MGM gets its 'Stooges'

Variety ^ | March 25, 2009 | NA

[buccaneer81]

MGM and the Farrelly brothers are closing in on their cast for "The Three Stooges."

Studio has set Sean Penn to play Larry, and negotiations are underway with Jim Carrey to play Curly, with the actor already making plans to gain 40 pounds to approximate the physical dimensions of Jerome "Curly" Howard.

The studio is zeroing in on Benicio Del Toro to play Moe.

The film is not a biopic, but rather a comedy built around the antics of the three characters that Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Howard played in the Columbia Pictures shorts.

The quest by the Peter and Bobby Farrelly to harness the project spans more than a decade and three studios. They first tried at Columbia, again at Warner Bros., and finally at MGM, where Worldwide Motion Picture Group chairman Mary Parent championed the cause and bought the WB-owned scripts and made a deal with Stooges rights holders C3.

Production will begin in early fall for a release sometime in 2010. The Farrellys, who wrote the script, are producing with their Conundrum partner Bradley Thomas, and Charlie Wessler.

C3 Entertainment principals Earl and Robert Benjamin will be executive producers.

Project will get underway after Penn completes the Asger Leth-directed Universal/Imagine Entertainment drama "Cartel." He hasn't done a comedy since the 1989 laffer "We're No Angels."

The Farrellys have long had their eyes on Del Toro to play Moe. Del Toro, who's coming off "Che," showed comic chops in the Guy Ritchie-directed "Snatch."

The surprise is the emergence of Carrey to play Curly. Howard established the character as a seminal physical comedian, from the first time he appeared in the first Stooges short in 1934 until he suffered a stroke on the set in 1946.

[ssaftler]

Don’t remember the name of the episode, but it was the one with Ichabod Slipp and the inheritance of Uncle Ambrose Rose. Curly played a sleeping train passenger when they were looking for Slipp.

[DManA]

Good. I’m glad I was wrong.

[JSDude1]

Sean Penn!!! Are you kidding that’s a disgrace to their immage. I’ll never watch this a fan of the old “three stooges!

[AnotherUnixGeek]

And, Shemp was actually a Stooge before Curly. He left the team to do other acting stuff. Curly was a big hit, and Shemp didn't come back until Curly had a stroke.

Yup. Curly became part of the act because the Horwitz parents bugged Moe into taking him after Shemp left. I remember reading excerpts from a letter in which Moe begged his brother Shemp to get their parents off his back about taking on Curly. Another sign that parents sometimes know best.

Curly is the only reason the Stooges are remembered.

Ah, that's not fair. Any Shemp 'Stooges' is also very watchable. The three Howard/Horwitz brothers and (Larry) Louis Feinberg were great talents, under-appreciated and underpaid throughout their careers - they never got the sort of respect the Marx Brothers got, for instance. I remember seeing an ad from Moe Howard's family after his passing, selling his cancelled checks as souvenirs for a few dollars. Wish I'd been old enough to afford one =).

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

**N I A G A R A FALLS

Slowly I turn***

could be worse. they could have been on their way to THE SUSQUAHANA HAT COMPANY but that was Bud Abbot and Lou Costello.

[My Favorite Headache]

That my friend is a FLOP...just like this film is going to be.

[buccaneer81]

That my friend is a FLOP...just like this film is going to be.

Gotcha. And agreed.

[silent_jonny]

Studio has set Sean Penn to play Larry, and negotiations are underway with Jim Carrey to play Curly ... Benicio Del Toro to play Moe.

AWFUL!!!

[drew]

The Farrelly Bros. have foisted more steaming piles of sh*t on the public than an elephant on Exlax.

[martin_fierro]

WINNAH! 543,289 INTARWEB POINTS FOR YOU!!!

Hold That Lion!

[retrokitten]

I’ve never been much of a Stooges fan, but this is horrifying. Benicio Del Toro to play Moe?? They couldn’t find anyone who looked less like him??? Was Denzel Washington not available??

[martin_fierro]

Another Stooges favorite episode of mine is the one in which a young Lucille Ball appears.

[isom35]

Michael Chiklis of “The Shield” fame once played Curly in a made for tv movie.

[ssaftler]

“Three Little Pigskins”, right? It was one of their very early episodes, as I recall.

[Richard Kimball]

Hold that Lion. It was the only episode where all four Horwitz brothers appeared together. According to Moe, they were hoping Curly would recover enough to rejoin the team.

[reagan_fanatic]

Three Stooges Pie fight with George Bush