Three Little Pigskins is a 1934 comedy short subject directed by Raymond McCarey and starring The Three Stooges. It is their fourth short.
The Stooges are "recruited" by a college to drum up publicity for the college's football team by being dressed up as football players. Meanwhile, the owner of a professional football team, Joe Stacks, has to find three new players for the next game. One of Joe's girlfriends soon meets the Stooges and confuses them for genuine college football players known as "The Three Horsemen" (a parody of the "Four Horsemen" of Notre Dame fame). The Stooges go back to her house and meet the girl's two friends.
After squirting each other with nightcap bottles, everyone decides to play the game blind man's buff. The Stooges are blindfolded and walk around trying to find the girls. Just at that moment, Joe and his two henchmen walk in. They punch out the trio and then chase them around the house. One of the women finally explains that the three strangers are actually "The Three Famous Horsemen," and Joe offers them money to play for him.
Naturally, the trio have not a clue how to play football. Their first game (staged at Hollywood's Gilmore Stadium) turns into a fiasco and eventually causing their team to lose. Believing that they had thrown the game on purpose instead, Stacks and his fellow managers turn their revolvers on the Stooges, hitting them on the buttocks as they attempt to flee.
A young Lucille Ball appears as one of the girls.
Tropes:
- Mistaken for Cheating: When Joe and his goons come back, they believe their girlfriends to be cheating on them with the Stooges and attack them.
- Mistaken Identity: The Stooges are mistaken for three college football players.
- Shot in the Ass: The Stooges all get this from Joe and his men at the end.
