In 1932, Jerome Howard (soon to be universally known as “Curly”) joined The Three Stooges comedy team. He was replacing his older brother, Shemp, as the third Stooge, joining his older brother Moe and frizzly haired Larry Fine.
In 1934, the team signed with Columbia Pictures and began churning out the series of comedy slapstick shorts that brought hilarity to the world. Within a year, Curly had established himself as the comedy star of the act. His “woo-woo”s and “n’yuk nyuk”s, as well as his incredible gift for physical, inventive, surreal comedy, made Curly Howard everyone’s favorite Stooge.
From 1934 to 1944, Curly Howard and the other Stooges made 80-odd of the funniest shorts in the history of movie comedy, but by 1945 something was obviously wrong with the brilliant Curly.
Although he was always a bad study, he was having a harder time than usual learning and remember his lines, his once graceful and quick movements now seemed slower and more lethargic, and his voice had lost its high-pitched vitality, now sounding deeper and more like a strained croak.
In early 1945, Moe Howard made an appointment for his kid brother at the Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital. The test results proved shocking: Curly was suffering from high blood pressure, hypertension, a retinal hemorrhage, and obesity.
Then came the failed marriage. Curly loved the good life—drinking, hanging out at clubs, seeing and dating as many beautiful women as possible. Moe, attempting to help his beloved brother settle down, tried to fix Curly up with a glamorous beauty named Marion Buxbaum. Always a sucker for a pretty face, Curly married Marion after only two weeks. Curly was soon to discover that Marion was not a very nice person and was only after his money. The marriage proved a disaster, and the unhappy couple divorced after only three months together. In the terrible divorce proceedings, Marion said of Curly: “He used filthy, vile language, kept two vicious dogs, he shouted at waiters in cafes, struck and kicked me, put out cigars in the sink.” These specious accusations were disputed by all who knew Curly as a jovial, good-natured, good-hearted fellow. Curly, always a free spender, had spent a fortune buying gifts for Marion, and the divorce really shook him up. He had his first stroke soon thereafter, in early 1946.
The aftermath following that stroke was that Curly’s great vigor and boyish vitality, his comedy trademarks, sank lower and lower. Instead of enabling Curly to rest after his stroke, as Moe requested, studio head Harry Cohn kept Curly churning out new Three Stooges shorts. Sadly, these final Curly shorts show him looking very old and worn, his previously starring roles greatly reduced, and, indeed, they put a bit of a black mark on his body of otherwise amazing comedy performances. Curly’s appearance grew worse until finally, while filming his 97th Three Stooges short, “Half Wit’s Holiday,” on May 6, 1946, the straw finally broke the camel’s back. Curly was supposed to participate in the film’s final, climactic pie fight, but Moe spotted Curly sitting in his chair on the set. “Come on, Babe,” he said. (“Babe” was Curly’s nickname among his close friends.) Moe found Curly slumped over in his chair with tears running down his face; Curly had suffered another stroke. He was taken to recover to the Motion Picture Country Home and Hospital, his career as a Stooge now effectively over. He was replaced in the act by older brother Shemp.
Curly finally got a happy break in 1947, when he met an attractive brunette named Valerie Newman. The two fell in love and married on July 31, 1947. Valerie was to bear Curly a daughter, Janie, the following year. She truly loved Curly and stuck by his side, through his constant downhill ride over the next few years, feeding and even bathing him as his health continued its slow deterioration in the late 1940s.
After his second stroke, Curly was confined to a wheelchair, but soon recovered enough to move around. During the days of Curly’s slightly improved health, he made a cameo appearance in a Three Stooges short (with his replacement, Shemp) called “Hold That Lion!” Moe, knowing Curly was frail, made sure the set was cleared of all but the absolutely necessary actors and technicians, in order to take any pressure off his brother. Curly, a brilliant comedian to the end, acquits himself quite well in his brief appearance, coming across as very funny, even doing his trademark “woo-woo-woo” sound effects. This brief cameo was to be the only recorded instance of the three Howard brothers—Moe, Curly, and Shemp—appearing together on film