A Plumbing We Will Go (1940)
Directed by Del Lord (1894-1970), Written by Elwood Ullman.
Often considered the quintessential Stooge film, A Plumbing includes all of the classic Stooge tropes: mildly criminal behavior, disrespect for authority figures, violence toward each other, the puncturing of the pompous, and the timing and antics of Curly.
Like most other Stooges films, A Plumbing is class based humor. The Stooges are working class guys. They beat on each other constantly but none of them are ever visibly hurt. The people they work for are members of the upper class. Their dignity and their property are destroyed.
Stooge humor had a very strong appeal for immigrant audiences. The Horowitz brothers and Feinberg were sons of immigrants. Their humor is primarily visual, easily comprehensible to people whose English was limited. More importantly, they express an aspect of the immigrant experience: they are outsiders, constantly being beaten down, but always getting back up. At the end of A Plumbing the house is left in ruins, and The Stooges are running from the police. But we know they will go on to wreck havoc elsewhere.
A Plumbing was produced and directed by Del Lord (1894-1970). Lord had worked as an actor and director with Mack Sennett (he drove the Keystone Kops van). He sold used cars at the beginning of the depression but was hired by Columbia in '35 as it opened its short films division. He made over three dozen Three Stooges films and was critical in helping create the style of the films.
The film was written by Elwood Ullman (1903-1985). Ullman was a humor writer for various magazines who moved to Hollywood and went to work for Columbia. He wrote more than half of the 190 Stooge films. In addition, Ullman wrote for Buster Keaton, Abbott and Costello, and numerous others.
One more thing that's gotta be said: Hollywood was very slow to make anti-Nazi films. This is a little surprising because Hollywood was full of people who had escaped the Nazis and had personal and exact knowledge of what was going on in Germany. However, Hollywood was concerned not to alienate any part of its audience and where Americans stood in the 30s was not clear. For example, on Feb 20, 1939 a rally of Nazi supporters drew a crowd of 20,000 to Madison Square Garden. Their leader Fritz Julius Kuhn (1896-1951) denounced FDR's "New Deal" as the "Jew Deal." Anyhow, The Stooges were among the first to make and release an anti-Nazi picture: You Nazty Spy, released in early 1940; a year before Chaplin's The Great Dictator, and two years before Casablanca.
Staring:
Well, The Three Stooges: Moe and Curly Howard and Larry Fine...and many others. Almost all of the others had extensive film careers, and almost all made multiple Stooge films. They include:
Bess Flowers (1898-1988) (Mrs. Hadley) over 700 acting credits, possibly the largest number in history. She was known as "The Queen of the Hollywood Extras." Among her many credits were It Happened One Night, You Can't Take it With You, All About Eve, The Greatest Show on Earth, and Around the World in Eighty Days, all of which won academy awards for best picture. You can read a nice brief article about Flowers here (not required)
Wilson Benge (1875-1955) (the butler) Benge appeared in two other Stooge films. Like Flowers, Benge was a great extra. He has over 200 acting credits but he almost always appears as a butler, a servant, or a waiter.
Dudley Dickerson (1906-1968) (the cook) Dickerson was famous for "scared reaction comedy," and appeared in a dozen other Stooges films. Dickerson almost always appears as a train porter, waiter, or other attendant. He appeared in two Marx Brothers films and had over 160 acting credits.
Symona Boniface (120 films) generally played the
society matron for the Stooges.
Monte Collins (167 films as an actor and another 32 as screenwriter) generally worked as a supporting player,
Bud Jamison, (450 films) often played policemen, detectives, and other authority figures,
Eddie Laughton (200+
films) English born and often played English characters.
Al Thompson (176 films) known particularly as a stunt performer,
John Tyrrell (almost 300 films) best known as the sidekick of Mandrake the Magician in 12 films.
Commentary (good read but not required): My Pal Moe by Bob Bernet