''Flat Foot Stooges'' is a 1938 short subject directed by

Charley Chase Charles Joseph Parrott (October 20, 1893 – June 20, 1940), known professionally as Charley Chase, was an American comedian, actor, screenwriter and film director. He worked for many pioneering comedy studios but is chiefly associated with pro ...

starring American slapstick comedy team

The Three Stooges The Three Stooges were an American vaudeville and comedy team active from 1922 until 1970, best remembered for their 190 short subject films by Columbia Pictures. Their hallmark styles were physical farce and slapstick. Six Stooges appeared ...

(

Moe Howard Moses Harry Horwitz (June 19, 1897 – May 4, 1975), known professionally as Moe Howard, was an American actor and comedian. He is best known as the leader of The Three Stooges, the farce comedy team who starred in motion pictures and television ...

Larry Fine Louis Feinberg (October 5, 1902 – January 24, 1975), known professionally as Larry Fine, was an American actor, comedian, and musician. He is best known as a member of the comedy act the Three Stooges. Early life Fine was born to a Russian Je ...

and

Curly Howard Jerome Lester Horwitz (; October 22, 1903 – January 18, 1952), known professionally as Curly Howard, was an American actor and comedian. He was best known as a member of the American comedy team the Three Stooges, which also featured his elder ...

). It is the 35th entry in the series released by

Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...

starring the comedians, who released 190 shorts for the studio between 1934 and 1959.

Plot

The trio are

firemen A firefighter is a first responder and rescuer extensively trained in firefighting, primarily to extinguish hazardous fires that threaten life, property, and the environment as well as to rescue people and in some cases or jurisdictions also ...

(''a la'' 1936's '' False Alarms'') at an engine company No 1 that still employs horse-powered

fire engines The Fire Engines were a post-punk band from Edinburgh, Scotland. The Fire Engines were an influence on many bands that followed, including Franz Ferdinand and The Rapture, with Meat Whiplash and The Candyskins both taking their names from Fire ...

. Sleazy salesman Mr. Reardon (

Dick Curtis Richard Dye (May 11, 1902January 3, 1952), known professionally as Dick Curtis, was an American actor who made over 230 film and television appearances during his career. Early years Curtis was born in Newport, Kentucky, the son of Frank Dy ...

) fails to convince Fire Chief Kelly (

Chester Conklin Chester Cooper Conklin (January 11, 1886 – October 11, 1971) was an early American film comedian who started at Keystone Studios as one of Mack Sennett’s Keystone Cops, often paired with Mack Swain. He appeared in a series of films with Ma ...

) that horse-powered engines are on the way out. His ideas are rejected, and he is sent on his way. Mr. Reardon, however, tries to sabotage the firehouse by committing arson. He drops a can of gunpowder into the old-fashioned pump boiler and the chief's daughter (Lola Jensen) sees him. Reardon chases the girl to stop her from telling her father but accidentally falls and knocks himself out. Reardon does not know that the can has a leak, and a duck has been eating the spilled gunpowder. The duck alights on a window ledge in the station and lays an egg, which falls to the floor and explodes like a hand grenade, starting a fire. The explosion startles the chief's daughter which causes her to fall backwards and knock her head on the bed, unconscious. After having taken the horses to a Turkish bath, when the fire alarm sounds the Stooges try to hook the horses up to the fire engine but only end scaring the horses and having volunteers move the engine. (At a traffic stop the engine blows up but the Stooges and the Volunteers arguing with a traffic policeman (

Heinie Conklin Heinie Conklin (born Charles John Conklin; July 16, 1880July 30, 1959) was an American actor and comedian whose career began in the silent film era. Early years Conklin was born Charles John Conklin on July 16, 1880, in San Francisco, Califo ...

) results in nobody getting hurt). Realizing too late that the blaze is coming from their own fire station, the Stooges manage to arrive just in time to save the chief's daughter from the flames. Reardon also jumps from the station but misses the rescue net when the stooges save the girl first; when the girl points out Reardon as the arsonist, he runs away-the Stooges give chase but fall into the hole Reardon made in the street.

Production notes

Filmed on October 25–28, 1938, the title ''Flat Foot Stooges'' is a pun on the 1938 jazz song " Flat Foot Floogie (with a Floy Floy)".Solomon, Jon. (2002) ''The Complete Three Stooges: The Official Filmography and Three Stooges Companion'', p. 129; Comedy III Productions, Inc., A rarity among Stooge shorts, the boys are shown reciting dialogue incorrectly on several occasions, a result of director

's rushed directing style. Chase rarely stopped for retakes in an effort to finish a film ahead of schedule. When Larry slides down the fire pole and is accidentally punched by Moe, he calls himself a "victim of circumstance". This marks the first time a Stooge other than Curly says the line. Upon realizing they are heading in the wrong direction, Curly quips "Hey, we're doing the Corrigan!", a reference to aviator Douglas "Wrong Way" Corrigan. Corrigan had recently returned from a

transcontinental flight A transcontinental flight is a non-stop passenger flight from one side of a continent to the other. The term usually refers to flights across the United States, between the East and West Coasts. History The first transcontinental multi-stop fl ...

from

Floyd Bennett Field Floyd Bennett Field is an airfield in the Marine Park neighborhood of southeast Brooklyn in New York City, along the shore of Jamaica Bay. The airport originally hosted commercial and general aviation traffic before being used as a naval air ...

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporate ...

. Instead of returning to New York, he bypassed it, and headed to

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. ''Flat Foot Stooges'' marks the first usage of "

Three Blind Mice "Three Blind Mice" is an English-language nursery rhyme and musical round.I. Opie and P. Opie, ''The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), p. 306. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number o ...

" as the Stooges' title theme. However, this was not put to permanent use until ''

We Want Our Mummy ''We Want Our Mummy'' is a 1939 short subject directed by Del Lord starring American slapstick comedy team The Three Stooges (Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Curly Howard). It is the 37th entry in the series released by Columbia Pictures starring th ...

''.

References

External links

* * {{The Three Stooges 1938 films 1938 comedy films American black-and-white films Films directed by Charley Chase The Three Stooges films Films about firefighting Columbia Pictures short films American slapstick comedy films 1930s English-language films 1930s American films