Welcome, You Cr-a-a-a-zy You!


Welcome to Joe Besser Forever! 

Launched by Besser's official co-biographer Greg Lenburg and close friend of nearly two decades, the site, a companion to Joe's updated and enlarged autobiography, Once a Stooge, Always a Stooge, features a biography, nearly 200 of clips from Besser's memorable movie and TV roles, a photo gallery of nearly 300 free downloadable photos and free giveaways.

Now in Audiobook and E-book! Joe's Updated Memoirs!

Once a Stooge, Always a Stooge, comic Joe Besser of The Three Stooges updated and enlarged autobiography, is now available in audiobook and e-book!

The new edition, also available in hardcoverpaperback and Kindle editions, is not the same book published under the same title in 1988, nor as it was first published in 1984 under the title, Not Just a Stooge.

The new edition has been lovingly retooled by the authors who knew Joe best. And it's lavishly illustrated with over 420 photographs.

Unlike previous editions, the new edition is divided into five sections: Joe’s autobiography (which includes never-before published anecdotes), filmography, television, and, for the first time, radio and stage.

Joe Besser: The Right Third Stooge at the Right Time

With Shemp Howard in Africa Screams (1949).
By Greg Lenburg

For six decades he made people laugh: In vaudeville. On radio. In the movies, including in starring feature films and solo short subjects for Columbia Pictures. On the stage and Broadway shows. On television. And, even by doing Saturday morning cartoon voice overs.

He was comic Joe Besser.

In November of 1955, Shemp Howard, one of Joe's dearest friends who replaced his brother Curly in 1947 as the third stooge in The Three Stooges, died suddenly of a heart attack. The Stooges had four shorts remaining to be produced for 1956. Instead of replacing Shemp as the third stooge, Columbia remade four Three Stooges shorts featuring Shemp and filmed new footage using an obvious double for him in some scenes.