General Spanky

General Spanky is a 1936 American comedy film produced by Hal Roach. A spin-off of Roach's popular Our Gang short subjects, the film stars George McFarland, Phillips Holmes, Rosina Lawrence, Billie Thomas and Carl Switzer. Directed by Fred Newmeyer and Gordon Douglas, it was originally released to theaters on December 11, 1936, by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).

Contents

• General spanky feature clip
• Dollars and sense by general spanky offical music video
• Plot
• Principal cast
• Additional cast
• Awards
• References

This film, a Civil War period piece, was intended as an experiment to determine if Roach could move Our Gang into features, as the double feature and block booking were slowly smothering his short subjects production. The film was a box-office disappointment and, after another year of shorts production, Roach ended up selling the Our Gang unit to MGM in May 1938.

When Roach bought the rights to the back catalog of Our Gang films he had produced from MGM in 1949, he did not buy back the rights to General Spanky. The film was part of the MGM catalog acquired in 1986 by Turner Entertainment, which holds the rights today as a subsidiary of Warner Bros. General Spanky was released on VHS and laserdisc in the early 1990s. In 2016 it was released on DVD in Region 1 by Warner Bros. via their Warner Archive Collection.

Plot

Spanky (George McFarland), Alfalfa (Carl Switzer), Buckwheat (Billie Thomas) and others form an army called "The Royal Protection of Women and Children Regiment Club of the World and Mississippi River". The group sees unexpected action when Union troops approach, engaging in battles more farcical than fierce. Using clowning tactics instead of military tactics, the kids stop the advance . . . and later save an adult friend from the firing squad.

Principal cast

Spanky McFarland as Spanfield George 'Spanky' Leonard

Phillips Holmes as Marshall "Marsh" Valient

Ralph Morgan as Yankee General

Irving Pichel as Capt. Simmons, The Gambler

Rosina Lawrence as Louella Blanchard

Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas as Buckwheat

Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer as Alfalfa

Hobart Bosworth as Col. Blanchard

Robert Middlemass as Overseer

James Burtis as Boat Captain

Louise Beavers as Cornelia

William Best as Henry, the lazy slave

Additional cast

Harold Switzer as Harold

Jerry Tucker as Jerry

Flayette Roberts as Flayette--Gang kid in Army

John Collum as Our Gang member

Rex Downing as Our Gang member

Dickie De Nuet as Our Gang member

Ernie Alexander as Friend of Marshall

Hooper Atchley as Slavemaster

Harry Bernard as Man on the boat

Jack Daugherty as General's Aid

Walter Gregory as Capt. Haden

Karl Hackett as First mate

Henry Hall as Slavemaster

Ham Kinsey as Man with paint on shoes

Frank LaRue as Slavemaster

Richard R. Neil as Col. Parrish

Buddy Roosevelt as Lt. Johnson

Jeffrey Sayre as Friend of Marshall

Carl Voss as Second Lieutenant

Jack Cooper as Bit role

Alex Finlayson as Bit role

Jack Hill as Bit role

Portia Lanning as Bit role

Harry Strang as Bit role

Slim Whittaker as Bit role

Von the Dog as Von

Awards

The film was nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Sound (Elmer A. Raguse).