Note: I have previously written about this short on my Movies With Michael blog. This is essentially a revised and expanded version of my post on that blog.
"Calling Dr. Howard, Dr. Fine, Dr. Howard."
"For duty and humanity!"
Despite the title, this film has nothing to do with aliens or Johnny Cash. Instead, the title references a feature length hospital drama starring Clark Gable and Myrna Loy called Men in White (1934). This short may not be a direct parody of that film but it does feature the Stooges as doctors.
In this film, Moe, Larry and Curly graduate from medical school with the highest temperatures in their class. Actually, they only graduated because they had spent too many years in the senior class for too many years. As they graduate, they promise to do whatever they can for "duty and humanity." What follows is a series of comedic bits involving the Stooges running amuck in a hospital.
This is a very enjoyable short. When the film focuses on the Stooges themselves, it is hilarious. The surgery scene is hilarious with one big laugh after another. The Stooges get some great bits of dialogue throughout, many of which are very funny. The "for duty and humanity" catchphrase gets funnier each time it is repeated. Many of the running gags are wonderful. I love the running gag of the boys entering and coming out of a door with a different mode of transportation including a horse and mini-racing cars.
However, the film is weaker when it focuses on the supporting characters. These supporting characters are a lot less funny than the Stooges. The high-voiced nurse is especially unfunny. The filmmakers were trying too hard to make her into Gracie Allen. However, she has none of the charm or humor that Gracie Allen had. Her lines are more likely to make you groan than laugh.
The building used in the film's opening was The Cedars of Lebanon Hospital (4833 Fountain Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90029). Joan Howard Mauer (Moe's daughter) gave birth to her two sons there. It is now a Church of Scientology.
Ray McCarey (born September 6, 1904, in Los Angeles; passed away December 1, 1948, in San Bernardino County) was not one of the typical Stooge directors, having only directed this and Three Little Pigskins (1934) for the team. However, he did direct Shemp (without any other stooges) in a short entitled Salt Water Daffy (1933). Comedy fans might know McCarey best for directing the Laurel and Hardy feature, Pack Up Your Troubles (1932). He also directed an excellent Our Gang short, Free Eats (1932). He would go on to direct such feature films as You Can't Fool Your Wife (1940), Torchy Runs for Mayor (1939), It Happened in Flatbush (1942) and The Falcon's Albi (1946). Ray McCarey was the younger brother of one of my favorite directors, Leo McCarey.
To advertise the film publicity stills were shot with the Stooges and Jeanie Roberts (who played the high-voiced nurse in the short). These were adlibbed by the Stooges during a break from filming. They can be seen below.
A lot changed from script to screen in this movie. One of the strangest was a switching of Moe and Larry's lines in one scene. In the original script, Larry asks a patient what her name is, she responds "Anna Conda." Moe would have said to this "Anna Conda - 95th and 1/8th." In the actual film, Moe asks the patient for her name and both Larry and Moe get the punch line. The Stooges themselves adlibbed a scene in this film. In this scene Moe tells Larry, "Move that cart." Larry responds, "I'll move it when I'm ready." Moe says in a tough voice "Are you ready?" Larry says "Yeah! I'm Ready!" This routine later became one which would be associated with the team. They would perform it again in Three Dumb Clucks, We Want Our Mummy, I Can Hardly Wait, Who Done it? and The Three Stooges in Orbit. Also cut out was a joke involving Curly vaccinating a woman. Curly would have asked if she wanted it on the arm or the leg. She would have responded "Where it won't show." Curly would have asked "What business are you in?" She would have responded "I'm a fan dancer." Curly would say "Stick out your tongue." A running joke in this film is that the Stooges would always run through a glass door in break it. There was one joke involving this that did not make the final cut. Here is how the script describes that joke, "The three stooges dash madly towards the door, but as they open it the laborer, in the corridor, had evidentially been picking something up in front of the door and the impact of his body against the door breaks the glass again, spreading it all over the floor." Joan Howard Maurer believed that the gag was probably cut out because it was too violent and also wasn't funny. Another scene cut involved the stooges working on a man whose knee hurts. He would have said "Oh my knee - oh my knee" to which Moe would responded "What's the matter? You being singing mammy songs?" Latter Larry would have said "I'll take his reflex." Curly would have responded "I'll take his watch." They would have later been in raincoats with beer spigots and mallets to test his reflexes. This film would have also had a completely different ending. Beautiful triplets would have told the stooges they would marry our heroes, "providing you do the most wonderful thing in the world for humanity." They would have got out an axe and said, "We're going to subdivide you." Yes, that ending deserved to wind up on the cutting room floor. It is interesting to note the Curly is not called Curly in the script but rather "Dr. Jerry."
This marked the only Stooges short to be nominated for an Oscar. However, it lost to the Technicolor musical short La Cucaracha (1934).
The music over the opening credits is an instrumental version of the song I Thought I Wanted You by Archie Gottler and Edward Eliscu, which was also heard before Punch Drunks (1934).
The bit with the Stooges using a mallet as an anesthetic, would late be used in Dizzy Doctors (1937), Calling All Curs (1939), All the World's a Stooge (1941), A Gem of a Jam (1943), Hot Ice (1955) and the feature length, Have Rocket Will Travel (1959).
The aforementioned "I'll do it when I'm ready" gag would later be used in 3 Dumb Clucks (1937), We Want Our Mummy (1939), I Can Hardly Wait (1943), Who Done It (1949) and the feature length Three Stooges in Orbit (1962).
The following are exhibitors' reviews from the Motion Picture Herald.
March 9, 1935"Men in Black: Three Stooges - Maybe you call this a comedy, but my patrons did not. Who told the stooges they could act? This is poor comedy and entirely too silly to be funny. Let's have better shorts and less of this kind of entertainment. Running time 19 minutes. -J.J. Medford, Orpheum Theatre, Oxford, N.C. general patronage."
March 27, 1937"Men in Black: Three Stooges - Very good. Played it twice so you know what we think of it. - Harlan Rankin, Plaza Theatre, Tilbury, Ontario, Canada."
-Michael J. Ruhland
Resources Used
The Three Stooges: Book of Scripts by Joan Howard Maurer.
The Three Stooges Scrapbook by Joan Howard Maurer, Jeff Lenburg, Greg Lenburg.
https://threestooges.net/filmography/view/3
https://tessa2.lapl.org/digital/collection/photos/id/115703
https://pcad.lib.washington.edu/building/1175/
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