Although the films of the Three Stooges are treated as kiddie fare on television, this author has sprinkled references to sex perversion through the book that are not kiddie fare and have nothing to do with the Three Stooges. The author evidently doesn't want to believe that anyone could still complain about "dirty humor" and says something that implies as much while discussing the Stooges' RHYTHM AND WEEP. But we are still free to complain about these things today, and I am complaining about what he has done.
While implying we are unable to complain of some things, the author tells us to complain about what he wants to complain about. And does so in a totalitarian tone.
While discussing THE YOKE'S ON ME, the author takes the opportunity to complain about Japanese having been put in internment camps during the second World War, but somehow fails to express any kind of concern about the Indians having been put on reservations at an earlier date.
He goes on to say that in THE YOKE'S ON ME the Japanese are "killed", but that in NO DOUGH, BOYS ( the very next film ) the Germans are "subdued". Both films end the same way, with the bad guys unconscious. Many of the Stooges' films end that way and sometimes the Stooges themselves are unconscious at the end.*
In addition to demonstrating a lack of concern about Indians being put on reservations, the author actually attempts to make "jokes" about white women being raped by Indians and thereby demonstrates insensitivity to mistreatment of women. Although the movie industry was notorious for mistreating women, little or nothing is said about that in this "Faq".
The author does not seem to know that Adrian Booth was the same girl as Lorna Gray under a different name, information that can be found in any number of other books.
The author puts some emphasis on scenes supposedly being timed wrong, saying that they tried to milk the laughs from gags for too long a period of time. The author evidently did not know that two-reel comedies were timed for a theater audience, not a lone individual who periodically hits the pause button to write notes.
This author does not always communicate things in a way that is easy to understand, and there are passages in this book whose meaning is not clear to me, such as where he says that by the time you reach the conclusion of the Stooges' LOOSE LOOT you will have a "stomach ache". Then there are peculiar words I do not understand, some of which may not be standardized, some of which are in a foreign language ( Yiddish ). And then there are things that he doesn't know about at all, possibly because they are inconvenient, such as World War II era Japanese medical experiments.
*I'm aware that the story that the Japanese were killed at the end of this film was in a previous book, THE COMPLETE THREE STOOGES by Jon Soloman. I've written about that before.
Hollywood and the Axis Powers:
http://benny-drinnon.blogspot.com/2013/07/hollywood-and-axis-powers.html
Japanese Medical Experiments:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731
Kill Chaplin:
http://benny-drinnon.blogspot.com/2012/12/kill-chaplin.html
Pearl Harbor:
http://benny-drinnon.blogspot.com/2012/12/pearl-harbor.html
A
