The Sitter Downers

It's springtime. Larry, Curly, and Moe are suitors asking for the hands of sisters Flora Bell, Dora Bell, and Cora Bell. They ask for their father's permission and he's refusing. The guys go on a sit down strike. After three weeks, it becomes a media circus and the father relents. Before their honeymoon, the girls demand that the boys build them a house.

The stunts are bigger which reminds me of Buster Keaton. The house falling down on them is pure Buster. I love the boys but in this one, I appreciate the girls just as much. These girls are not the usual Amazon beauties and they have good comedic chemistry. June Gittelson would do more Stooges shorts. She's the classic giant brute who could beat up the boys. Betty Mack is probably the best of the three in that she's that giant brute and also pretty enough to be pretty. She's like a taller Amy Schumer. Marcia Healy is the one that can be left behind and being the sister would do that eventually anyways. I like this one short.

The Three Stooges has always been some of the many actors that I have loved. I love just about every one of the shorts that they have made. I love all six of the Stooges (Curly, Shemp, Moe, Larry, Joe, and Curly Joe)! All of the shorts are hilarious and also star many other great actors and actresses which a lot of them was in many of the shorts! In My opinion The Three Stooges is some of the greatest actors ever and is the all time funniest comedy team!

One of the most unique Three Stooges shorts is The Sitter-Downers. In this short are James C. Morton, Bert Young, June Gittelson, Marcia Healy, with Betty Mack and Robert McKenzie. The acting by these actors are good especially by Morton. There are many funny scenes here that I think most Three Stooges fans will love! In My opinion this one of the most different Three Stooges shorts. I strongly recommend this one!

A long-time friend and fellow Stooges fan (we're in our fifties) and I sat down with a few glasses of 'Cab-Sav' (Cabernet Sauvignon for the uninitiated) and spent some enjoyable hours p***ing-ourselves laughing. Of the twelve classics in this collection, TSD was the last in order on the DVD but paradoxically the first released: 1937.

It is a real hoot but, more than that, surprisingly contemporary and with some insights into the American psyche. Yes, Virginia, there ARE female Stooges! The uncredited trio of actors playing the wives are a feminist's delight: just as stupid as the boys. Now there's equality for you! There are pointed comments about Unionism, the notion of lotteries, and even how the selection of wives is, in itself, a lottery. The final scene with its pre-fab nightmare (the house that 'crack' built) would have made Dali proud! Escher would rise from the dead just to applaud this surreal masterpiece!

What makes TSD different from many of the Stooges' shorts is that it does not fit neatly into their vaudeville act (for surely that is where many of their set-pieces were derived). While it shares the same anarchistic bent, it is at once more pointed in its criticism of the American world-at-large as it is of life-in-general. Put simply, it is a masterpiece of its genre and can stand alone as an indication of just how brilliant Moe, Larry and Curly were. Enjoy!

"Corabelle," "Florabell" and and "Dorabell".....where else but in a Three Stooges flick would hear those names? Where else would three guys ask, for the 100th time, "Will you marry us," and get a reply, "Oh, this is so sudden."

Of the girls, the plump "Corabelle" (Betty Mack) is the best. When she hugs you, start counting the broken ribs! She played the "heavy" in a number of Three Stooges shorts and was always funny.

The boys need permission from the girls' father before they will agree to marriage. "Mr.Bell," played by James C. Morton, is adamant in saying "No!" I recognized Morton's gruff voice. He, too, was in a number of Three Stooges shorts including the famous "Disorder In The Court"

This story gets ludicrous fast as the boys go on a sit-down strike until the old man gives in.....and it gets national attention in the newspapers!!! "Persistent Lovers Win Nation's Sympathy As Gifts Pour In" blares one headline. Are you kidding me? It must have been a slow time for news.

Anyway, it gets wilder and wilder as the boys get married (drawing names out of hat) and then try to build a house. There are some classic slapstick scenes in here, such as with Curly and the cement. It's total insanity.....just the way we Three Stooges fans like it.

This is, in my humble opinion, the best short the 3 Stooges ever made. The boys go on a strike inside their fiancees' home until their father relents and lets them marry his 3 daughters. Due to all their new found notoriety, a construction company donates a do-it-yourself pre-fabricated home which the boys set out to build after they do get married. Needless to say everything turns out wrong - the bathtub is on the side of the wall and the stairs lead to nowhere. The house collapses when one of the wives unintentionally pulls out a beam. This short was based on a silent by Buster Keaton called One Week. It also contains my all time favorite quote by Moe after Curly's feet get stuck in cement and he decides to use explosives to free him and Curly protests he'll get blown up - "Don't you know that dynamite always blows down?".