The following is a listing of the primary child actors in the Our Gang comedies. McGowan worked to develop a style that allowed the children to be as natural as possible, downplaying the importance of the filmmaking equipment. See production, box office & company info, Timeless Classics.As Much Fun To Watch Today As They Were As A Child, Hal Roach Studios - 8822 Washington Blvd., Culver City, California, USA. We were just a group of kids who were having fun. He was only 31. Copy link. Robert A. McGowan was credited for these shorts as "Robert McGowan"; as a result, moviegoers have been confused for decades about whether this Robert McGowan and the senior director of the same name at Roach were two separate people. Starting in 1922, the Our Gang shorts (also known as The Little Rascals) were an iconic part of the early days of film. He became an avid speaker about his days as a part of The Little Rascals. For more of these throwback videos, check out our YouTube Channel! The folk-rock group Spanky and Our Gang was named for the troupe because lead singer Elaine "Spanky" McFarlane's last name was similar to that of George "Spanky" McFarland. The film, directed by Penelope Spheeris, starred Travis Tedford as Spanky, Bug Hall as Alfalfa, and Ross Bagley as Buckwheat; with cameos by the Olsen twins, Whoopi Goldberg, Mel Brooks, Reba McEntire, Daryl Hannah, Donald Trump and Raven-Symon. [13] A later Our Gang spin-off film, Curley (1947), was banned by the Memphis, Tennessee, censor board for showing black and white children in school together, a characteristic common to even the earlier shorts. The franchise began in 1922 as a silent short subject series produced by the Roach studio and released by Path Exchange. Five-year-old Lee had a growth spurt in early 1939, outgrowing 10-year-old McFarland. Upon Dickie Moore's departure in mid 1933, long-term Our Gang members such as Wheezer (who had been with Our Gang since the late Path silents period) and Dorothy left the series as well. We didn't care that our folks -or even grandparents- had watched it. Sidney Kibrick, the younger brother of Leonard Kibrick, played Butch's crony, Woim. Like many child actors, the Our Gang children were typecast and had trouble outgrowing their Our Gang images. I have no regrets. In 1963, Hal Roach Studios, by then run by Roach's son Hal Jr, filed for bankruptcy. Rivkin, who discovered her as a child, cast her in The Bat her last film role in 1959. [3][4][5], Even when there was no talent search, the studio was bombarded by requests from parents who were sure their children were perfect for the series. These three shorts explored Jackie Cooper's crush on the new schoolteacher Miss Crabtree, played by June Marlowe. Thomas initially played Buckwheat speech impediment and all as a girl dressed as the stereotypical African-American pickaninny. He wore bowed pigtails, a large hand-me-down sweater, and oversized boots. The first cast of Our Gang was recruited primarily of children recommended to Roach by studio employees, with the exception of Ernie Morrison, under contract to Roach. [2] Douglas, in particular, had to streamline his films, as he directed Our Gang after Roach halved the running times of the shorts from two reels (20 minutes) to one reel (10 minutes). [56] In 2008, a Darla Hood impostor, Mollie Barron, died claiming to have appeared as Darla in Our Gang. Unlike the mid-1920s period, McGowan sustained the quality of the series with the help of the several regular cast members and the Roach writing staff. All we knew was that it featured an appealing bunch of kids and that it was funny as Hell! The 1930 Our Gang short Pups is Pups was an inductee of the 2004 National Film Registry list. In 1971, because of controversy over some dated racial humor in the shorts and other content deemed to be in bad taste, King World made significant edits to Little Rascals TV prints. Here are The (original) Little Rascals then and now. Beard was cast as a baby in many films before signing a five-year contract to play Stymie in Our Gang. The film is based on the "Our Gang" series of short films from the '20s, '30s, and '40s. The kids from The Little Rascals each had their own distinct personality and image that earned them their nicknames. He was able to turn his life around, though, and after rehabilitating, he appeared as a guest star on Sanford and Son and The Jeffersons, and had a recurring role on Good Times as Monty. In 1978, he appeared in The Buddy Holly Story as a member of the backstage crew at the Apollo Theatre, wearing his trademark bowler hat. ClassicFlix, a company specializing in releasing classic films and TV series on home media, licensed the home video rights to Hal Roach's Our Gang sound shorts from their current owners, Sonar Entertainment. He won parts in a number of outside features, appeared in many of the now-numerous Our Gang product endorsements and spin-off merchandise items, and popularized the expressions "Okey-dokey!" RHI Entertainment and Genius Products released an eight-disc DVD set, The Little Rascals the Complete Collection, on October 28, 2008. They were born from the 1922-1938 'Our Gang' shorts from MGM. Overall, the Our Gang films produced by MGM were not as well-received as the Roach-produced shorts had been, largely due to MGM's inexperience with the brand of slapstick comedy that Our Gang was famous for, and