The Stooges get thrown out a motel for being eight months behind on their rent. Desperate to pay their rent, the Stooges get some easy money by having Curly slip on a bar of soap in a hotel lobby so they can sue and pay back the owner. Curly slips as planned but the hotel turns out to be run by an old lady who is about to lose her lease to the evil landlord. The trio then decide to help her fix up the place and start by beating up the landlord and stealing his watch. After their usual antics in renovating the place, the hotel is ready for the grand re-opening. The boys put on a big show with famous critic Waldo Twitchell in attendance. Their corny act goes over poorly until Curly accidentally puts on a magicians coat and becomes a sensation and the place is a success.
Production notes
Filming for Loco Boy Makes Good took place from July 29 to August 1, 1941. However, it did not appear in theatres until January 1942, the first Stooges short to be released after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Loco Boy Makes Good is filled with parodies and timely references. The title itself parodies the expression "Local Boy Makes Good," a generic small-town newspaper headline about a local citizen who has achieved a major accomplishment. Loco is Spanish for "crazy." In addition, the character name "Waldo Twitchell" is pun of the name Walter Winchell. The Stooges' act is billed as "Nill, Null & Void: Three Hams Who Lay Their Own Eggs, appearing in the Kokonuts Grove." The "Kokonuts Grove" is a reference to the Cocoanut Grove, later the site of the deadly 1942 Cocoanut Grove fire.
Controversy
In March 1946, four years after the release of Loco Boy Makes Good, silent film star Harold Lloyd filed a $500,000 suit against Columbia Pictures for violation of copyright. The court found the script for Lloyd's 1932 filmMovie Crazy, which Clyde Bruckman had directed, virtually identical with Bruckman's script for Loco Boy Makes Good. Columbia lost the suit. Universal Pictures was later sued for similar violations in several Bruckman scripts, costing them several million dollars in damages.
Quotes
Curly: "How do ya like that?! Hittin' me with a tomato! And Major Bowes said I had talent!"
Balbo: "A tomato, 'uh?"
Curly: "Yeah, a cowardly tomato, one that hits you and runs!"
Patron: "Excuse me, waiter, do you have pâté de fois gras?"
