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Post by Hard-boiled Harry on Aug 26, 2013 16:18:50 GMT -5
B.A.R.R.E.L. (1927) A young boy wearing a bowler hat is found wandering the streets of Culver City apparently suffering from amnesia. The Gang take pity on him and decide to befriend him. Jay R. Smith takes him home and when Jay's mother asks the boy what his name is he replies 'I think my name is Barrel.' It turns out that Barrel has no idea how to play baseball or how to do any of the other things that the Gang enjoy so the Gang set about instructing him. Because he can run so fast the Gang nickname him Scooter. Soon he's the best baseball pitcher and hitter for miles around and his sporting prowess even gets into the newspapers. This draws Barrel to the attention of a secret government department who immediately dispatch two operatives to reclaim their lost property. Barrel waves goodbye to the Gang and leaves with a tall thin man and a large plump one, who both wear bowler hats just like their so-called nephew. The Gang are worried about the fate of their new friend and use their latest mule powered hovercraft to visit the facility to which he has been taken. It turns out that Barrel isn't a lost boy at all, in fact his name isn't Barrel but B.A.R.R.E.L. (Boy Artificial Robot Recycling Electrical Linkages). A professor Einstein had been unhappy with the government's plans for the robot boy and he'd removed some radio valves from inside his head and released him into the outside world. Wheezer creeps through some air recycling ducts and overhears plans being made for the duplication of Barrel. Executives from MGM are discussing their investment in the B.A.R.R.E.L. project. "Now that we have the prototype robot back we can copy him and make a whole batch of them. We'll make them with a selection of different heads and then we can replace all the children in movies with them. Our new robot kids can teach children about morals, patriotism and useful things such as how to organize their socks. There'll be no more of the silliness that real kids do in Hollywood movies, no more exploding cakes, life size toy trains or boys wearing dresses." When Wheezer returns and tells the rest of the Gang what MGM are planning they immediately decide to rescue Barrel, "Because without Barrel to copy from they won't be able to make other robot kids," explains Joe. "But how can we get him out of here without him being recognized?" asks Jackie. Barrel himself supplies the answer. He opens a secret panel in the wall of his room and extracts a pleasant roundish head with a grumpy expression and a whole load of freckles. Barrel hands the head to Jay R and explains. "I want you take off my present head and put this new improved head that I made in its place. I haven't had time to finish the artificial hair so we'll need to put my hat on the new head to cover up the valves and electrical things that are showing." Shortly afterwards the Gang and the robot formerly known as Scooter are able to simply walk straight out of the facility without raising any concerns from security. They return back to Culver City. Jay R. Smith's mother is confused, "I know he has a bowler hat but I swear he's not the same boy that we adopted last week, he's not Scooter." Jay R. shrugs, "Yeah mum but that was last week. This week I've got a new adopted brother and I'm gonna call him Harry." After an initial test screening Hal Roach decided that the cinema going audience of the time would not understand the concepts of robots and electrical valves. He shelved the project and the movie was simply left to gather dust until the 1980s when it was artificially colorized, had some additional scenes added and was finally released with a slightly altered name.
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Post by RJH on Aug 27, 2013 0:18:44 GMT -5
Bad Good Boys (1938) -While Hal Roach was on summer vacation, some wannabe writers produced a script. Alfalfa gets framed for stealing, and convinces the rest of the boys in the gang to lead a life of crime. After a couple of successful small robberies, they get caught and thrown into the boys' reformatory. They have to wear black and white stripe prison outfits, but after a few days they get in a fight with another gang. The next scene shows them handcuffed to pipes over their heads in the shower, and Butch and the Woim grinning evilly in warden's uniforms holding whips. There follows five minutes of what is supposed to be whipping, but is clear that is really mediocre acting, followed by a view of a clock that is sped up to show twelve hours pass before the gang is released from the handcuffs and thrown back in their cell. And then .. the scene fades out and changes to one of Darla saying, "And that's what will happen if you boys turn to a life a crime." One screenshot remains of Spanky, Buckwheat, and Porky in shock at hearing the story. The whole film up to that point wasn't real. Then Alfalfa asks, "Hey Darla, how come you know so much about what goes on in the boys' reformatory?" Darla hems and haws, and stutters, and mumbles something unconvincing like, "My friend's brother told her, and I heard it from her." The one reel is up so the film ends. When Roach got back and saw the film, he became violently ill and tossed the film and manuscript into a fire, and yelled, "Are you out of your minds?" The writers tried to defend themselves. "The rough stuff was all like a dream, so it didn't really happened, The boys weren't really whipped, they all just