Scripts were written for the shorts by the Hal Roach comedy writing staff, which included at various times Leo McCarey, Frank Capra, Walter Lantz and Frank Tashlin, among others. He worked hard to develop a style that allowed the children to be as natural as possible, downplaying the importance of the filmmaking equipment. McGowan helmed most of the Our Gang shorts until 1933, assisted by his nephew Anthony Mack.
Who played buckwheat in the original little rascals series#
The series was notable in that the gang included both African-Americans and females in leading parts at a time when discrimination against both groups was commonplace. Unlike many other motion pictures featuring children that are based in fantasy, producer/creator Hal Roach rooted Our Gang in real life: the majority of the children were poor, and the gang was often put at odds with snobbish “rich kids”, officious adults and parents, and other such adversaries. Such a thing had never been done before in cinema but was commonplace after the success of Our Gang. Our Gang also notably put boys, girls, whites and blacks together in a group as equals, something that “broke new ground,” according to film historian Leonard Maltin. McGowan worked to film the unaffected, raw nuances apparent in regular children.
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While child actors are often groomed to imitate adult acting styles, steal scenes, or deliver “cute” performances, Hal Roach and original director Robert F. The series is noted for showing children behaving in a relatively natural way. In the mid-1950s, the 80 Roach-produced shorts with sound were syndicated for television under the title The Little Rascals, as MGM retained the rights to the Our Gang trademark. A total of 220 shorts and one feature film, General Spanky, were eventually produced, featuring over forty-one child actors. MGM in turn continued producing the comedies until 1944. Roach changed distributors from Pathé to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in 1927, went to sound in 1929 and continued production until 1938, when he sold the series to MGM.
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Created by comedy producer Hal Roach, Our Gang was produced at the Roach studio starting in 1922 as a silent short subject series. Our Gang, also known as The Little Rascals or Hal Roach’s Rascals, was a series of American comedy short films about a group of poor neighborhood children and the adventures they had together. Hand color tinted photo of Alfalfa, Buckwheat, Darla & Spanky, The Little Rascals Our Gang