The Three Stooges Biography

The Three Stooges were a hugely popular film comedy team of the mid-1900s. The original hit trio were Moe Howard (born Harry Horwitz, 1897-1975), his brother Curly (born Jerome Lester Horwitz, 1903-1952), and Larry Fine (born Louis Feinberg, 1902-1975). Moe was the irritable ringleader, Larry the mop-haired middleman, and Curly the nearly-bald dimwit — although none of the characters was a mental giant. Stooge comedy consisted mainly of slapstick eye-gouging, shin-kicking, head-knocking, and the like, punctuated by Curly’s signature “nyuk-nyuk-nyuk” chuckle. The group made nearly 200 comedy shorts between 1934 and 1958. The first 97 starred the original trio; after Curly suffered a stroke in 1946, he was replaced by his brother Shemp, then by Joe Besser, and finally by ‘Curly Joe’ De Rita. Extremely popular in their day, the Stooges gained a whole new following through TV reruns in the 1960s and ’70s.