Shemp
HowardShemp
Howard
Shemp Howard, his hair slicked down over loving-cup ears,
became one of the most famous comedy stooges in the history of
stage and screen. The third eldest brother of Moe Howard, the
team leader, Shemp was born Samuel Horwitz in Brooklyn, New York,
on March 17, 1895 (not 1900 as listed in studio biographies).
Moe once recalled how his brother acquired the name Shemp.
"Shemp was given the Hebrew name Schmool, after his mother's
grandfather. Schmool was Anglicized to Samuel and then shortened
to Sam. When his mother, with her broad European accent, would
call him, the name 'Sam' came out 'Sams,' and if you weren't listening
carefully it could sound like Shemp... which it did! So from the
time he was seven that's what his family called him. It was Shemp
in school and in the world of the theater. In later years, no
one knew it was anything else."
Shemp was a very mischievous child, and Moe recalled his
favorite pastime was stuffing everything from woolen stockings
to sweaters down the hallway toilet. "I remember one time
when Shemp tore the pages out of our brother Irving's history
book and jammed them into the toilet in our home in Bensonhurst,"
Moe chuckled as he recalled, "Because of this he had to run
the family gauntlet: a smack from Mother, a belt across the head
from Dad, a shove from Irving and a kick in the fanny from me.
When Shemp reached the age of thirteen, he was a completely
different person and had outgrown most of his mischief-making.
Moe remembers that friends of the family had always predicted
that Shemp was going to be an actor or a great comedian. But Shemp
thought otherwise and never seriously entertained the idea of
entering show business. Moe, on the other hand, worked like a
demon at it, planned his future, and eventually made it to the
footlights before his brother.
Shemp graduated from P.S. 163 in Brooklyn, the same grammar
school his brother Moe attended, and got as far as starting New
Utrecht High School. Since he and Moe failed to finish school,
their parents, Jennie and Solomon Horwitz, urged them to go to
a trade school. Late in 1911, Moe and Shemp enrolled at the Baron
DeHirsch Trade School in New York, where Shemp took up plumbing
and Moe studied to be an electrician. While Moe learned the definition
of an ampere, an ohm and a volt, Shemp learned the basics of threading
and cutting pipe. Neither of the boys ever finished these courses
but instead put their lessons into practice in a rare act of mischief.
Moe remembers that while learning the tricks of their trade
they got the tricks down pat: "Neither Shemp nor I ever finished
the course, but we did find a use for lesson #1-'The Push-Button
Door Latch.' We wired it into our apartment so that by pushing
a concealed button we could open the front-door latch when we
got home late at night without our parents being the wiser. I'd
just reach under the door step, press the button, wait for the
click of the latch and open the door from the outside. This worked
well until Dad found out. One night we came home very late, and
reached for the button, but the button wasn't there. That particular
evening Shemp and I had borrowed Jack and Irving's new long-pants
suits to go to a party. We came home about three in the morning
and there was no way to get in without waking our parents. Then
I got the bright idea of going to the back of the house. The bathroom
window was open and I climbed through the darkened opening, head
down, arms outstretched and probing, right into a half-filled
tub that either Irving or Jack had left from that night's bath.
I landed face down in the water. I rolled over and sat up laughing
hysterically. I had forgotten all about Shemp and letting him
in. A moment later he climbed in and found himself in the same
boat. There we were when my father entered, the two of us sopping
wet with our brothers' good clothes on. Somehow our father's smacks
on our wet faces sounded much louder and were more painful than
on a dry face."
In recalling his school days, Moe has said that Shemp was
not athletically inclined and as a student he was nil. He tried
to pay attention in class but seemed unable to concentrate. Jack
and Irving tried to help him with his schoolwork, but Shemp was
already playing the comedian. He'd laugh everything off with a
cute remark, draw funny drawings, or make faces at the other students
to make them laugh and get them in trouble along with himself
Shemp craved attention.
Moe also recalled that Shemp was industrious for his age.
The two brothers worked together at many different neighborhood
jobs. First, they tried the plumbing business, but when Shemp
burned his hand on hot solder he quit. The Howards next tried
setting up pins in a local bowling alley, then delivering newspapers
for the Brooklyn Eagle. This continued until, finally, Shemp realized
there was nothing left for them but the theater.
In the hope of acquiring some stage experience, Shemp agreed
to do an act with Moe at dance halls and theater amateur nights
in the area. Comedy was neither Moe nor Shemp's forte at the time.
Moe had been directing his energies toward dramatic theater while
Shemp, except for fooling around at parties, had practically no
theatrical experience. The two boys wrote a short skit, rehearsed
it and went on stage at an amateur night at the Bath Beach Theater.
