Barrett: No Moe

For sheer laugh power, no current or past TV comedy can match “The Three Stooges.” (Naturally, I am excluding the loathsome “Joe” episodes.)

So I’m sure readers will share my horror upon learning of plans to have Jim Carrey, Sean Penn and, perhaps, Benicio Del Toro play the roles of Curly, Larry and Moe, respectively, in an MGM remake.

Mr. Carrey has moments of brilliance surrounded by oceans of oatmeal — and not the tasty strawberry kind. After his desecration of the Grinch, he’s not fit to don the mantilla Curly wore while singing “The Voice of Spring.”

Sean Penn was remarkably natural in “I Am Sam,” I’ll grant, but he carries so much political baggage that he would be an implausible Larry. He’ll get laughter, all right, but it’ll be the nervous kind that makes studios ask, What were we thinking?

And it is impossible to imagine the brooding Benicio Del Toro, perennially full of himself, being believable as Moe, the most wonderfully infuriating of the Stooges.

I’d love to be proved wrong on this. Heaven knows Hollywood needs something better than the rubbish it’s putting out these days. But I’ve never seen a stronger case for MGM to leave well enough alone.

Steve Barrett can be reached by e-mail at sbarrett@timesfreepress.com.