Jean Darling, silent movie Our Gang member, has died

examiner.com ^ | september 6, 2015 | james l. neibaur

[lowbridge]

Jean Darling, one of the last surviving members of the silent movie Our Gang comedies, has died. Her death was reported on Sunday September 6 on social media sites by her friends. She had turned 93 years old only two weeks earlier. Our Gang were also called Hal Roach's Rascals. The series was known as The Little Rascals on television. In its long history, from the 1920s into the 1940s, the Our Gang roster changed a lot, with some notable members including Jackie Cooper, Farina Hoskins, Stymie Beard, Spanky McFarland, Darla Hood, and Alfalfa Switzer.

Jean Darling joined Our Gang in 1927 when she was only 5 years old. Jean was the pretty girl, often getting the attention of the boys, and causing rivalries among them. Along with appearing in seveal silent Our Gang comedies, Jean also acted a handful of the early talkies.

One of Jean's most noted silent Our Gang comedies was "Crazy House" where she played a lonesome rich girl who was stuck in her mansion and not allowed to play with the "common" children in the neighborhood. When the parents and servants are away, Jean invites several of the kids into her house, which her father has rigged with April Fool gags for a party later that evening. Great visual gags and a heartfelt performance by Jean Darling make "Crazy House" one of the best Gang comedies of the silent era. Another of Jean's best films was the early talkie "Boxing Gloves" (1929) when she played the object of affection for rival boys Fat Joe Cobb and Norman "Chubby" Chaney, who end up fighting in a boxing ring over her. Since this is such an early talkie, it is part sound and part silent, giving the movie some historical significance as well.

[ozzymandus]

+1. Miss Crabtree was a looker.

[RegulatorCountry]

There was another one of those old shows that they ran late on Saturday mornings that was funny, in hindsight it likely inspired The Beverly Hillbillies. “Ma & Pa Kettle.”

[BeadCounter]

Vaguely remember her; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_Marlowe

[windcliff]

ping

[GreenHornet]

Here’s little known fact for ya, Sammy: George “Spanky” McFarland made a cameo appearance on one of the last episodes of “Cheers” shortly before his death.

[greene66]

I knew that Darling was still around, and basically even out-lived virtually all of the younger, talkie-era Our Gang members. Not many connections left to the old Hal Roach studio. They produced some top-notch 2-reel comedies in the 1920s and 1930s... Laurel and Hardy, Charley Chase, Thelma Todd and ZaSu Pitts. A lot of the humor tended to be more ‘situational’ than slapstick (like Mack Sennett), although there was still an ample amount of the latter. Hal Roach himself lived a long life. I nearly got to see him at a film festival one time, but he wasn’t feeling up to it, and cancelled out.

The early-talkie Our Gang shorts really capture that semi-rural americana vibe that was still hanging over from the pre-Roaring 20s time. Something you’re more apt to find in 1910s/early-1920s film fare. And that nice, lilting soundtrack that was so reflective of West Coast dance-bands of the time. Quite differenct from the harder-edged East Coast sound.

Roach sold the rights to Our Gang over to MGM around 1938, and the subsequent 1938-44 shorts (with Froggy and Robert Blake) are total crap.

[lowbridge]

Already have known that fact for the longest time. Saw that episode when it originally aired way back when in 93 :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPB8f6pJgjw

[W.Lee]

YUM YUM...EAT “EM UP!!!!

[lowbridge]

“I can’t place her, though I only saw the Our Gang/Little Rascals shorts a time or two as a kid.”

Here she is charming chubby and joe in boxing gloves:

http://vimeo.com/4019176

“My favorite was “Spooky Hooky”, where the guys skip school only to find out the entire class got taken on a field trip to the amusement park. Pretty funny stuff.”

You got the title mixed up.

The one where they play hooky when the rest of the class goes to the amusement park is Fish Hooky.

Spooky Hooky is the one where spanky and alfalfa decide to pretend to be sick so that they could go to the circus. To that end they concoct a phony note to be placed on the teachers desk only to learn that the teacher is taking the class to see the circus. Now alfalfa, spanky, porky, and buckwheat have to retrieve the phony note before the teacher sees it. But the school is closed and locked up. So they have to break in on a rainy night to try to get their note back.

[BeadCounter]

This all may be so, I think I only saw mainly the newer shorts though, had an idea of the earlier ones.

[BerryDingle]

“Ma & Pa Kettle.”

Do you remember Henry Aldrich or Francis the Talking Mule?

[lowbridge]

“When did it become”Spanky”? And where is Darla and Alfalfa?”

Jean Darling was a little rascal from 1927-1929. This was years before spanky, alfalfa, and darla joined up. The entire our gang/little rascals series got its start in 1922 and ran up until 1944.

[RegulatorCountry]

Francis The Talking Mule, yes. Henry Aldrich doesn’t ring any bells.

[lowbridge]

“There was a WC Fields episode with a woman in a dentist chair that was the most hilarious slapstick comedy I’ve ever seen.”

That wasnt a little rascals short, but here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvQRYd8xUYU

[greene66]

I love the “Henry Aldrich” films (c. 1941-44), starring James Lydon... who is still alive, by the way. I’ve always found them vastly more amusing than the concurrent “Andy Hardy” series that MGM was making, with Mickey Rooney.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Little Rascals - Spooky Hooky 1936 in Color!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPdcFhvaECE

Crazy House
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UII4553UITo

The Haunted House
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndJRORZ4SHM

[BerryDingle]

Yes! I don't remember any particular episodes, but I certainly do remember the leader where his mother would call out Henry! Henry Aldrich! and he would answer coming mother!

[greene66]

One thing I liked about the “Henry Aldrich” films is how they usually incorporated a bit of suspense in with the humor. One film (perhaps “Henry Aldrich, Editor”) involved a firebug on the loose, with Henry somehow being accused of being the arsonist and having to clear his name. “Henry Aldrich Haunts a House” also had some nice old-time juvenile thrills. Plus, the films, in their own way, capture a bit of that 1940s wartime-era ‘teen’ culture, which generally didn’t get captured in too many films.

It’s a shame they don’t really circulate at all anymore. The last actual time I encountered them on tv was on an independent channel back in 1986, which aired them in their late-night movie slots. Eventually I got some bootleg videotapes of most of them, even the initial two films with Jackie Cooper as Henry, which weren’t part of the official film series.

[CARTOUCHE]

Yes, yes, “Yum, Yum, Eat ‘Em Up was the funniest bit I think I have ever seen and I still recall vividly the cannibal and the fear of death on the gang’s faces. OMG, my lost and innocent childhood. What memories.

[BerryDingle]

The last actual time I encountered them on tv was on an independent channel back in 1986, which aired them in their late-night movie slots.

I recently signed up for a TV channel that shows westerns and western movies 24 hours a day. The best seven dollars and fifty cents a month I've ever spent. My wife and I laugh at the Kim Darby singers singing "Wyatt Earp" and are fascinated watching Ronald Reagan on Death Valley Days.