pretended. Butch and Woim whipped sides of beef off camera. And the gang had bathing suits on in the shower; we were careful to film above their waists. And that was fake blood trickling down the drain." "The handcuffs looked real." "We couldn't fake that. And they weren't handcuffed for anywhere near twelve hours." "How long did you keep my stars handcuffed?" "Funny thing about that. Butch and Woim accidentally dropped the handcuff key down the shower drain, and it took four hours to find a duplicate." "Why didn't you saw them out of the cuffs?" "That would have ruined them, and we couldn't afford to go over our budget." "Get out of here! There'll be none of these inane moralizing features while I'm in charge!" Unfortunately, Roach sold the series a few months later. An MGM person found that the first page of the manuscript stuck against the wall of the fireplace, and thought that by changing the order of the words in the title and seeing something about moralizing, that there was a decent idea to be derived from that. --------------------------- The next one comes from continuing an idea from another thread. It helps to be familiar with "Fightin' Fools," "Joy Scouts," and "Don't Lie." --------------------------- The second reel of "Mighty Lak A Goat" (1942) Mickey: "But... but how'd we get from the police pulling us out of the theater to us burying our clothes ourselves in the woods? Did they just take us out here and dump us? And if we could get the tools to bury the clothes and make the sign, why didn't we also get something else to wear? And if we had to bury every stitch we were wearing, shouldn't the smell still be on our skin and hair? And..." Spanky: "Slow down. The police did take us here and dump us. And the smell is still on our skin. That's why we didn't get anything else to wear." Mickey: "Huh?" Spanky: "Guess your folks were too busy arguing about hash to tell you." Mickey: "Tell me what?" Buckwheat: "My mama explained that if I put on any clothes now, they'll get ruined because of the smell. We can't afford to waste anything, so I'm not allowed to wear any clothes until this smell comes off." Spanky: "That's right. Besides, my folks say if I come home too soon, the house will have to be fumigated, and that's an unnecessary expense we can easily avoid." Mickey: "But ... how long will it take for the smell to come off?" Froggy: "Uh ... a week ... or two. It's gotten into our skin enough that it won't wash off with soap, so we have to let it wear off naturally." Mickey: "What!? What are we going to do?" Froggy: "Look on the bright side. We don't have to go to school for the rest of this week and all of the next." Buckwheat: "And we don't have to do any chores!" Spanky: "We can go camping." Mickey: "Our last camping trip was a disaster." Spanky: "But now we know what poison ivy looks like. And later I remembered me and Scotty did well camping when we were little, so we'll be more like that." Mickey: "Who's Scotty?" Buckwheat: "I remember that he was Spanky's best friend from when I was very little. I guess he moved away. He looks a lot like Alfalfa's Cousin Wilbur." Spanky slaps his forehead. "That's right! I never noticed that before." Froggy: "That pond where we went swimming a few months ago is near here. We can go there, and this time we don't have to worry about that Third Street Bunch stealing our clothes or tying them in knots." Buckwheat: "And we can get great suntans - with no tan lines!" Mickey: "You have tan lines?" Spanky: "Buckwheat is the most honest guy I know. He would never lie about that - or anything else." Buckwheat: "Sure I got tan lines. They may not be as obvious as you guys, but ..." Mickey: "Never mind. What if we don't find food here?" Spanky: "They're going to catapult food from the non-smelly side of our sign once a day. And there's water to drink from that pond, at least if we don't swim in it first." Mickey: "It might get cold at night. How are we going to sleep?" Spanky: "Haven't you heard of sharing body heat?" Mickey: "Eww." Froggy: "Please stop whining and accept this like a man." Buckwheat: "We can make blankets out of leaves. They're lots of those in the woods." Mickey pauses, takes a deep breath, and declares, "You're right guys. I whine too much. It's time to man up and do this." The boys head out of sight walking away from the sign. ----------------- Epilog: MGM decided it wasn't time to bring back two-reelers and instead followed the first reel of "Mighty Lak A Goat" with a dozen highly entertaining, gripping, riveting and hilarious one-reelers guaranteed to ensure many more years of "Our Gang" comedies. Oh, wait ...
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Post by myhomeo on Aug 27, 2013 17:21:07 GMT -5
More on Helmut Jakobsom Schroeder...
Schroeder had a... unique approach to the Gang and it's interesting, if not a little disturbing, to imagine how things might have gone.
For one thing, he loathed the mini-musical format and refused to do any stories along those lines, or anything involving Spanky putting on a show, insisting, "Any boy who tap-dances in a barn should be shot."
Moreover, the Alfalfa-Darla-Butch triangle would have gone by the wayside as well. Schroeder openly hated Darla, calling her a "faithless strumpet" and circulated a phony scene he'd written for his own amusement in which Alfalfa responds to her coyness by knocking her to the ground, raping her repeatedly, then beating her to death. He apparently thought this was quite hilarious and was surprised other people weren't amused.
