No Dough Boys

This is another great short from the stooges. The stooges look quite strange in this, especially Curly. I loved the fight scene and the acrobatics scene. Its still nice to see some Nazis get beaten around though. Overall, almost perfect, but there are better wartime shorts they did.

Grade: A

It's WW II and the boys are actors posing as Japanese soldiers for a magazine ad. On a break from shooting they stumble into a Nazi hideout where the commandant is waiting for the arrival of three Japanese soldiers and thinks that the stooges are them. The boys end up getting the best of both the Germans and Japanese and save the world.

Obviously, this can be an uncomfortable short to watch, due to the boys' broad Japanese mannerisms and dialect. But in 1944, Japan was the enemy in real life, and was tirelessly mocked. Just as in The Yoke's on Me, the writers had no problem with portraying Japanese as unintelligent buffoons. (One difference that makes that movie less acceptable is that the characters in it were American citizens who had "escaped" from a relocation center.) I even recognized the same actor who was in both movies--the younger guy with the Shemp-styled haircut.

All that said, this is an hilarious short: fast paced with gags and plenty of stooge humor galore. Putting it in the context of the time, you can get a lot of laughs out of it.

No Dough Boys (1944)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

The Three Stooges are on a photo shoot, which has then dressed up as Japanese soldiers. During a break they go to eat when they're mistaken as the real thing by the dinner owner. Soon afterwards they end up in the house of a German spy where all sorts of chaos follows.

NO DOUGH BOYS isn't the greatest Stooges short but it's decent enough to where fans should at least get a few laughs out of it. The first two segments dealing with the photo shoot and the restaurant are rather lame without too many laughs but things pick up during the finale where the boys end up running into the real Japanese soldiers who escaped a war ship.

I thought that each stooge did a great job masquarading as the Japanese and Vernon Dent did a good job as the German spy, the highlights were Curly getting his head stuck on the wall and a bird pecking on his head and the fight part when the lights go off and on, one of the stooges gags.

A good WWII short. 8/10 stars.

Moe, Larry and Curly don't look like Doughboys (old slang for "American soldiers"), they are dressed as Japanese soldiers for a photo session. Grabbing a quick lunch at a diner, they stuff their mouths with bread, and sound like they are talking gibberish-- the owner mistakes them for Japanese spies. The Stooges run away, and wind up in a house with German spies. They are introduced to 3 beautiful German ladies: Miss Zweiback ("twice-baked bread"), Miss Schwarzbrot ("rye bread") and Miss Pumpernickel ("dark rye bread"). The Three Stooges quip that the ladies are "well bread" (well bred). Trying to convince them they are real Japanese soldiers, the Stooges do some "oriental" balancing acts, and fall down a lot. The real Japanese soldiers show up, and the Three Stooges knock everyone out in a hilarious fight scene. With the Three Stooges around, America is still safe for democracy.