Shemp Howard

Howard was born Samuel Horwitz in Manhattan, New York on March 11, 1895, and raised in Brooklyn. He was the third-born of the five Horwitz brothers born to Lithuanian Jewish parents Solomon Horwitz (1872–1943) and Jennie Horwitz (1870–1939). Irving and Jack were his older brothers; Moses (Moe) and Jerome (Curly) were his younger brothers.

By 1922, Moe had teamed up with boyhood-friend-turned-vaudeville star Ted Healy in a "roughhouse" act. One day Moe spotted his brother Shemp in the audience and yelled at him from the stage. Quick-witted Shemp yelled right back, and walked up onto the stage. From then on he was part of the act, usually known as "Ted Healy and His Stooges". The Howard brothers were the original Stooges; Larry Fine joined them in March 1928. On stage, Healy sang and told jokes while his three noisy stooges got in his way, and Healy retaliated with physical and verbal abuse. Shemp played a bumbling fireman in the Stooges' first film, Soup to Nuts (1930), the only film where he played one of Healy's gang.

In September 1925, Shemp married Gertrude Frank (March 12, 1905 - May 17, 1982), a fellow New Yorker. They had one child, Morton (February 26, 1927 – January 13, 1972). Gertrude Frank Howard outlived her husband and son, and was living when the son of her father's brother, Barney Frank (born 1940), became a US Congressman. Barney Frank's, father was Shemp's wife's first cousin. Shemp used his somewhat homely appearance for comic effect, often mugging grotesquely or allowing his hair to fall in disarray. He even played along with a publicity stunt that named him "The Ugliest Man in Hollywood". ("I'm hideous," he explained to reporters.) Notoriously phobic, his fears included airplanes, automobiles, dogs, and water. According to Moe's autobiography, Shemp was involved in a driving accident as a teenager and never obtained a driver's license.

After a disagreement with Healy in August 1930, Moe, Larry and Shemp left to launch their own act, "Howard, Fine & Howard," and joined the RKO vaudeville circuit. They premiered at Los Angeles's Paramount Theatre on August 28, 1930. In 1931 they added "Three Lost Soles" to the act's name, and took on Jack Walsh as their straight man. Moe, Larry and Shemp continued until July 1932, when Ted Healy approached them to team up again for the Shuberts's Broadway revue "Passing Show of 1932," and they readily accepted the offer. In spite of their past differences, Moe knew an association with the nationally known Healy would provide opportunities the three comics were not getting on their own.

On August 16, 1932, in a contract dispute, Healy walked out of the Shuberts's revue during rehearsals. Three days later, tired of what he considered Healy's domineering handling of the Stooges' career, Shemp left Healy's act to remain with "Passing Show," which closed in September during roadshow performances and after pan reviews in Detroit and Cincinnati. Shemp regrouped to form his own act and played on the road for a few months. He landed at Brooklyn's Vitaphone Studios for movie appearance opportunities in May 1933. When he split from Healy, Shemp was immediately replaced by his and Moe's younger brother Jerry Howard (known as Curly).

Shemp seldom stuck to the script. He livened up scenes with ad-libbed dialogue and wisecracks, which became his trademark. In late 1935, Vitaphone was licensed to produce short comedies based on the "Joe Palooka" comic strip. Shemp was cast as "Knobby Walsh," and though only a supporting character, he became the series's comic focus, with Johnnie Berkes and Lee Weber as his foils. He co-starred in the first seven shorts, released in 1936–1937. Nine of them were produced, the last two done after Shemp's departure from Vitaphone.

Away from Vitaphone, Howard unsuccessfully attempted to lead his own group of "stooges" in the Van Beuren musical comedy short The Knife of the Party. It was a rare failure in an otherwise successful solo career. In 1937 he followed his brothers's lead, moved to the West Coast, and landed supporting-actor roles at several studios, predominantly Columbia Pictures and Universal. He worked exclusively at Universal from August 1940 to August 1943, performing with such comics as W. C. Fields (playing Fields' bartender in the film The Bank Dick, 1940); and with comedy duos Abbott and Costello and Olsen and Johnson. He lent comic relief to Charlie Chan and The Thin Man murder mysteries. He appeared in several Universal B-musicals of the early 1940s, including Private Buckaroo (1942; in which he clowned onstage with The Andrews Sisters during their performance of "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree"), Strictly in the Groove (1942), How's About It? (1943), Moonlight and Cactus (1944) and San Antonio Rose (1941), in the latter of which he was paired with Lon Chaney, Jr. as a faux Abbott and Costello. Most of these projects took advantage of his improvisational skills. When Broadway comedian Frank Fay walked out on a series of feature films teaming him with Billy Gilbert, Gilbert called on his closest friend, Shemp Howard, to replace him in three B-comedy features for Monogram Pictures, filmed in 1944–45. He also played a few serious parts, such as his supporting role in Pittsburgh (1942) starring Marlene Dietrich and John Wayne.

During 1938–1940 and 1944–1946, Howard appeared in Columbia's two-reel comedies, co-starring with Columbia regulars Andy Clyde, The Glove Slingers, El Brendel, and Tom Kennedy. He was given his own starring series in 1944. He was working for Columbia in this capacity when his brother Curly was felled by a debilitating stroke on May 6, 1946. Curly had already suffered a series of strokes prior to the filming of If a Body Meets a Body, 1945, and in January 1945, Shemp filled in for Curly at a week-long appearance at the St. Charles Theatre in New Orleans.

Shemp agreed to fill in for Curly in Columbia's popular Stooge shorts, knowing that if he refused, Moe and Larry would be out of work. He intended to stay only until Curly recovered; but as Curly's condition worsened, it became apparent that Shemp's association with the Stooges would be permanent. Curly died on January 18, 1952, at the age of 48.

Shemp appeared with Moe and Larry in 73 short subjects—or 77, counting four that were made after Shemp's death by incorporating stock footage. The trio also made the feature film Gold Raiders (1951). Shemp suffered a mild stroke in November 1952, but recovered within weeks. The medical episode had no noticeable effect on his remaining films with the Stooges, many of which were remakes of earlier films that also used recycled footage to reduce costs.

On November 22, 1955, Howard went out with associates Al Winston and Bobby Silverman to a boxing match (one of Howard's favorite pastimes) at the Hollywood Legion Stadium at North El Centro and Selma Avenues, one block above the Hollywood Palladium. While returning home in a taxi that evening, Howard died of a massive heart attack, at the age of 60. He had just told a joke and was leaning back, lighting a cigar, when he suddenly slumped over on Winston's lap, burning him with the cigar.

When it was time to renew the Stooges's contract, Columbia hired comedian Joe Besser to replace Shemp. Columbia discontinued filming new Stooge short subject comedies in December 1957, releasing the last new short in June 1959, but kept the series going into the 1960s by reissuing Shemp's Stooge shorts to theaters. This, as well as a TV release of Stooge shorts, allowed Shemp Howard to remain a popular star for long after he died.

The Three Stooges earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1560 Vine Street on August 30, 1983.