Finally, he objected to the ending of 'Came The Brawn' where Butch's suit is torn off and he ends up whimpering under the canvas, refusing to show himself. Schroeder insisted such behavior was "unmanly" and attempts to explain Butch was a bully and a blowhard were dismissed out of hand. He even wrote a script proposal he felt redressed these concerns, 'A Foul Ball', in which Spanky tries to avoid playing football against Butch's much tougher team by releasing a skunk in their locker room to contaminate all their uniforms and clothes. Later, Spanky gloats to his pals Butch's team is "all taken care of" and is startled when they show up anyway in the buff. Butch then makes Spanky's team strip as well and the Gang have to find some other way to win the day. Obviously, there was no way this could possibly be filmed; repeated attempts to explain the Hays Office rules were disregarded by Schroeder, who called them "silly." Moreover, it was unlikely Roach would agree to another football-centered movie so soon after 'The Pigskin Palooka,' especially given 'Palooka's' budget problems. Finally, while it never reached the point where they were consulted, it would have been wildly unlikely any of the series principals would have agreed to be filmed nude again by Schroeder after 'A Summer Day'; Spanky remembers he and his parents were told he'd only be shown in longshot or from the waist up and were outraged when they saw the finished short.
On the positive side, Schroeder developed quite an interest in Dickie Jones and wanted to make him a regular in the series, taking advantage of his trick-riding background and his experience in westerns to make him a cowboy-style Rascal. This very much annoyed Alfalfa and his parents, who considered themselves authentic 'cowboys'. Perhaps that was the problem; they were authentic frontier hillbillies rather than the square-jawed Tom Mix style heroes of Schroeder's fantasies. He'd already started writing a script to introduce Dickie's new character, 'Tex', involving he and Alfalfa competing in a rodeo against one another. It's one of the few Schroeder projects that don't make one cringe and attempts were made later to retool it as another 'Alfalfa-Butch-Darla' story after Schroeder left and Dickie became unavailable (His parents were reportedly unnerved by a 'present' Schroeder gave to the boy, a book of poetry by Gabriele D'Anunnizo). Ultimately, however, it was decided between location shooting, renting horses, etc, it would just be too complicated.
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Post by Hard-boiled Harry on Aug 27, 2013 18:42:43 GMT -5
Lord of the Fleas (1936) It's a hot sunny day, far too hot and sunny for Darla to come out to play and risk blemishing her skin with freckles so the boys head off alone. Eventually they make their way to the city park, where Jerry Tucker generously pays out to hire a rowing boats so they can spend the afternoon on the park lake. After aimless drifting around for a while Alfalfa suggests that they should row over to one of the islands in the center of the lake. They choose the biggest of the three islands and once they land there the boys jump out of the boat, eager to explore. Unfortunately nobody gives a thought to securing the boat and when they return to the island shore they find that it has drifted far out into open water. The boys call for help but they are too far from the shore of the lake for anyone to hear, not that there are any people around because it's getting late and most of the people have left before it gets dark. Harold Switzer takes charge, "We need to get organized, build a shelter to sleep in and maybe make a fire so that we can keep warm during the night and so that people can see the light and come to rescue us." "I agree" replies Spanky. "You would fatty," replies Alfalfa, "Organize things, build shelters and light fires? You pair of girl boys sound just like grown ups." He turns to the rest of the boys, "We're kids, we've got a whole island to ourselves with no grown ups, lets have fun." He unfastens his trousers, "I'm going skinny dipping, who's come?" Clothes are strewn all over the bank as several of the boys hurry to join Alfalfa in the lake. "Just like silly kids," complains Spanky as he uses the glass lens from his pocket watch to light a fire. Harold Switzer and Uh-huh construct a simple shelter from branches. Soon afterwards the rest of the boys return from their swim in the lake and gather around the fire to dry. "See I told you that a fire was a good idea," says Spanky. "Oh shut up you fat oaf," replies Alfalfa, "Nobody asked you. What good are you anyway? You can't swim, you don't have any freckles and you're not in the slightest bit funny." "Stop that," protests Harold Switzer. "And you shut up too," shouts Alfalfa, "stop trying to boss me around, I'm the important one in our family, you're just an extra, you can't tell me what to do. I've had enough of this I'm going to form my own Gang, who's coming with me? We'll have fun and bake apples, I saw some on the trees at the other end of the island, we can play hide and seek in the dark. we can do anything we want." "I'll come," agrees Buckwheat. "How about you extra kids who don't have nicknames and hardly ever say anything?" Asks Alfalfa. "They'll all come with us" says Buckwheat, "I saw it in the script. Only Uh-huh and Spanky will stay with Harold." "What about Jerry Tucker?" Asks Harold. Everybody looks around. "The production staff have forgotten about him again, he's probably still in the canteen eating his lunch," says Alfalfa, "So we'll have to carry on without him, we can pretend that he's gathering apples or something. Anyway, back to the storyline, lets go and bake some apples and have fun," orders Alfalfa, "I'm