The Stooge (1952)

It's hard to see why Hal Wallis and Paramount held this film for two years before releasing it. Maybe they wanted a few more straight out comedy hits for Martin and Lewis before giving this one to the public.The story has a somewhat true background based on writer Sid Silvers's experience as just such a stooge for singer/vaudevillian Phil Baker. They however didn't stay a team for any length of time in the way Martin and Lewis did.Martin has a singing/accordion act that is going nowhere until he hires a stooge with whom he can do shtick with from the audience. Of course The Stooge is Jerry Lewis.The Stooge was an uncomfortable film for both of these guys. It exposes the cracks in their own relationship. What's ironic here is that because of television in the sixties, everyone knows just how funny Dean Martin could be on his own.Dino's given a whole bunch of film standards to sing in this, mostly owned by Paramount. He recorded all of them and they wound up on his first long playing album from Capitol records along with That's Amore. I still have that album.There's one new song written for the film, A Girl Named Mary and A Boy Named Bill. Dino sings it solo and with leading lady Polly Bergen. Of course they play Bill and Mary in the film. On the Capitol recording Dean ends it in a falsetto that puts him poaching in Frankie Valli territory. It's one of my favorites of his film songs.Fans will no doubt recognize Frances Bavier, Aunt Bee herself, as Jerry's mom. And Jerry has some great moments with nervous Percy Helton and with slow burn short order cook Donald MacBride.Hal Wallis was nervous for nothing. The Stooge is one of the best team efforts for Martin and Lewis.

STOOGE, THE (1952) *** (out of four) Dean Martin plays a singer wanting to make it on his own but he needs the help of a stooge (Jerry Lewis) in order to hit the big time. Once there, Dean decides he can make it solo. Outside his performance in THE KING OF COMEDY, I wasn't really a big fan of Lewis whose humor just really doesn't appeal to me. I had been told that his teamings with Martin were much better than his solo career and that's certainly something I'd agree with because THE STOOGE turned out to be a nice little gem. The film features all sorts of wonderful gags including a scene inside a diner and another were Lewis takes his first drink of alcohol. Even the songs are pretty good, which is why I was somewhat shocked that Paramount kept this on the shelf at first.

It has its moments as a curious piece where one can't help but see this as a premonition of the future relationship between Dean and Jerry. All the laughs go to Jerry and the romance is looked after by Dean the man. I now know where Jim Carey got his facial expressions from.

I haven't seen this movie in years, but a flick like this one just cannot be forgotten! I am in my early twenties and for more than half my life, I have been a film buff of movies old and new. Martin and Lewis are one of my all time favorite comedy duos, and at one time, I was renting movies here and there so that I could see all of the films they made together, and ones the lively, virtuous humanitarian Lewis did during his solo career. When I saw this movie, it just blew me away. This film is the most dramatic film those boys ever made--and if you're thinking that that can't possibly be saying much since most of their movies were screwball comedies, I'm here to tell you you're mistaken. This movie is funny, but it's also very impassioned and heart-rendering, so you might do yourself a favor by keeping a box of tissues near you when viewing it.Both Martin and Lewis are great in these dramatic and comedic roles as a comedy team that splits up because Lewis' character is under-appreciated and emotional mistreated by Martin's character. In a oddly coincidental way, this movie seemed to foreshadow the boys' split up in '56, but of course, in the movie, there is a happy ending. And while everyone knows that both Dean and Jerry went on to have successful solo careers and reunited as friends years later, I think that it would have been great to have seen them do a couple more films together that were as unforgettable as this one.