What do the Three Stooges, Abbot & Costello and Lucille Ball have in common? They all performed a variation of the classic vaudeville routine “Slowly I Turned.” This sketch was reportedly written by comic Joey Faye.
I first saw this routine performed on TV in the broadcast of the Three Stooges short entitled “Gent’s Without Cents.” A clip of that routine, Niagara Falls, is below:
The comedy team of Abbot & Costello performed the routine in the movie, Lost in a Harem. This time the trigger word is “Pokomoko:” Sadly, I’ve been unable to find a clip of that that I could embed here. However, you can find that performance on Facebook. The link is here. This link will open Facebook Watch in another window (I apologize in advance for anything else you will see on Facebook after watching this clip and believe me, Facebook will play a lot of videos (mostly inappropriate ones) immediately after the clip plays. Continue to stay on the site at your own risk.).
Below is a performance of Abbott and Costello from their early 1950s TV show essentially doing the same routine, but this time the trigger word(s) are again “Niagara Falls:”
Finally, Lucille Ball performs the routine on “I Love Lucy” in the first season episode, The Ballet. The trigger word is “Martha:”
Don’t know about you, but I’ve laughed at all three of these. I admit I loved the Three Stooges version the best. How about you?