The Three Stooges: Malice in the Palace [VHS]

These short subjects were made at the time of Curly's recuperation, NOT his full retirement: it appears that efforts were made to bring him back, in fact "Malice" is the picture which reportedly originally featured Curly as the Cook! (One source claims that the only remaining evidence is the "lobby card" with the "FOUR Stooges"; another source says that the sequence was not deleted but remains in the form of an alternate version!). At any rate, the first "third Stooge" does a fine job in the '49 flick and in "Six Pants" - both are strong efforts with clever gags.

The shorts on this tape are great shorts, but the quality is horrible, even according to videotape standards. Plus, there are only two shorts on this tape! Not enough to sustain any stooge fan and there are better releases of these same two films by other companies! I'm giving this one two stars because the two shorts on the tape are quite funny.

MALICE IN THE PALACE (1949)- A true Shemp classic. This is probably Shemp's most famous short. Every bit of this is hilarious. Too much to discribe. You must see it.SING A SONG OF SIX PANTS (1947) is another true Shemp classic. This was great. Once again, too much to discribe. A must-see.Too bad this tape only has two shorts.

Certain things only Curly could do, and certain things only Shemp could do. These are two of the funniest ever done by the Stooges. (And I consider Curly a RARE comic genius.) Shemp is GREAT here, but in general I would rate him on a par with Larry and Moe.What can you say? All four of them were fantastic. I just wish Curly could have performed with Shemp. Did they ever? They were brothers, you know!

This is one of the funniest stooge episodes I have ever seen with Shemp. Shemp was able to fill Curly's shoes and then some. Besides, Shemp was a stooge before Curly was. I guess fate wanted the original stooges to be around for awhile. All stooge fans need to see this classic Shemp episode.