Like many child actors, and especially child actors from the 30's to the 60's the Our Gang children were subsequently typecast and had trouble outgrowing their Our Gang images. The characters of Alfalfa, Spanky, Buckwheat, Darla, and Froggy were especially well known. The some of the more memorable characters in the cast of the Little Rascals consisted of: "Spanky", played by George McFarland from 1932 to 1942 "Buckwheat", played by Billie Thomas from 1934 to 1944 "Alfalfa", played by Carl Switzer from 1935 to 1940 "Darla", played by Darla Hood from 1935 to 1941 "Stymie", played by Matthew Beard from 1930 to 1935 "Porky", played by Eugene Lee from 1935 to 1939 "Waldo", played by Darwood Kaye from 1937 to 1940 "Mickey", played by Robert Blake from 1939 to 1944 "Froggy", played by Billy Laughlin from 1940 to 1944 The characters in this series became well-known cultural icons, and could often be identified solely by their first names. In the mid-1950s, the 80 Roach-produced shorts with sound were syndicated for television under the title The Little Rascals, as MGM owned the rights to the Our Gang trademark. A total of 220 shorts and one feature film, titled General Spanky, were eventually produced, featuring over forty-one child actors. Production continued at the Roach studio until the series was sold in 1938 to MGM, who continued producing the comedies until 1944. Roach changed distributors from Pathé to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, otherwise known as MGM, in 1927, and by 1929 had converted the series to sound. Our Gang, the trademark name of MGM before Roach studios titled it the Little Rascals, first production was at the Roach studio was in 1922 as a silent short subject series. Producer Hal Roach broke new ground in the filming industry by putting boys and girls, black and whites all in equal roles, something that was unheard of in the 1920's and 1930's. He was just 38-years-old.The Little Rascals was a series of comedy shorts films about a group of poor neighborhood children and the adventures they had together. He was found dead on May 10 th 1968 and a note and pills were found nearby. In 1962, he even tried suicide after going on a heavy drinking spree.īeckett checked into a nursing home on after receiving a vicious beating – the circumstances around this are cloudy. He had several run-ins with the law for drunk-driving, drug possession and passing fraudulent checks. Following his acting career, he tried his hand at real estate but things never really worked and that’s when the problems started. His career scored a big break in 1954 when he was cast as the comic sidekick ‘Winky” of the popular TV show Rocky Jones, Space Ranger. He also attended the University of Southern California but dropped out because it was too difficult to juggle an acting career and classes. After he left the show, he got regular child acting gigs and even found consistent work as a young adult. He played the best friend of another show favorite named George “Spanky” McFarland. He appeared in the Little Rascals series from 1934-35. Scotty Beckett was born in Oakland, California in 1929.
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