Would Our Gang work nowadays?

[Buppster]

During the twenty two years that it ran Our Gang changed enormously. Silent's became Talkies, pauper children became young middle American. From wearing sweaters with holes in the elbows Spanky transformed into a swanky nightclub owner. Tommy left and returned transformed into Butch, Scotty did the same, changed his name to Wilbur and donned a pair of glasses. So even the 'original' Our Gang changed.

It changed even more when it was revamped for the 1994 feature film, featuring Bug "I've got a willy and I'm gonna pierce it" Hall as Alfalfa, but did it work? What I mean is that the feature film was presumably set in the 1990s but elements of it were borrowed directly from the 1930s, things like Alfalfa's clothing, soap box car racing and sleeping out all night in a gang hut. Did 1990s kids really do things like that? 1940s, '50s and '60s kids? Yes, without a doubt but 1990s kids? I somehow doubt it. In these child predator/murderer/abductor paranoid times and with the obsessive health and safety culture that is dominant would today's kids ever be allowed or even want to do most of the things that Our Gang did?

In short: Has the Our Gang concept still got any relevance to the kids of today? Oh sure there are no doubt still kids in the USA, UK and elsewhere who live in dire poverty like the early 1920s Gang but they are a dwindling minority. Many kids today don't even bother with TV, it's old tech as far as they are concerned. For many tech savvy kids even computers are for oldies, it's all smart phones and tablets for most, three thousand 'friends' on FacePalm but none in real life. They think that they're miniature adults at age ten but in reality they lack most of the basic freedoms that kids enjoyed in the past. camping out all night, skinny dipping, cycle rides, having simple and uncomplicated fun out of doors with other kids. Nowadays kids' lives are subject to excessive parental control, in some cases even when they've reached their twenties. We members of this forum like Our Gang but we are adults and perhaps we identify with elements from our own childhoods, that we shared with Our Gang, but much of that doesn't apply to today's kids.

So is the Our Gang concept a product of it's time, just an interesting slice of celluloid history? Or could it be adapted to a new audience? If you think that it could, how could it be adapted? I mean the curious hybrid 1930s/present day mixture of the 1994 film and it's direct to dustbin imitators are contrived and unrealistic. So how should a new Our Gang be portrayed, as a period series that's set in the time of the original version or as a present day series with characters who dress like and reflect the interests of the kids of today? Or should it stick to the 1994 concept of an alternate reality that's set in the present but in which kids dress like they live in the 1930s? These days would anyone really have a cowlick like Alfalfa? Should there even be an 'Alfalfa,' a 'Spanky' or a 'Darla'? Or are sticking with those well known characters simply shackling the whole concept too firmly to a long dead past?

[imnotallenhoskins]

Even Hal Roach failed when he tried to revive Our Gang in the late 40s and 50s. The vibe of Our Gang is firmly rooted in pre-war America. Kids just aren't like they were in Our Gang anymore and any attempt to recapture that feel just rings hollow.

[Buppster]

Mar 18, 2018 10:09:57 GMT -5 imnotallenhoskins said:

Even Hal Roach failed when he tried to revive Our Gang in the late 40s and 50s. The vibe of Our Gang is firmly rooted in pre-war America. Kids just aren't like they were in Our Gang anymore and any attempt to recapture that feel just rings hollow.

That's pretty much my view too. Any attempt to modernize Our Gang and set it in 'the present' would quickly date. Can you imagine how cringeworthy a 1980s version of Our Gang would look now, with Darla wearing a 'power suit' with shoulder pads, Buckwheat's hair cut in a flat top and his pants on backwards, Spanky in dayglo shorts and Alfalfa wearing a purple and orange Polyester shellsuit?

I think the only way to make a modern Our Gang that worked would be to make it set in it's original period, whether that's the 1920s, 1930s or god forbid the 1940s, sticking only to the original characters of that time period and not adding any unnecessary 'new' characters to the Gang. So no CGI talking dogs or empowered female ninja leaders of the gang, just a faithful remake of the original concept.