to MGM's insistence on keeping Alfalfa, Spanky, and Buckwheat in the series as they became teens. [26] New faces included Bobby Hutchins as Wheezer, Harry Spear, Jean Darling and Mary Ann Jackson, while stalwart Farina served as the series' anchor. [33] After delivering the Laurel and Hardy feature Block-Heads, Roach also ended his distribution contract with MGM, moving to United Artists and leaving the short-subjects business. Her tenure, with the "Little Rascals" was from 1935 to 1941. I would have stayed in Hollywood if I could have gotten picture jobs.. Watch The Our Gang Collection: Game Winner, Watch The Our Gang Collection: Saving Alfalfa, Watch The Our Gang Collection: Football Romeo, This television package includes every sound Hal Roach-produced Our Gang comedy, except for. As part of a month-long tribute to Hal Roach Studios, Turner Classic Movies televised a 24-hour marathon of Roach Our Gang shorts both sound films and silents on January 45, 2011. The Little Rascals. The Roach-produced The Little Rascals shorts (1922-1938) are currently owned by Halcyon Studios who manages the copyrights as well as theatrical and home video releases, while CBS Media Ventures (via King World Entertainment) owns the television distribution rights to the Roach era shorts. Eugene Lee was born on Oct. 25, 1933, in Fort Worth, Texas. To escape his acting career, he changed his name to Gordon Lee after his favoriteOur Gangdirector, Gordon Douglas. Beginning with the short When the Wind Blows, in 1930 background music scores were added to the soundtracks of most of the Our Gang films. The short film series, also sometimes referred to as The Little Rascals, was created by Hal Roach (the producer and studio executive behind Laurel & Hardy) in 1922 and spurred 220 shorts. Later Our Gang directors, such as Gus Meins and Gordon Douglas, streamlined the approach to McGowan's methods to meet the demands of the increasingly sophisticated movie industry of the mid-to-late 1930s. New Roach discovery George McFarland joined the gang as Spanky late in 1931 at the age of three and remained an Our Gang actor for eleven years, except for a brief break in summer 1938. He reportedly married and divorced, and had one daughter, but died alone in a hotel room in 1970 while working as a taxi driver. After Beard left the series at the tender age of 10, he went on to score some minor roles in such feature films as Captain Blood (1935) and The Return of Frank James (1940) with fellow child star and Our Gang alum Jackie Cooper. From main characters to minor roles and cameos, these characters are a big part of what made the film so great. The Our Gang series was a success from the start, with the children's naturalism, the funny animal actors, and McGowan's direction making a successful combination. [36] The MGM entries are considered by many film historians, and the Our Gang children themselves, to be lesser films than the Roach entries. We can all sleep peacefully tonight. Under the supervision of Charley Chase, work began on the first two-reel shorts in the new "kids-and-pets" series, to be called Hal Roach's Rascals, later that year. "[14] In a separate interview, Ernie Morrison stated, "When it came to race, Hal Roach was color-blind. Their legend continued on the big screen in the 1994 Universal release, The Little Rascals, which was a feature film loosely based on interpretations of those classic Our Gang shorts. Inspired by Hal Roach's "Our Gang" series. The murder of a comedian from the Red City Nightclub puts Van der Valk one step behind. On June 14, 2011, Vivendi Entertainment re-released seven of the eight DVD's from RHI/Genius Products' The Little Rascals The Complete Collection as individual releases. Meins's Our Gang shorts were less improvisational than McGowan's and featured a heavier reliance on dialogue. Many of us remember the film shorts of these first child stars of Hollywood, Spanky, Alfalfa, Buckwheat and Darla, today we flashback on the Little Rascals. Me and my friends (Really- everyone in my class practically!) He had a habit of grabbing things and, in doing so, his mother warned, Spanky, mustnt touch! In later years, he was affectionately called Spank.. Among the most notable are The Kiddie Troupers, featuring future comedian Eddie Bracken; Baby Burlesks, featuring Shirley Temple; the Buster Brown comedies (from which Our Gang received Pete the Pup and director Gus Meins); and Our Gang's main competitor, the Toonerville Trolley-based Mickey McGuire series starring Mickey Rooney. [citation needed]. Who are the names of the Little Rascals? Hal Roach noted how much the 18-month-old toddler looked like Our Gang star Spanky McFarland, also from Texas. A smaller cast of Our Gang kidsMatthew Beard, Tommy Bond, Jerry Tucker, and Georgie Billingswere featured in supporting roles with reduced screen time. Since 1937, Our Gang had been featured as a licensed comic strip in the UK comic The Dandy, drawn by Dudley D. Watkins. The Little Ranger was the first Our Gang short to be produced in-house at MGM. According to IMDB, Daniels was living pretty large during his time on the show, making $37 per week when he started and up to $175 per week when he left (or more than $2,500 in todays dollars). Director Fred C. Newmeyer helmed the first pilot film, entitled Our Gang, but Roach scrapped Newmeyer's work and had former fireman Robert F. McGowan reshoot the short. Our Gang (also known as The Little Rascals or Hal Roach's Rascals) is an American series of comedy short films chronicling a group of poor neighborhood children and their adventures. Using a modified version of the series' original name, Roach repackaged 79 of the 80 sound Our Gang shorts as The Little Rascals. [61][62] This set includes all 80 Hal Roach-produced Our Gang sound short films. The series also broke new ground by portraying white and black children interacting as equals during the Jim Crow era of racial segregation in the United States.