The Three Stooges

I recently saw the “The Three Stooges” movie, which I wanted to see from the time I saw the first trailer. It wasn’t an inspirational film, didn’t have any deep message and was fairly predictable. Yet, I thoroughly enjoyed it with three of my friends. We laughed so much at some points in the movie that we missed four or five lines of dialogue. However, it didn’t really matter, because this was, after all, The Three Stooges. No line of dialogue, no one scene was going to be the key to the movie. The key to the movie was the ridiculous slapstick comedy that went on between the three of them and sometimes others.

Here’s the one surprise of the movie. At the end of the movie the Farrelly brothers, who directed the movie, had a quick scene. They explained for the audience that the props used to smash someone over the head or in the face were just rubber or Styrofoam. They showed how they were used and how by putting in sound effects it seemed like they were real sledgehammers and crowbars. Seriously, you have to put that at the end of the movie? Why?

We watched the Stooges all the time when I was growing up. They were on every day after school on the new local UHF TV station (those of us around before cable know what UHF was) and we watched at least some of them, if not all of them, while having a snack. They were probably on TV on Saturday afternoons, too. Back then we would rather have spent our time outside doing stuff than sitting in front of the TV, but the Stooges were special. We made exceptions for them.

We could quote lines from the various episodes and do whole scenes. If we didn’t know them exactly, it really didn’t matter. We weren’t doing Shakespeare. For all the times we watched “The Three Stooges”, we never believed the hammers, pipes, crowbars and any other devices that were used to hit someone were real. In addition, when we imitated the Stooges and used real devices, we didn’t actually hit the other guy with them. No, we were smart enough to know that you could really hurt someone with them, so we faked hitting someone. I don’t know of anyone who ever did what the Stooges did, but with real tools, hammers, etc., and hurt someone else. Even though we were warned by teachers, parents and other assorted adults that “someone is going to get hurt”, no one that I know of was ever hurt in any way.

For all the so called violent shows we watched, we were not violent kids. We didn’t try to blow up somebody like in the Looney Tunes cartoons, or hit someone over the head like the Stooges, or shoot someone like they did in the cowboy movies that were on TV. Sure, we pretended to do all that stuff and even added in sound effects and a little drama as we slowly died. I just can’t imagine the directors of Looney Tunes taking a moment to tell us not to put a bomb under someone or to not put dynamite down someone’s pants, that it was all just for entertainment and not to try it at home. I believe that was something that parents did back then. I know my parents made sure we weren’t really beating on each other and knew that it was not acceptable to be violent toward someone else.

“The Three Stooges” hold many good memories for me, times of hanging out with my brothers and laughing until it hurt. The movie did the same for me and my friends. We laughed so much we had tears running down our faces and our stomachs hurt at times. Much to the annoyance of our families, we quoted the movie for a couple of weeks and laughed at nothing readily apparent when something reminded us of the movie. However, let it be known that none of us have hit anyone over the head with a sledgehammer or poked them in the eyes, even without a warning from the Farrelly brothers.

All I Really Need to Know I Learned From Looney Tunes

Last week during a conversation (I don’t remember if it was at work or somewhere else – another senior moment) someone mentioned the book All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Now I’ve heard it was a good book, but I’ve never read it and the person was saying how true it is. Well, I didn’t go to kindergarten so I can’t say it is true for me. However, I did learn a lot at an early age and sometimes I think that all I really need to know I learned from Looney Tunes. That’s right, Looney Tunes.

These are some of the things that, contrary to Mom’s belief that I was wasting my time watching cartoons, I learned (each with a link, if you’re inclined to watch):

§ Use your strengths, especially in a bad situation. When Rocky the gangster was going to get rid of Bugs Bunny, he used his superior intelligence, quick wit and talent for imitating Irish police officers to beat them. He knew he couldn’t outslug or outgun them, so he used the strengths he had.

§ Don’t be greedy. Daffy Duck showed me that when you can’t see all the treasure you do have and you get greedy, you may end up losing what you do have. You may also end up just an inch tall.

§ You can’t let fear stop you. When Bugs was faced with an evil scientist and a big, red monster in their castle, he didn’t just give up. He overcame his fear, got rid of the monster and eventually got away.

§ You need to persevere. Pepe LePew never got the girl on the first try, even though he was quite the smooth talker. He had to keep on pursuing her if he had any chance to get the girl.

§ Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it. Pepe LePew sometimes got more than he bargained for when the pursuee became the pursuer. L’amour was not so much fun then.

§ Sometimes others don’t listen to your advice or plans because they’re not that good. Foghorn Leghorn was always trying to tell others, like the little chicken, what to do and how to do it. They didn’t listen to him because he was nowhere near as brilliant as he thought he was.

§ Intimidation doesn’t work. Yosemite Sam was always blustering and blathering, firing off his guns, but where did that really get him? Bugs Bunny always beat him.

§ Don’t be too cocky. Bugs Bunny was convinced he was smarter and faster than the turtle, yet he always lost the race to him. When you get too cocky you underestimate your opponent and then you lose.

§ Don’t be deceived by small and cute. Tweety Bird beat the tar out of Sylvester the Cat every time, mostly because Sylvester thought Tweety was just a little, weak bird.

These are all things I learned a long time ago and still live by today. I’ve been faced with some bad situations, at work and in life in general, and it took using my strengths and a little perseverance to get through them. There have been times in my life I was afraid, but I didn’t let the fear stop me from doing what I needed to do. I’ve been cocky and arrogant about something, fallen on my face and learned from it. There have been times I thought I absolutely needed something, then gotten it and wished I had never even thought about it. There have been situations where I felt no one was listening to me and later realized that they weren’t because their ideas were much better than mine. My wife is small and pretty cute and I let that deceive me – once. Yes, I learned a lot from Looney Tunes.

Even today, Looney Tunes is part of my life. A co-worker and I constantly crack each other up as we quote various cartoon characters, whether we’re happy, stressed, angry, or just need a laugh. When we drive past a dead skunk and I don’t say “SKUNK DE PEW!”, my son will say, “Aren’t you gonna say it?” I know exactly what he’s talking about, and after almost 16 years of hearing it he expects it. When someone asks for a good name for a girl, I always say Prunella, trying to say it just like Bugs says it. When my son isn’t listening to me, I do my best Foghorn Leghorn imitation and say “Listen to me when I’m talking to ya boy!” And there are many more examples, as my wife and kids and friends can attest to.

OK, so maybe I didn’t learn everything I need to know from Looney Tunes, but I did learn a great deal. Besides, I learned a lot from The Three Stooges, too!