''No Dough Boys'' is a 1944 short subject directed by Jules White 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 82nd 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 Stooges are dressed in

yellowface Portrayals of East Asians in American film and theatre has been a subject of controversy. These portrayals have frequently reflected an ethnocentric perception of East Asians rather than realistic and authentic depictions of East Asian cultures, c ...

as Japanese soldiers for a photo shoot; their boss ( John Tyrrell) tells them to go on a lunch break but they have to keep their costumes on to finish the photo shoot quickly. Meanwhile, in the restaurant the Stooges are about to go to, the manager reads a headline in the newspaper that states a Japanese submarine was destroyed offshore and three Japanese soldiers had escaped. When the Stooges arrive, the owner thinks they are the Japanese and attacks the Stooges, but they manage to escape. When they escape into the alley, they accidentally activate a hidden door. When they get inside, they meet a Nazi spy named Hugo (

Vernon Dent Vernon Bruce Dent (February 16, 1895 – November 5, 1963) was an American comic actor, who appeared in over 400 films. He co-starred in many short films for Columbia Pictures, frequently as the foil and the main antagonist and ally to The Thr ...

) who mistakes them for the three Japanese, Naki (Larry), Saki (Moe), and Waki (Curly), that escaped. Just as Hugo is about to introduce them to some ladies, Curly accidentally calls them "dames" which makes Hugo realize that they are not the Japanese, but he plays along anyway. In order to prove themselves, the Stooges have to teach the ladies jujitsu and do acrobatic tricks. When the real Japanese arrive, the Stooges fight them, but they keep turning the lights on and off, leading them to fight the wrong persons. At the end, the Stooges come out victorious.

Cast

Credited

as Moe *

as Larry *

as Curly *

as Hugo * Christine McIntyre as Celia Zweiback

Uncredited

* Kelly Flint as Amelia Schwartzbrot *

Judy Malcolm Judy Malcolm (December 1, 1910July 22, 1998) was an American film actress. Born Marguerite Westergren, Malcolm appeared in approximately 25 films between 1933 and 1951. Malcolm is familiar to modern viewers for her roles in several Three Stooges ...

as Stelia Pumpernickel * Brian O'Hara as Waiter * John Tyrrell as Photographer * Warren Kening as Joe the photoshoot model * William Yip as Waki * Joe Chan as Saki * Orson Tanaka as Naki

Production notes

''No Dough Boys'' was filmed on April 25–28, 1944. The film title is a play on "No-No Boys," Japanese-Americans who answered "no" to a two-part loyalty question that asked them to renounce the Japanese emperor and agree to serve in the

U.S. Armed Forces The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is the ...

.threestooges.net
/ref> It is also a play on the nickname for American infantrymen in the previous world war, known as a

doughboy Doughboy was a popular nickname for the American infantryman during World War I. Though the origins of the term are not certain, the nickname was still in use as of the early 1940s. Examples include the 1942 song "Johnny Doughboy Found a Rose in ...

. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, the Stooges made a few comedies that engaged in propaganda against the

Empire of Japan The also known as the Japanese Empire or Imperial Japan, was a historical nation-state and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 until the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of Japan, 1947 constitu ...

, including ''

Spook Louder ''Spook Louder'' is a 1943 short subject directed by Del Lord starring American slapstick comedy team The Three Stooges (Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Curly Howard). It is the 69th entry in the series released by Columbia Pictures starring the come ...

'', ''

Booby Dupes ''Booby Dupes'' is a 1945 short subject directed by Del Lord starring American slapstick comedy team The Three Stooges (Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Curly Howard). It is the 84th entry in the series released by Columbia Pictures starring the comedia ...

'', ''No Dough Boys'' and '' The Yoke's on Me''. The gag of smoking an imaginary pipe was used twice by Laurel and Hardy: 1937's '' Way Out West'' and 1938's ''

Block-Heads ''Block-Heads'' is a 1938 comedy film directed by John G. Blystone and starring Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. It was produced by Hal Roach Studios for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The film, a reworking of elements from the Laurel and Hardy shorts ''We Fa ...

''. Curly's utterance of "Manchewie" is likely a reference to the World War II nation of "Manchuko", the Japanese puppet state founded by the Empire of Japan after its occupation of Manchuria.

References

External links

* *
''No Dough Boys'' at threestooges.net
{{The Three Stooges 1944 films 1944 comedy films The Three Stooges films American World War II propaganda shorts American black-and-white films Films directed by Jules White Columbia Pictures short films American comedy short films 1940s English-language films 1940s American films