Production Information
Title: How High Is Up?
Studio: Columbia
Short Number: 48
Release Date: July 26, 1940
Running Time: 16:5
“What do I look like, a rivet??” “How do you feel?” “Like a rivet.”
(Moe and Curly)
How High Is Up? Short Take
The Stooges are itinerate tinkers who are not above “creating” work, and are caught punching holes in workers’ lunchboxes and have to run away. They end up on a skyscraper construction site and pass themselves off as “the best riveters that ever riveted,” where they get put to work… on the 97th story!
During their riveting duties, Larry multitasks by heating sausages for his companions, leading to inadvertent confusion between rivets and food items. Despite their best efforts, the trio’s incompetence leads to a structural collapse when the head foreman, Mr. Blake, inadvertently leans against a beam. Angered by the mishap, Mr. Blake and his team pursue and subsequently dismiss the Stooges from the construction site.
The Stooges quickly deploy parachutes from the building, landing safely in their wagon below, which is fortuitously covered by the chute tarp.
Cast & Crew
| Directed by | Del Lord |
|---|---|
| Produced by | Del Lord Hugh McCollum |
| Written by | Elwood Ullman |
| Starring | Moe Howard Larry Fine Curly Howard Vernon Dent Cy Schindell Duke York Bert Young Bruce Bennett Edmund Cobb |
| Cinematography | Allen G. Siegler |
| Edited by | Art Seid |
Production Notes
Filming for How High is Up? was completed May 7–11, 1940. The aerial shots of the scene, straight down from the building the Stooges are working on, are from the then newly built Empire State Building in New York City.
The sweater removal scene is considered one of the finest examples of the Stooges’ tendencies to use unorthodox methods to get the simplest job done. Since Moe and Larry cannot pull the sweater off of Curly, they figure the only way to do so is through the use of tools, such as mallets, chisels, and eventually a pair of scissors. Larry can be seen breaking character and laughing, particularly when Curly yells, “Don’t mind me, don’t mind me!!”
