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Post by Paul F. on Apr 17, 2018 14:39:50 GMT -5
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Post by myhomeo on Apr 19, 2018 12:16:29 GMT -5
Disturbing footnote: If I understand correctly, Jackie's crying scene at the end was the source of the infamous story where the director essentially terrorized the poor kid into breaking down into tears by making him think he'd shot Petie. Jackie insisted this really happened and it made such an impression he titled his autobiography PLEASE DON'T SHOOT MY DOG.
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Post by mtw12055 on Apr 19, 2018 12:33:30 GMT -5
Disturbing footnote: If I understand correctly, Jackie's crying scene at the end was the source of the infamous story where the director essentially terrorized the poor kid into breaking down into tears by making him think he'd shot Petie. Jackie insisted this really happened and it made such an impression he titled his autobiography PLEASE DON'T SHOOT MY DOG. That was later on when he was doing Skippy at Paramount. Jackie's uncle, Noramn Taurog, was directing. On the other hand, during Teacher's Pet, Jackie's grandmother leaned over him so that nobody could see what she was doing. She smacked him around a bit, pinched his legs, and told him to get the scene right. |
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Post by myhomeo on Apr 19, 2018 13:21:42 GMT -5
Oh, thank God. My enjoyment of the short had been ruined for YEARS...
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Post by Buppster on Apr 19, 2018 15:17:33 GMT -5
That was later on when he was doing Skippy at Paramount. Jackie's uncle, Norman Taurog, was directing. On the other hand, during Teacher's Pet, Jackie's grandmother leaned over him so that nobody could see what she was doing. She smacked him around a bit, pinched his legs, and told him to get the scene right. That pretty much agrees with what I've read about the two incidents, that basically his grandmother slapped him and pinched his legs to make him cry. Perhaps Harry Spear had a perfectly good reason for disliking his time in movies. After seeing photos of Harry's grandmother I certainly wouldn't have wanted a slap off her. From what I read in Junior Coghlan's autobiography Norman Taurog was known for mistreating the actors who worked in his movies. I never liked Teacher's Pet much anyway. |
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Post by mtw12055 on Apr 19, 2018 16:05:18 GMT -5
That was later on when he was doing Skippy at Paramount. Jackie's uncle, Norman Taurog, was directing. On the other hand, during Teacher's Pet, Jackie's grandmother leaned over him so that nobody could see what she was doing. She smacked him around a bit, pinched his legs, and told him to get the scene right. That pretty much agrees with what I've read about the two incidents, that basically his grandmother slapped him and pinched his legs to make him cry. Perhaps Harry Spear had a perfectly good reason for disliking his time in movies. After seeing photos of Harry's grandmother I certainly wouldn't have wanted a slap off her. From what I read in Junior Coghlan's autobiography Norman Taurog was known for mistreating the actors who worked in his movies. I never liked Teacher's Pet much anyway. Taurog didn't direct "Teacher's Pet." Bob McGowan did. By most accounts McGowan was a good guy. The kids trusted him. But some have admitted he liked to show favoritism. |
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Post by Buppster on Apr 19, 2018 16:26:51 GMT -5
I know that Norman Taurog didn't direct Teachers Pet. He did direct Jackie Cooper in Skippy though, as you indicated in your post, and I was simply mentioning what Junior Coghlan had indicated about his not altogether pleasant directorial style. That's why I then put a full stop before I mentioned not liking Teachers Pet much, which was simply an after thought and a response to what myhomeo had written. I probably should have placed it in a separate paragraph.
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Post by mtw12055 on Apr 19, 2018 19:41:16 GMT -5
I know that Norman Taurog didn't direct Teachers Pet. He did direct Jackie Cooper in Skippy though, as you indicated in your post, and I was simply mentioning what Junior Coghlan had indicated about his not altogether pleasant directorial style. That's why I then put a full stop before I mentioned not liking Teachers Pet much, which was simply an after thought and a response to what myhomeo had written. I probably should have placed it in a separate paragraph. Ah, got it! I've heard similar things about Taurog, though from Cooper. It seems Cooper ran into a handful of toughies during his career as a kid actor - Taurog, Wallace Beery, his grandmother... glad he was able to make friends with others in the business, though. |
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Post by Buppster on Apr 20, 2018 5:23:37 GMT -5
Junior Coghlan was certainly not endeared to Norman Taurog's directing style at all, which is in marked contrast to the experiences of Coy Watson at Sennett studios, where he said that in order to get him to cry on camera they had a violinist on set playing sad tunes, nobody pinched him, nobody slapped him and nobody threaten to shoot his dog. Things were very different back then, with probably very little in the way of child protection laws. Kids were simply supposed to obey adults and seeming to cry on demand, when required to do so, 'in a natural way.' 
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Post by myhomeo on Apr 20, 2018 12:14:25 GMT -5
As I understand it, the main problem was that some directors didn't understand or believe kids had the mental acumen to understand how to act. So instead of explaining what was going on in the scene in a way the kids could understand, they tried to manipulate them into showing the proper reaction.
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Post by myhomeo on Apr 20, 2018 12:23:34 GMT -5
Also, I suspect most, if not all, child actors and former child actors have a couple of stories in that vein.
Bill Mumy, LOST IN SPACE's original Will Robinson, largely enjoyed his time as a child actor but had an anecdote about being directed by Alfred Hitchcock himself in an episode of the old TV series 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents.' I can't do justice to Mumy's telling, but essentially he claimed when he was being a little squirmy and not quite hitting his mark Hitchcock leaned down and whispered in his ear, "Little boy, if you don't stop moving about, I will get a nail and I will NAIL YOUR FOOT TO THE FLOOR and the blood will fill your shoe and pour out LIKE MILK, so DON'T MOVE."
Then there are the folks like Patty Duke and Jay North, who were reportedly seriously abused.
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Post by Buppster on Apr 21, 2018 4:40:09 GMT -5
I think it was just certain directors. From what I've read Norman Taurog behaved like a tyrannical ar5ehole towards adult actors as well as kids. In contrast other directors treated kids as well as they treated their adults actors and they got good results from them. However due to the differences in values and behaviour almost a century ago I'd imagine that children were far less likely to be treated with kid gloves as they are these days. A director nowadays would be scared to sneeze while in the same room as a child actor, for fear of finding himself facing a lawsuit.
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