the chief cos I've got a cowlick and Buckwheat's second chief cos he's got a nickname and the rest of you extra kids are just our tribe and you have to do what we say." "But they don't," protests Spanky. "Stay here and we can all be equals. Harold and me will think up nicknames for you all and we can organize things, wash our socks and make combs from fir cones, so that we look neat and presentable when we get rescued." Alfalfa punches Spanky in the belly and knocks him to the ground, "That'll shut fatso up," he declares. Alfalfa points to two of the bigger extra boys, "Grabs some burning branches from their fire so we can start out own fire." Then he heads off into the trees followed by most of the rest of the boys. "They didn't even take their clothes," says Spanky, as he gets up from the ground. "They've just left them here laying on the ground, they'll be ever so dirty and creased." "Don't worry, I'll help you to brush the soil off them and we can fold them up tidily," offers Harold Switzer, "Uh-huh will help too, won't you?" "Uh-huh" replies Uh-huh. At the other end of the island Alfalfa's Gang are happily baking apples in the embers of their fire. "What about our clothes?" Asks Buckwheat, "we left them behind." Alfalfa shrugs, "Who cares, it's a warm night, we've got a fire and we're all boys anyway. Never mid that stuff let's have some fun, we can raid their camp tonight and get our clothes back," says Alfalfa. "We could just send a couple of the extras to ask for them back now," replies Buckwheat. "That won't work, extra's hardly ever speak," replies Alfalfa, "and anyway where's the fun in just asking for our clothes back? It'll be much more fun if we raid them in the middle of the night and we can beat up Spanky and Harold too!" "What about Uh-huh?" asks Buckwheat. "Who's he?" Asks a puzzled Alfalfa. "The dark haired kid with the cowlick," explains Buckwheat. "That's me you moron," declares Alfalfa. "I know that but he's got dark hair and a cowlick too, only he doesn't have any freckles." "The little beast," shouts Alfalfa, "How dare he copy off me." "I think he was in the Gang before you joined," explains Buckwheat. Alfalfa shrugs off the information, "Who cares, I'm the chief and he's a nobody, a stinky little piggy with fleas and you know what we do to piggies don't you lads?" The extras look at each other and shake their head. "What do we do to piggies?" Asks Buckwheat. Alfalfa shrugs his shoulders, "I don't know but I'll tell you just as soon as I make something up." Later that night as Spanky and Harold are sleeping in their shelter they are suddenly awakened by a hail of rotten apples being thrown at their shelter. "Where is the copy cat piggy?" Demands Alfalfa, "Send out the little beast so we can teach him a lesson." "Who are you talking about?" replies Spanky nervously. "Uh-uh or whatever his name is" replies Alfalfa, "He's copied my cowlick and now he's gonna pay for it." "He's not here," shouts Harold, "He said he was going to your camp to straighten things out with you." The sound of laughter and jeering comes from outside as Alfalfa's Gang retrieve their carefully folded clothes and run off into the night. Alfalfa pauses in the shadow of a tree close to his own camp site and points to a slightly built figure who can be seen silhouetted by the light from their camp fire. "I can see the little beast's cowlick from here. Time to make him pay." The boys rush out from the trees and surround Uh-huh. "What are you up to, copying off me, copying my cowlick?" Demand's Alfalfa. "I didn't mean to," replies Uh-huh, "It was just a girl in the make up department having a joke, it wasn't my idea honestly. I'll comb my hair differently if you like. How about a side parting, would that be okay?" "Too late you little beast," replies Alfalfa and punches Uh-huh in the mouth, "Get him extras," he shouts and the boys gather closer and beat the defenseless Uh-huh to a pulp. That was the point that filming was stopped. Apparently Alfalfa and the extras got a little too carried away and they really did beat Uh-huh to a pulp. Fortunately he had a twin brother who was able to replace him in the series but out of respect for the dead the name Uh-huh was never used again and the film was destroyed.
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Post by Hard-boiled Harry on Aug 28, 2013 9:02:08 GMT -5
Petey Pan (1927)
Jay R. Smith's mother wins a civic prize for her work adopting homeless waifs. Leaving the house on her way to attending the prize giving function she tells Jay R. that he can't be trusted to look after the younger children after previously allowing them to chalk all over the walls. Instead she appoints Petey as the babysitter.
Once she sets off Jay R. uses his patented hosepipe and tin can telephone to invite Joe and the rest of the Gang to come over, telling them that his mum has gone out and that they can give her a wonderful surprise by redecorating the entire house, baking her a giant cake and chopping down the pesky tree that is growing close to the house. Within minutes Joe, Jackie, Harry, Farina and Scooter arrive. Jay R. attempts to organize things telling Joe and Jackie to bake the cake, Farina and Harry to decorate the house and choosing Scooter to come and help him to chop down the tree. However Petey is taking his role as babysitter seriously and he chases Harry & Farina out of the kitchen before they've even managed to open a kitchen cupboard. Then Petey bares the way to the tool shed by growling at the other members of the Gang, refusing to allow them access to the tools they need. Reluctantly most of the Gang obey Petey and return to the living room, where they play a quiet game of Happy Families, which also keeps the younger children amused and out of mischief.