[mtw12055]

There's an indie movie that came out last year called "The Florida Project." It was partially inspired by Our Gang, and from what I've heard, does a good job at being the spirit of the series.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwQ-NH1rRT4

[Buppster]

Mar 19, 2018 23:44:45 GMT -5 mtw12055 said:

There's an indie movie that came out last year called "The Florida Project." It was partially inspired by Our Gang, and from what I've heard, does a good job at being the spirit of the series.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwQ-NH1rRT4

I've just watched the trailer and it does look interesting. It's not a remake of Our Gang, it doesn't have any of the same old tried and tested characters and nobody has a cowlick or sings out of tune. Instead, as you said, in a modern setting, with entirely different characters, it seems to be having a good stab at capturing some of the essence of that element of childhood which the early Our Gang shorts, in particular, illustrated so well.

[myhomeo]

Actually, that's one of the major differences between the originals and the remakes. The remakes are pretty much stuck trying to re-create Spanky, Alfalfa, Darla, etc. It's rather like that recent Three Stooges movie without the real Three Stooges or the Laurel and Hardy movie they made without Laurel and Hardy or the Marx Brothers movie without the Marxes.

Obviously, one of the drawbacks to this is that Spanky was George MacFarland, Alfalfa was Carl Switzer, etc. They weren't exactly playing 'themselves' but they originated the characters whom the writers shaped around them. Latter-day kids are pretty much asked to imitate them.

Of course, one could do a new 'Little Rascals' without the stock characters, but most people would find it confusing. "This is the Little Rascals? Where's Darla? Where's Miss Crabtree?"

[Buppster]

I think that you've hit the nail on the head, in the mind of the 'general public' the terms Our Gang and Little Rascals are synonymous with the characters of Alfalfa, Spanky, Buckwheat and Darla (I'm not certain that Porky is as instilled into the public consciousness). Such that I've seen DVDs containing earlier episodes of Our Gang given poor reviews on Amazon etc because they contain "some kids who aren't Alfalfa, Spanky etc." With that sort of mindset prevalent any attempt to recreate Our Gang without the most well known line up would be doomed to failure, no matter how good it was, because it simply wouldn't conform to public expectations. Perhaps the only way to make a new Our Gang would be to follow the example of some of those early imitators and create a group of kids who are based roughly on the same concept of the Gang, without being slavish copies. Call them by a different name and create some new story lines. It might work as a period piece too, a gang of kids in Depression era USA getting up to Our Gang style escapades. The basic Our Gang concept, or something similar has already been used in movies and TV series like The Double Deckers, Fatty Finn and The Boys Of Paul Street etc. But personally I think that flogging the Alfalfa, Spanky & Darla dead horses any further is a waste of time. Those kids are all well and truly dead but those roles are now forever linked to the original actors, so that anyone else who takes on those roles will always come off second best in comparison.

[RJH]

I pretty much agree with the above sentiments. There is too small an audience for Our Gang style features these days. To be true to the original a series must feature kids running around without adult supervision, and there hasn't been anything like that in a long time. Most of the activity should be outdoors, and a rural setting would be good. Not being rich, the kids have to be innovative and build things out of what they can get for free instead of routinely relying on modern technology. I guess cartoons might be the best hope, but I find most cartoons today to be rubbish. Picking one from the last twenty years, I'd go with Hey Arnold! as being closest in spirit to Our Gang, even though that was set in a city. Maybe settings in other parts of the world would work better.

[Buppster]

RJH wrote: "Maybe settings in other parts of the world would work better."


That's actually a really good point. I can easily imagine a group of poor kids in a Brazilian favela or in rural Romania getting up to Our Gang type escapades, even in a present day setting. Come to think of it not so long ago I watched a short TV series on YouTube, which came from an eastern European county, which was set in a children's convalescent home, with a group of kids getting up to things. One of the boys, who was disruptive and vindictive but still somehow likeable, reminded me strongly of Bug Hall as Alfalfa. I'll post the name of the series when it comes to mind.