[1]. He had a stroke on Jan. 3, 1981, sustained head injuries from falling down a flight of stairs, and succumbed to pneumonia five days later. Created by Hal Roach in 1922, almost 200 short comedy films were made until MGM ended the series in 1944.Although there were some efforts to revive the series in the 1970s, Our Gang remained a quintessential product of the first half of the 20th century. Maksymilian Faktorowicz, who foundedMax Factor & Company in Los Angeles, drew the circle. The result of a glandular problem, Chaney's weight continued to increase. These productions did not appear to be affiliated with Hal Roach, but often used storylines from the shorts of the period, and sometimes went so far as to identify themselves as being Our Gang productions. As MGM retained the rights to the Our Gang trademark after buying the series, the Roach-produced sound Our Gang films were re-released to theaters and syndicated for television under the title The Little Rascals. He was born October 18, 1914 in Cambridge, Maryland. The Little Rascals, which debuted on television in 1955, introduced a band of ragtag children to the world. Laughlins character Froggy was known for his strange, guttural voice, which sounded like a frogs croak thus a nickname was born. Matthew Beard, Wheezer Hutchins, and Dorothy DeBorba carried the series during this period, aided by Sherwood Bailey and Kendall McComas, who would play Breezy Brisbane. and "Okey-doke!"[27]. [37] The children's performances were criticized as stilted and stiff, their dialogue being recited instead of spoken naturally. After he left the film shorts, Thomas enlisted in the U.S. Army when he was just 23 years old. When he first started making the shorts way back in 1921, they were shown in theaters ahead of the main picture. In the 1994 feature-film remake of The Little Rascals, Petey is an American Bulldog. Most early shorts were filmed outdoors and on location and featured a menagerie of animal characters, such as Dinah the Mule. Loads more TV Themes at: http://teeveesgreatest.webs.com/Our Gang (also known as The Little Rascals or Hal Roach's Rascals) is a series of American comedy sh. It was great.. As part of the arrangement with MGM to continue Our Gang, Roach received the clearance to produce an Our Gang feature film, General Spanky, hoping that he might move the series to features as was done with Laurel & Hardy. By then, all but 11 of the Roach-era sound films were available on home video. Little Rascals shorts were also shown. I just try to look at it as mostly a fun thing. He was 16 as old as Billy Froggy Laughlin when he died. [19] Morrison's "Sunshine Sammy" instead became one of the foci of the new Our Gang series. [22] A reviewer wrote of the Farina character depicted as female though played by a male child[23] in Photoplay: "The honors go to a very young lady of color, billed as 'Little Farina.' Retaining McFarland, Matthew Beard, Tommy Bond, and Jerry Tucker, the revised series added Scotty Beckett, Wally Albright, and Billie Thomas, who soon began playing the character of Stymie's sister "Buckwheat," though Thomas was a male. Unfortunately, Daniels career never took off after the shorts. Our Gang would be used by MGM as a training ground for future feature directors: Sidney, Edward Cahn and Cy Endfield all worked on Our Gang before moving on to features. Unlike other kids, he couldnt really go outside and play, and not because of his stardom, but rather because the neighborhood they lived in was so dangerous. Although its been called the first series to feature kids as the stars the original members were not household names. A new kid moves into town and is soon bullying little Jackie. The characters in this series are well-known cultural icons, and identified solely by their first names. We didn't care that it was black and white. The names of the actors and actresses who portrayed each character are included below as well, so use this The Little Rascals character list to find out who played your favorite role. Our Gang was very successful during the 1920s and the early 1930s. These new television prints made their debut on the American Movie Classics cable network in 2001 and ran until 2003. September 10, 1922 Our Gang/First episode date Where can I watch the original Little Rascals? She had fond memories of her days being a little rascal and died of a heart attack in 2003. Created by film producer Hal Roach, also the producer of the Laurel and Hardy films, Our Gang shorts were produced from 1922 to 1944, spanning the silent film and early sound film periods of American cinema. Republic would release Little Rascals VHS volumes for retail purchase in non-comprehensive collections through the rest of the 1980s and early 1990s.
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