One of the boys however tells the others that he 'won't be pushed around by a stupid dog.' Determined to chop down the tree, by himself if necessary, Scooter goes back outside and once more attempts to open the tool shed. Once more Petey bars his way. Scooter backs away a distance and picks up a fallen apple which he throws at Petey. Soon he's throwing more and more fallen fruit at the trusty hound who manages to avoid being hit by them although he is getting increasingly annoyed. Eventually Petey loses his cool and chases after Scooter, the boy realizes that he's gone too far and that now Petey is seriously angry. In his panic to escape Scooter slightly trips over a fallen branch, causing the rim of his bowler hat to slip over his eyes. Unable to see where he is going Scooter blunders into the low wall that surrounds the well and plunges head over heels down the sixty feet deep the well shaft and into the icy water below.
When Jay R's mother returns home with her award she finds the house just as she left it and the children happily engaged in a yet another game of Happy Families. If isn't until the next morning that anyone even realizes that Scooter is missing. Once his disappearance is reported however the police do make inquiries and then launch an intensive search, which fails to locate any sign of him. Eventually the police chiefs calls a news conference and declares that they've called off the search, telling the gathered reporters that he doesn't believe that Scooter has come to any harm but has left of his own choice and that he's "just another lost boy."
Having noted that the audience at the test screening failed to laugh at any point during the story Hal Roach ordered an immediate rewrite but despite several attempts they simply couldn't inject any humor into the episode. Reluctantly they gave up and the film was consigned to a cellar, where it is probably still gathering dust. Unfortunately it was only then that Hal Roach inquired whether anybody had actually retrieved Scooter from the well. It seems that nobody had, they'd simply forgotten about him. Hal Roach sensibly instructed the whole production team to keep quiet about Scooter and his disappearance. He gave Scooter's spare bowler hat to Harry and quipped to Bob McGowan that 'Now most of the public won't even notice that Scooter has gone,' and it seems he was right.
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Post by myhomeo on Aug 28, 2013 17:28:36 GMT -5
In a locker in a long-defunct train station somewhere in Culver, Indiana, wrapped in some shirts in an abandoned foot-locker marked 'H SPEARS,' researchers have uncovered another complete, never-shown Schroeder short.
The sad thing about 'Baby Butch' is that it does show considerable promise (If I do say so myself). Alfalfa has just received a present from his aunt, who's recently returned from a trip to Florida: A fancy bottle of water labelled 'Official Water From The Fountain of Youth,' obviously picked up in a tourist-trap novelty store. Spanky's dubious but Alfalfa's convinced the water must have actual magical properties. Unfortunately, immediately after vowing to treat the water very carefully, he trips and spills it all over Butch. The bully is furious at first and threatens to give Alfalfa a good pummeling, but after seeing the bottle label and overhearing some of Spanky and Alfalfa's comments, he leaves, claiming to feel 'funny.'
As it happens, Butch and Woim have been saddled with taking care of Butch's infant nephew for the day. He and Woim dress the baby up in Butch's clothes and Butch hides. Woim, seeing the boys coming, kneels by the infant in Butch's outfit and pretends to be distraught. "SPEAK to me, boss! SPEAK to me!" He manages to convince the credulous Alfalfa and the incredulous Spanky the magic water transformed Butch into an infant, then hands the child to them, saying he has to go break the news to Butch's poor mother.
A frightened Spanky and Alfalfa take 'Butch' back to their clubhouse and try to take care of him, not realizing the real Butch and Woim are spying on them, thoroughly enjoying their panic. Eventually, however, the boys realize an infant Butch is no longer a danger to them. "You hear that, you little brat? Now WE'RE in charge!" Alfalfa even threatens 'Butch' with a spanking. At this point, the real Butch, infuriated by their remarks, charges in and chases them into the distance.
It's a fairly solid idea for a short but once again, Schroeder's penchant for nudity sabotages the film and renders it unreleasable. There's no real reason why Butch should have to strip off completely to disguise the baby. He certainly could have changed to another outfit without spoiling the joke; it might have even been funny to see him in his skivves. Moreover, it's completely preposterous Butch would then proceed to go and spy on the boys without bothering to put anything on. Perhaps the idea was to suggest Spanky and Alfalfa thought the 'grown' Butch was actually the infant, also naked at this point, suddenly restored to his proper size, but the execution's so murky it doesn't really come off. Adding insult to injury, Tommy Bond is clearly quite embarrassed throughout those scenes, though he carries through like a trooper. Another sad error in Schroeder's ouvre.
