Pop Goes The Weasel
Every time Shemp Howard hears "Pop Goes The Weasel", he goes blank and starts swinging hard. He's recruited as a prizefighter, with Charley Rogers playing the violin during the matches. During his title bout with champion Joe Palma, Rogers breaks his violin and Shemp has to delay while he finds another.
It's a pretty good Shemp Howard comedy, drawn from the early Three Stooges short, PUNCH DRUNK. That happened a lot with Columbia shorts; plots and gags were reused, whether it was from an earlier Columbia short, a Mack Sennett script, or a movie produced in the silent era by unit producer Jules White's brother Jack -- who was credited as "Preston Black" to avoid charges of nepotism. By the end of the Columbia shorts era, the same script might have been used five or six times.
The difference, if any, lay in the lead comic, and with Shemp Howard shorts, the new gags tended to cluster nearer the start. They do here, and the result is a pretty good short comedy.
It's a pretty good Shemp Howard comedy, drawn from the early Three Stooges short, PUNCH DRUNK. That happened a lot with Columbia shorts; plots and gags were reused, whether it was from an earlier Columbia short, a Mack Sennett script, or a movie produced in the silent era by unit producer Jules White's brother Jack -- who was credited as "Preston Black" to avoid charges of nepotism. By the end of the Columbia shorts era, the same script might have been used five or six times.
The difference, if any, lay in the lead comic, and with Shemp Howard shorts, the new gags tended to cluster nearer the start. They do here, and the result is a pretty good short comedy.
- boblipton
- Jun 9, 2019