Our Gang

This is the very first Our Gang comedy...and it's appropriately entitled "Our Gang". However, only a portion of the original film exists today and Turner Classic Movies showed this four and a half minute segment from a short that was probably originally 20 minutes more or less. Because of this, you cannot give the film a numerical score.

What you have are a variety of story elements but where they go and what it's all about, I have no idea. But it is anyone's guess where it all goes--there's the rich prissy kid who takes the girl, there are the ragamuffin gang members and some plot involving working at Mary Jane's mother's store. I did love the way the kids arranged the package delivery--using their mule. You just have to see it to believe it. Additionally, it was nice to see 'Sunshine Sammy' Morrison (Ernest Morrison) playing an important part of the film--as the Our Gang comedies were incredibly progressive for their time by having black and white kids playing together as equals.

Our Gang was the first installment produced in the long-running shorts series... to confuse things it was the third film released. Hal Road and director Fed Newmeyer shot the 2-reeler around Los Angeles in the late Spring of 1922 and previewed it in several theaters around town. Based on his belief in the concept rather than the lukewarm public reception, Roach green-lighted the series but scrapped most or all of the original footage and brought Robert McGowan in to rework it, officially releasing Our Gang on Nov. 5, 1922 (One Terrible Day was the first film to be released, followed by Fire Fighters). Sadly, Our Gang is considered a lost film. But since film historians tend to rely on production dates Our Gang, can be called the first film and that makes it significant. After all, how many film series can claim to have survive through the advent of sound across 21 years, innumerable cast changes, 2 distributors, a studio change, through 221 installments (including a feature--- not to mention that thing in the 90's)? No doubt about it: Our Gang (or The Little Rascals, if you prefer) had legs.

Most modern audiences have never seen any of the 88 silents (the transition to sound began with crude synchronized sound effects during the 1928 season, but complete conversion to talkies wouldn't occur until the following year).

Significant events: 1922: series begins as a 2-reeler (roughly 22 minutes) and distributed through the Pathe Exchange, a pioneering French film company with offices in New York City (it ironically, financed and distributed Roach's primary competitor Mack Sennett). 1922-1926: Although boasting many likable kids (Johnny Downs, "Farina" Hoskins, Joe Cobb, Jackie Condon, etc.). Mickey Daniels becomes the un-official star of the series. His departure in 1926 leaves a series void that wouldn't be filled until the arrival of Jackie Cooper in 1929's Boxing Gloves. 1927: Roach ends his association with the rapidly disintegrating Pathe Exchange (with The Smile Wins, short #66) and signs a distribution and financing deal with MGM. Technology note: MGM, despite being the stellar studio in the world, takes a long wait-and-see attitude regarding talkies (primarily due to the huge expense that parent Loew's Inc. faces in converting it's vast theater chain to sound. This stretches out 'Our Gang's part-talkie period, allowing uncoverted studios to run silent versions). 1928: Barnum & Ringling (#74) is released with synchronized sound effects. 1929: Small Talk (#89; released as a 3-reeler) is the first all-talking Our Gang short. 1929-31: Jackie Cooper becomes a major star and departs for features after 15 Our Gang shorts (ending with Bargain Day, #106). 1932: George "Spanky" Mcfarland debuts in Free Eats (#112). Dickie Moore appears in 8 shorts beginning with Hook and Ladder (#116) and leaves for a successful feature career. 1934: Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas debuts in For Pete's Sake (#127) and would remain with the series until the end. 1935: Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer debuts in Beginner's Luck (#135) and, over time, becomes a headache (his antics would end his series tenure at MGM). 1936: Roach bombs with General Spanky, a 71-minute feature (technically Our Gang #150). 1938: Roach sells the Our Gang unit to MGM and exits shorts production completely in favor of feature films. These MGM-produced entries are generally dismal. 1943: Series production ends with the 221st production, Tale of a Dog (Our Gang shorts are released into 1944).

Although there was no Freckles officially, many people called Mickey Daniels Freckles also Joe Cobb was called Fatty unofficially. This added to confusion of the actual characters. A number of individuals claimed to have been certain characters that did not exist such as smelly, fatso etc.

An earlier comment by suzyq19651 asked who Robert Blake played as a member of Our Gang. Robert Blake did not appear in the group of shorts commonly referred to as The Little Rascals, with such as Spanky, Alfalfa, Buckwheat, Porky and Darla. Blake appeared later on after Hal Roach sold his franchise to MGM. MGM recast the series with a group of younger children, although Spanky did appear in some of these as an older and much larger fellow. Blake was a member of this later group and played the character of Mickey Gubitosi, which was his actual birth name. This was in keeping with the Our Gang format in which most characters used their real names, though usually with a nickname such as Spanky or Butch. Froggy was also a part of this later group, which as a group simply did not measure up to prior ones.

After reading the review in Leonard Maltin and Richard Bann's 1992 "Little Rascals" book of this very first "Our Gang" film, I can only hope someone will locate and restore the film, and ultimately put it on DVD. It sounds like "Our Gang" at its best and funniest (I wonder what that surviving fragment of "Our Gang" Maltin and Bann cited was like?). For that matter, it would be nice to see some of these early silents, period, since some of them were the "blueprints" for the more commonly seen (sound) episodes. I wonder what kind of "show" the kids and their pets put on to win the widow's much-needed business? Maybe a makeshift circus?....