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Post by myhomeo on Aug 29, 2013 16:30:34 GMT -5
By this time, Schroeder had managed to upset Spanky MacFarland, Tommy Bond, and Darla Hood (And the parents thereof) to the point where all three of them refused to work for the series any longer. Spanky and Butch's roles in 'Cradle Days' were rewritten for Waldo and Woim, respectively, but during filming, Schroeder decided to rework Waldo into what he called 'a Shylock character.' Revised scripts were issued, jaws dropped, and Darwood Kaye and Sid Kubrick followed their associates out the door. None of them would appear in a 'Gang' short until 'The Little Ranger,' the first in the series for MGM. Forced to continue as best they could with only Alfalfa, Buckwheat, and Porky, Roach finally had enough. Schroeder's termination from the studio and subsequent suicide came shortly thereafter.
It's been speculated Schroeder was a pedophile. Certainly, Hal Roach seems to have thought so; it would explain the complete erasure of Schroeder's brief period with the Gang from official histories of the series. Spanky, however, disagreed: "He was just a vulgar clod with a crude sense of humor. He liked rude jokes," he said in a 2003 interview, pointing to a gag in 'A Summer Day' involving a crowd of elderly, half-deaf grande dames chattering about high-toned matters, totally oblivious to their own and one another's loud flatulance. Another person pointed to Schroeder's wife, a grandmotherly figure adored by the children on her infrequent visits to the set, partly due to her home-baked cookies. Still, one must admit, the jury's still out.
One must also wonder about the Rascals who stayed. Both of the younger children were reportedly terrified of the man, but their parents, for one reason or another, were unable to pull them out of the series. Alfalfa, on the other hand, is especially puzzling, particularly given his already established temper and penchant for practical jokes. It's amazing the two would have been able to work together at all, yet they did. Some crew members insist it was because Alfalfa was cowed by Schroeder, who didn't hesitate to strike him if he fumbled a gag. Others claim Schroeder simply refused to take Alfalfa's misbehavior seriously, finding his flare-ups and tantrums 'cute.' Since both are long dead, it's unlikely we'll ever know for sure.
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Post by Hard-boiled Harry on Aug 30, 2013 9:43:26 GMT -5
I'm not altogether certain that 'Mister Schroeder' is in the best of taste, especially given that there really was an Our Gang director who was a pedophile... Click here for Gus Miens thread
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Post by myhomeo on Aug 31, 2013 14:12:25 GMT -5
Good heavens.
No idea about any of that. My apologies.
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Post by myhomeo on Aug 31, 2013 15:23:11 GMT -5
And he was German too. Oh, lovely. Oh yes, I'm just HILARIOUS... (Head in hands)
Anyway, while I'm not sure about how wise it is to start speculating which kids might have been molested, trying to work up 'evidence,' etc. I've always been under the impression Scotty left because his career was beginning to take off elsewhere. Similarly, someone on another board suggested that might have been the reason Tommy Bond temporarily left the series, which seems unlikely. It might be worth mentioning the boys he was accused of molesting were said to be about ten years old or so, and most of the kids in the Gang were considerably younger. It's possible they weren't his 'type.' Still, it is rather disturbing to note his first short, 'Hi-Neighbor,' had virtually the entire Gang, with the exception of Spanky, stripped to their underwear, while the second, 'For Pete's Sake', had Spanky being caught bare-bottomed with his pants around his ankles and retreating into the bushes (The only instance of nudity in a sound 'Rascals' comedy, I believe). And while it doesn't appear to have been a regular thing, there are instances of kids (and a couple adults, even) losing their clothes in his sixteen comedies.
One of the things that inspired 'Schroeder' was my observation about how naive people were about pedophilia and how images of little boys being caught naked, getting spanked, etc. were considered 'cute' and at worst slightly rude back then. It seemed inevitable at some point a perv would have seized the opportunity to get an eyeful or a cheap thrill, though I wasn't sure how one would go about verifying it. Very sad to see my suspicions confirmed in one of my favorite comedy series.
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Post by mtw12055 on Oct 22, 2013 19:02:35 GMT -5
Feed 'Em Hash and Weep - The Gang go to Darla's house to celebrate her dad's birthday. Mr. Hood (now played by Byron Shores) is surprisingly not upset about the kids crashing his party. Rather, he's upset that he has to eat hash for dinner. Mickey starts crying because he thinks Mr. Hood is mad at the Gang. Mr. Hood realizes his complaints have worried the little guy, and decides to eat the hash. But not before a speech on "how wrong I was about hash". Alfalfa ends the party with a rendition of "Lydia the Tattooed Lady" (from the Marx Bros.' "At the Circus"). Afterwards, Spanky wonders where Froggy is. "I told that guy we were having hash", states Spanky. Just then, Froggy shows up, looking incredibly sleepy. "I brought some extra hash, fellas", he says. "No, Froggy! Not that kind of hash!", everyone else says. Froggy shrugs. "Well, like my Aunt Minnie always sa--". He passes out. Everyone laughs and says "You said it!".
