Production Information
Title: A Pain in the Pullman
Studio: Columbia
Short Number: 16
Release Date: June 27, 1936
Running Time: 19:46
“I’m Paul Pain, the heartthrob of millions!” “What’s a heartthrob?” “A pain in the neck!”
Short Take
In A Pain In The Pullman, The Three Stooges are small-time actors traveling by train to an engagement—and fleeing the landlady for their unpaid rent. The Boys are told to put their pet monkey, Joe, in the baggage car, but are afraid he will get hurt. They sneak Joe onto the Southern Pacific train with them, but Joe gets loose. They have a hard time getting up to the berth bed by making a lot of noise and managing to awaken and annoy all of the train’s passengers, including Mr. Paul Pain (James C. Morton) and Mr. Johnson the stage manager and boss (Bud Jamison), the latter of which routinely bonks his head on the upper berth upon awakening. Ultimately, a terrified Joe pulls the train’s emergency cord, abruptly stopping the train in the process. The passengers then forcibly remove The Stooges from the train because they were fired for making a lot of noises and bringing their pet monkey onto the train.
A Pain in the Pullman Cast & Crew
| Directed by | Preston Black |
|---|---|
| Produced by | Jules White |
| Written by | Preston Black |
| Starring | Moe Howard Larry Fine Curly Howard Bud Jamison James C. Morton Eddie Laughton Loretta Andrews Phyllis Crane Wilna Hervey |
| Cinematography | Benjamin H. Kline |
| Edited by | William A. Lyon |
A Pain in the Pullman Trivia
- Some Stooge firsts: Curly flirting by a hand wave under the chin, an animal tail protruding through a curtain, eating a shell and throwing away the edible part, putting one Stooge’s leg inside another Stooge’s clothes, one Stooge getting an elbow in the face from another, and cooking a shoe
- The Stooges play themselves in this short
- This is the longest of the Stooge Columbia shorts
Production Notes
- The closing shot of The Stooges leaping over a bush, and landing on a trio of bucking steers was reused at the end of A Ducking They Did Go
- Filming was completed between April 29 and May 4, 1936
- 1420 North Beachwood Drive is the location where The Boys run from the landlady (Anne O’Neal) before we see them at the train station. The brick stairwell can be seen from a different angle in Three Little Beers.
- One of a couple of Stooge shorts that include trains, the train terminal in A Pain In The Pullman was built in 1893 as part of the Santa Fe Railway’s La Grande Station, located at Second Street and Santa Fe Avenue in Los Angeles.