Cast & Crew:
Moe Howard
Larry Fine
Curly Howard
Beverly Warren as Molly
Harold "Tiny" Brauer as Butch McGee
Jackie Johnson as Eggbert
Joe Palma as Henchman no. 2
Wally Rose as Henchman no. 1
Directed by Jules White
Written by Felix Adler
Produced by Jules White
Cinematography by George Kelley
Film Editing by Edwin Bryant
Art Direction by Charles Clague
Music by John Leipold
Three Loan Wolves is an early prototype of Three Men and a Baby told via flashback sequence. The Stooges relate to their adopted son (horribly un-ably portrayed by Jackie Jackson) how it came to be that he has three fathers.
We begin our tale with the Stooges, owners of an inherited pawn shop "Here Today, Pawn Tomorrow," owing money to the Gashouse Protective Association. You know, gangsters. When the main mobster makes his first attempt at touching up their shop, the Stooges deal with him in their typical Stooge fashion. Actually, while the fashion is typical -- the outcome is less so, seeing as they are rather one-sidedly and quickly victorious. Too easy a win to get chuckles from -- surprise gives you the belly laughs. Relief, chuckles.
Larry's "Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute," is in smart homage to Robert Goodloe Harper -- in this July 4th 1946 Stooges offering.
There is an interesting tact employed here in their initial altercation, wherein Moe "Shows ya some mayhem," in a bid to impress their bully with the tact of 'look what I'm doing to this fellow I like -- imagine what I'll do to you!'
With Curly getting the short-end of the eye-poke there, it's then his turn to impress the thug. A mannequin is his target, and we are immediately privy to his sad state of health. Sped up footage is used in place of a more honest stoogery, to cover up his slowed motions.
We actually see a harbinger to this, in the use of his ears made to wiggle "You ain't heard nothing yet ..." in lieu of more natural effect...
While these simple bits help to somewhat disguise his slow, hesitant movements, there is no disguising that his skin hangs loose from his bones and he's noticeably the least portly of the trio. Three Loan Wolves was filmed near the end of Curly Howard's career. The by then 42 year-old Super Stooge had already suffered a series of minor strokes leaving his performances of this sad era infamously unpredictable and just plain feh. Notable to this short, in particular, is Curly's often inability to maintain his falsetto voice.
Different directors had different ideas on how best to cover Curly's newly lacking Stoogery. Edward Bernds devised ways to cover Curly's illness:
It was an awful tough deal for a novice rookie director to have a Curly who wasn't himself. I had seen Curly at his greatest and his work in this film was far from great. The wallpaper scene was agony to direct because of the physical movements required to roll up the wallpaper and to react when it curled up in him. It just didn't work. As a fledgling director, my plans were based on doing everything in one nice neat shot. But when I saw the scenes were not playing, I had to improvise and use other angles to make it play. It was the wallpaper scene that we shot first, and during the first two hours of filming, I became aware that we had a problem with Curly.Jules White, on the other (and easier) hand, the hand we see at play here, simply gave the majority of Curly's lines to Larry. This made Three Loan Wolves essentially a de facto Larry short, and while I'm a big fan of The Stooge in the Middle, that seldom plays well.
"The kid walked in and asked for a match, I said I don't smoke."
Larry then attempts at coming further clean than not at all:
"The bag left me holding the babe!"
There's something about the way Larry delivers a line, that I positively adore. Out of all the Stooges his sense of timing in dialog is, in my opinion, unmatched. Perhaps this is due to his musical talents, of which there is some fun poked at in this short -- as he is shown in gags to be inept among the instruments. He, an accomplished violinist.
Hilarity ensues, but not overly so if truth be told -- as neither Moe, Larry, nor Curly have one iota of an inkling among them on how to take care for a baby. Moe of course goes straight to ballistic in response to the kid's crying, "Quiet, little baby, quiet. Or I'll break yer neck." and their first best attempt at soothing comes in the form of Curly giving the baby a revolver as a pacifier.
[Interesting to see Moe become Shemp momentarily, courtesy of a hairdo rearranged by an exploding beer bottle. Something to look for.]
As to the revolver pacifier, Curly assures Moe the gun isn't loaded but of course it is, and a shot is fired. The stray bullet makes a lamp crash down on Moe's head. *Expected Stoogery* Finally, the baby's mood, or hunger, is satiated when Curly makes an improvised bottle from a ceramic whisky jug and rubber glove. The physics of which greatly irk me.
Later, Mobster #1 shows up with some of his goons to get that money. In another not funny bout of mostly awkward fisticuffs, Curly again is the beneficiary of sped up filming and los trios manage to defeat the crooks somewhat less handily and to a chuckle.
"And that's how it was, son..." Moe tidies up the ending. An ending that sees the kid go off to find his mother, and Moe and Curly venting their frustrations on Larry. Such is parenthood. I suppose.
Final Grade: C-