Three minutes into their performance, they were thrown bodily
out of the theater. Needless to say, Shemp was terribly discouraged
but Moe felt it was a step in the right direction.... Shemp had
finally performed on a stage. Charlotte Shurman, an old Bensonhurst
friend of the Howards when they were in their twenties, watched
many of their performances around the neighborhood. She recalled:
"They were just starting out in dance halls and everyone
got a big kick out of them and the shows they put on. Shemp and
Moe worked together and I followed them around wherever they went
... because I was so proud. I remember Shemp. He was a riot ...
simply a riot. And it came so naturally."
Sometime during the course of World War I, Moe and Shemp
formed a blackface vaudeville act which disbanded for a brief
period when Shemp was drafted into the army. He was discharged
after only a few months (he was discovered to be a bed wetter)
and rejoined Moe in vaudeville. In 1917 Shemp and Moe took their
comedy act back to the boards and played on both the Loew's and
RKO circuits, managing to work for the rival outfits through a
ruse: They played a blackface routine for RKO and a whiteface
one for Loew's. They continued with their stage appearances through
1922. Shemp jokingly recalled the blackest moment of his life
as the time he was working blackface in a minstrel show and the
manager skipped with the payroll and the cold cream. Despite his
show business desires, Shemp once said, "My parents wanted
me to grow up to be a gentleman."
Then, one afternoon in 1922, Shemp got his biggest show
business break. A former schoolmate and vaudeville comedian, Ted
Healy, was playing at the Brooklyn Prospect Theater and needed
a replacement in his current act. He prevailed upon Moe and then
Shemp to come up out of the audience and perform in the show.
The Howards went on stage with Healy and fractured the audience
with an entirely ad-libbed routine.
The act with Healy and his Stooges kept up its frantic pace
from that night on. A short-lived problem arose at the beginning
of the brothers' careers. Their mother, Jennie Horwitz, was totally
against the idea of her sons joining Ted Healy.
Jack Howard remembers what Ted Healy said to persuade her
to change her mind. "It seems my mother did not want Shemp
or Moe to be actors. She thought it would be much better if they
became professionals. Ted Healy came to the house one day to plead
with my mother to let Moe and Shemp join the act. He was getting
nowhere. Suddenly, Ted said to my mother, 'Jennie, I'll give you
$100 for your synagogue building fund if you let the boys come
with me. She thought about the good that the money would do and
agreed, reluctantly."
Following his debut as a stooge, Shemp's association with
Healy continued to prosper. He was prominently billed in such
J. J. Shubert musicals as A Night in Spain and A Night in Venice.
In 1925, Howard married Gertrude "Babe" Frank. She gave
birth to a son, Morton, in 1927. (He died on January 13, 1972,
of cancer.) In this same year, Larry joined Healy, Moe and Shemp.
Then, in 1930, it was off to Hollywood to co-star in Rube
Goldberg's critical sensation Soup to Nuts. A short time later
Larry, Moe and Shemp left Healy to form an act of their own, "Three
Lost Souls." But a year later they returned to Healy to star
in The Passing Show of 1932, a J.J. Shubert Broadway revue. Healy
left the show over a contract dispute, taking Moe and Larry with
him. Shemp decided to stay behind.
Leaving the team gave Shemp a chance to use his wide-ranging
talents in various film productions, including features and featurettes.
He went on to star in countless two-reel comedies for Vitaphone
in 1932 and he later played the role of Knobby Walsh in the Joe
Palooka series. Shemp's leaving the act also gave his kid brother
Curly the opportunity of a lifetime - to become the world's favorite
Stooge.
In 1937, Shemp Howard returned to Hollywood, this time to
open the "Stage One" nightclub (now Andre's restaurant
on Wilshire Boulevard) with actor/partner Wally Vernon. Shortly
after the club opened, Shemp signed a contract to do a comedy
series at Columbia and later feature film roles at RKO, MGM and
Monogram. In the 1940's, he was given numerous roles in such Universal
films as Buck Privates, The Bank Dick and Hellzapoppin! He also
worked in films starring Abbott and Costello, W.C. Fields, Broderick
Crawford and John Wayne.
When times were good, Shemp and his wife Gertrude's greatest
pleasure was entertaining actor friends in the movie community.
The Howards' parties at their North Hollywood home included such
guests as Morey Amsterdam, Phil Silvers, Harry Silvers, Huntz
Hall, Gabe Dell, Martha Raye and Murray Alpert. On rare occasions,
brothers Moe and Curly would drop by with their wives, but when
things went sour work-wise, some of Shemp's friends were known
to abandon ship. Clarice Seiden, Moe Howard's sister-in- law,
recalls: "I remember when Shemp's contract was not renewed
with Universal, the partygoers that were always at his house disappeared.
