951	Y	Y		Y
Have Rocket, Will Travel	1959	Y	Y				Y
Stop! Look! and Laugh! (compilation)	1960	Y	Y	Y
Snow White and the Three Stooges	1961	Y	Y				Y
The Three Stooges Meet Hercules	1962	Y	Y				Y
The Three Stooges in Orbit	1962	Y	Y				Y
The Three Stooges Go Around the World in a Daze	1963	Y	Y				Y
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (cameos)	1963	Y	Y				Y
4 for Texas (cameo)	1963	Y	Y				Y
The Outlaws Is Coming	1965	Y	Y				Y
Kook's Tour (TV pilot)	1970	Y	Y				Y