Three Reichs, You're Out! (a.k.a. "Adolf Hitler Jr.") - A WWII propaganda film in which Froggy has a nightmare about becoming dictator of Greenpoint. "Froggolf Hitler" spends the entire short standing outside of the "Our Fuehrer" Clubhouse, making speeches to an unseen group of neighborhood kids. He promises to "lemonade" school, spinach, and parents from Greenpoint. Midecky Tojo (Mickey), Buckwheato Mussolini (Buckwheat), and Janseph Goebbels (Janet) merely add "how true, how true". Froggy wakes up and gives a dramatic speech to the audience: "Do you want your children taking over? Nobody likes an immature ruler. So help stop Adolf Hitler, the biggest child of 'em all. Like my Aunt Minnie always says, 'der siegwird unser sein!'". This nearly budget-less short was filmed during a lunch break.
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Post by myhomeo on Oct 24, 2013 17:16:01 GMT -5
Our Gang Follies of The Apocalypse - Of unknown origin. Found in a defunct avant-garde theater in 1973, presumably cobbled together using pirated footage and possibly lookalikes of the actual Gang. The film begins in the usual coal-bin 'theater' of the Gang, only this time instead of kids, the excited audience being shown to their seats are grotesquely old people dressed to the nines in elegant finery. There are periodic cuts to rats scampering about their feet as they walk. The show, extremely overlit so everything's on the verge of fading into white light, begins with the curtain parting and a musical fanfare. Spanky emerges dressed in a tux, in heavy makeup that makes him look vaguely Satanic. He sings a welcome, the soundtrack out of sync and slightly sped up. He gestures grandly and out of a puff of smoke Alfalfa appears in his 'cowboy from the drugstore' costume. He sings 'Comin Round The Mountain.' The soundtrack plays properly here but the last line, "when she comes," is repeated in a loop for five minutes. Darla enters in an elaborate carriage pulled by a nude, hooded Buckwheat. She's dressed in a spangled showgirl costume and performs an elaborate cootch dance with a stuffed snake doll. There are repeated cuts to excited boys in the audience (taken from other shorts) intersped with shots of snakes, lizards, crocidiles, and (stop-motion) dinosaurs. Alfalfa, who's stood to one side of the stage watching in awe, comes forward as the soundtrack goes wild with white noise. He drops to one knee and sings a scratchy-sounding love song, concluding by reaching under his shirt and producing an enormous heart-shaped mound of meat. He hands it to Darla, who tosses it away, spurning him; there's a quick shot of an alligator catching some meat in midair. Darla opens her dress and superimposed over her body is footage from 'the skeleton dance' from FOLLIES OF 36. She laughs manically. Waldo, elegantly dressed in top hat and tails, money overflowing from his pockets, rides in on a toy fire engine. He helps her into the engine and they drive away while Alfalfa stands there, staring dully. The white noise returns. The camera moves in for a closeup of Alfalfa's devastated face and holds it for several minutes. Butch rises from the ground on an elevated platform, singing 'Tomorrow Belongs To Me' in a heartbreakingly sweet voice. He's wearing a stormtrooper uniform. Other boys in stormtrooper uniforms --I think I recognised Porky and Woim-- march out, produce rifles, and shoot Alfalfa dead, firing squad style. Darla and Waldo reappear. Darla is at first distressed by Alfalfa's lifeless corpse but Waldo, now dressed in a black robe, gestures hypnotically. Her face goes blank, there's a quick cut, and she's now wearing a Dracula's Wife type gown. They fall on Alfalfa's corpse, which has now turned to a sort of wet, cakelike sculpture of Alfalfa, and devour it. The white noise returns again, accompanied by the barking of dogs. Then everything suddenly vanishes. After a pause, Spanky comes back on stage and sings the "And if it makes you happy, we'll try again some day!" song. The happy audience leaves, accompanied by the familiar closing music. Hal Roach denied all involvement.
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Post by RJH on Oct 31, 2013 22:32:44 GMT -5
Halloween Special (1932) - The gang goes trick-or-treating. Stymie goes as a scarecrow and paints Wheezer's face silver, and Wheezer finds an axe to go as a woodcutter. Breezy goes as a lion, and Dorothy as a farm girl from Kansas. They make Pete up to look like a little terrier. It goes well for a while, but one resident, Mr. Brown, refuses to give them candy. Summoning an unexpected surge of courage, Breezy convinces the gang to vandalize Brown's house, throwing eggs and toilet paper at it. Stymie's aim isn't so good and he hits himself in the head with the eggs several times. Wheezer whacks several trees and bushes with his axe. At the conclusion, Dorothy can only stammer "Oh, my!" A short time later, the gang is rounded up, charged with vandalism and copyright infringement, and sent to reform school, where a scene shows them still in costume but as a chain gang, breaking rocks with sledgehammers. A final voiceover says, "You better behave or this could happen to you."