When his contract was renewed everyone would come back."
Whatever the situation, no matter how unnerving, Shemp was
always a warm, caring, understanding man, though a bit of an introvert
at times. Once he was at ease with people, Shemp opened up and
the jokes and humorous anecdotes poured forth. Dolly Sallin, daughter
of Jack Howard, remembers Shemp as informal and casual. She says,
"Shemp was really a quiet, family man who had evening get-togethers
where friends would drop in. He was quite devoted to his wife
and son. Moe was the one who kept up on world affairs and kept
his mind active, while Shemp simply didn't care. He wanted things
to be easy and uncomplicated." Friends also reveal that Shemp
was not a businessman and spent most of his time sitting at home
listening to his favorite radio show or, in his later years, watching
television.
Shemp also shared many intimate moments with his son Mort,
who was an only child and bore more resemblance to his mother
than to Shemp. Irma Leveton, Helen Howard's friend, remembered
that Shemp liked to go fishing with Mort. Dolly Sallin added that
Shemp and Mort used to produce their own tape-recorded music on
a reel-to-reel recorder Shemp owned.
Norman Maurer, who first met Shemp in 1945, remembers the
comedian as always being jovial and never without a kind word.
Maurer recalls: "Shemp was a delightful man. He was the funniest
of the three brothers ... he was a riot. He would just open his
mouth and he was funny. He was also the world's greatest environmentalist.
He couldn't step on an ant."
Shemp also had his share of phobias that he was never able
to outgrow-a fear of heights, a fear of driving or being driven
in a car and a fear of water. Moe told of the time that Shemp
insisted he was getting seasick ... just standing on the dock
fishing. The Stooges always traveled by train whenever they went
across country on personal appearance tours because of Shemp's
paranoia; it was impossible to get him on an airplane. Irma Leveton
recalled Shemp's fear of dogs, even though he had a dog of his
own, a collie named Wags. As Leveton said: "He used to walk
down the street with a stick in his hand to protect himself. If
a dog ever came near him, he would have fainted. There was no
way he would ever hit a dog. He couldn't kill a fly. It's hard
to imagine that a man with a face like that - he looked like a
killer - was really a gentle man."
Emil Sitka, who worked with Shemp in many comedies, remembers
his fear on the set of Hold That Lion (1947). "We had a lion
in this film who was so sickly he would fall asleep in the middle
of a take. When Shemp heard that there was a lion on the set,
he was really panicked. I thought he was kidding, but he wasn't.
When he finally shot the scene the technicians had to put a glass
plate between the lion and Shemp...he was that scared."
Another anecdote concerning Shemp's phobias occurred during
the filming of Africa Screams, a 1949 romp featuring Shemp and
starring Abbott and Costello. In it was another future Stooge,
Joe Besser. Charles Barton directed the epic and remembers that
Shemp's fear of heights and water seemed funny to everyone but
Shemp: "I remember when we did Africa Screams together, there
were some funny scenes between Joe Besser and Shemp Howard where
they were sitting on a raft floating down a river and Shemp was
beside himself with fear and refused to get on the raft, even
though the water wasn't up to his knees. I had to literally carry
him onto the raft. When it started moving, he was so afraid of
falling off; he kept clutching at Joe Besser's shirt. This brought
on a lot of teasing from the cast and crew. After the scene, they
left him sitting on the raft as a gag. And he kept yelling, 'Will
someone get me down from here? How much longer do I have to stay
here? I'm getting sea-sick!' Everybody just laughed."
Joe Besser, who replaced Shemp as a third Stooge, was his
good personal friend. During production on Africa Screams, Besser
recalls an incident which illustrated the comedian's inborn fear:
"Every night Shemp would wait outside the studio for a cab.
One time I stopped to give him a lift. He seemed nervous and didn't
want to go with me. Finally, I convinced him to get in the car
but he couldn't relax. In desperation, I took his hands and made
him hold them as if he was holding an imaginary steering wheel,
hoping that would help. He seemed more at ease but when I took
off down the street, he started madly turning his hands back and
forth as if he were actually driving the car!"
Shemp loved spectator sports, the more aggressive the better.
It was probably a form of release for his fear and tension. He
also filled his leisure time fishing, attending the fights and
listening to Cole Porter's music. Richard Arlen, Andy Devine and
Horace MacMahon were his favorite actors, Patsy Kelly his favorite
actress and Fred Allen his choice for radio comedian. His favorite
Three Stooges comedy was Fright Night (1947), his first comedy
with the Three Stooges and which, coincidentally, dealt with boxing.
Shemp's mother wished her son to be a gentleman and according
to everyone who knew him he certainly was a gentle man!
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