Hal Roach was disgusted at the heavyhanded moralizing, destroyed the copies of the film, and fired all the writers. It appears they got jobs at MGM a few years later.
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Post by myhomeo on Apr 1, 2014 17:43:24 GMT -5
'Switcheroo Day' - A proposed episode which apparently never got beyond script form for various reasons. Butch and Darla find a magic lamp and idly wish each could be the other, "just for one day." There's a puff of smoke and Butch and Darla have magically exchanged bodies. Worse, because of the way the original wish was worded, they're stuck like that for the rest of the day. Horrified that someone might find out about their mortifying predicament, the two agree to do their best to impersonate one another and live the other's life until sundown. This means Butch, as Darla, has to go on a romantic picnic date with Alfalfa while Darla, as Butch, has to lead Butch's football team to victory against their arch-rivals.
Most of the rest of the script cuts back and forth between Butch, as Darla, trying his best not to paste Alfalfa one and keep him at arm's length whenever he tries to get lovey-dovey while Darla, as Butch, confounds her teammates with her sudden lack of prowess, habit of screaming and covering her head when the opposing team try to tackle her, her tendency to call time-outs so ladybugs crossing the infield won't get trampled, and her newfound habit of starting games by cheerfully announcing, "Now let's all be good sports and just have a fun time!"
Against all logic, Darla manages to win the game; when they hoist her up on her shoulders, it's sundown and she transforms back into Darla in Butch's uniform. Quickly, she manages to grab a low-hanging branch they march under, climb up, and evade detection. Alfalfa, meanwhile, has finally managed to kiss Darla... and suddenly finds himself kissing a furious Butch in drag. Butch chases Alfalfa into the sunset as the scene irises out.
Obviously, the Hays Office was very anxious about this script and concerned the writers avoid anything suggesting 'sex perversion' like Sissy Butch or the two leads in drag. The Switzers, meanwhile, were upset the story didn't center around Alfalfa. But the major problem was the obvious similarities with the 1931 Thorne Smith novel TURNABOUT, which Roach made into a feature in 1940. The studio finally decided it was more trouble than it was worth was tossed it.
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Post by mtw12055 on Apr 6, 2014 16:04:42 GMT -5
The Kids and Critters Of Comedy (1972) - Produced by Robert Youngson. This was one of Youngson's last compilation films before his death. The film features clips from various Our Gang silents, as well as from similar series (Buster Brown, Hey Fellas!, Mickey McGuire, Big Boy, McDougall Alley Kids, Dippy Doo Dads, Smith Family, Baby Snookums, and a few pre-Our Gang Sunshine Sammy shorts).
Due to the lack of behind the scenes information on Our Gang at the time (it would still be a few years before the Maltin/Bann book was released), most of the narrated pieces are inaccurate.
The film opens on a scene from the Boyfriends' comedy "Too Many Women" (the only sound film to be featured). 1920's silent comedy plays over footage, as Mickey and Mary look through a photo album, which shows bits and pieces from the clips that are to be seen in the film, as well as the opening titles. The titles, as well as the theatrical trailer, promote the heck out of the many 'guest stars' appearing in the compilation, including Laurel and Hardy, Harold Lloyd, Will Rogers, Charley Chase, and Jimmy Finlayson. They're barely featured.
Interestingly, clips from "Our Gang", "Your Own Back Yard", "Bring Home the Turkey", "Edison, Marconi, & Co.", "School Begins", "The Old Wallop", and an obscure "Sunshine Sammy" film titled "The Little ******" (seriously, that's the title. The narrator even pronounces the asterisks), among others, are featured. It's known that Youngson had a habit of getting rid of the film negatives he had after grabbing the clips he wanted. Too bad.
Youngson was at least able to identify some of the non-Our Gang series. But some of the lesser-known ones ("McDougall Alley Kids" and "Hey Fellas!") are misidentified as Our Gang.
Farina is frequently referred to as a girl. Andy Samuel and Jack Davis are both misidentified as Johnny Downs, while Johnny is misidentified as Eddie Bracken. Pineapple is called "Buckwheat", while Mary Ann Jackson is called "Bubbles" (her Smith Family character name).
The narrator claims that "over 400 Our Gang films were produced between 1918 and 1940".
The film ends on perhaps the worst choice for a finale - the Gang throwing firecrackers at Farina and Mango in "The Glorious Fourth".
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