Q: Rosina, please tell us what it was like, working with Darla Hood in the OUR GANG series?
Rosina Lawrence: Darla was a doll, a perfect little angel. She was a sweet child...not only in the OUR GANG comedies, but she was my daughter when we were making Charlie Chase comedies. It's wonderful to see her again.
Q: Darla, would you tell us please, how you were chosen for "Our Gang"?
Darla Hood: Oh, yes, I was born in a little town in Oklahoma, Meedy, Oklahoma. I'm an only child and my mother, I think, taught me how to sing and dance before I could walk and talk. But she wasn't happy enough with that, she wanted me to be trained. So, when I was 3, she used to drive me 150 miles, once a week, to Oklahoma City, to take dancing lessons. At one point in my training, my dancing teacher was going to New York to get some ideas for her choreography students, and she asked my mother if I could go along. She thought it would be a good experience for me. I hate to admit it, but I was only 3 years old, and I don't remember a thing about the whole trip! But when we got there, we stayed at the Edison Hotel, and somehow my teacher prodded the bandleader to let me get up, and dance with the band. Joe Rinkin, who was the casting director at Hal Roach Studios had been on a nation wide search for a little girl for the "Our Gang" comedies. So, they screen tested me in New York, and I was rushed to Hollywood to sign a 7 year contract.
Q: Darla, did Johnny Arthur, who played your father in the "Our Gang" films, act in real life, as he did in the films?
Darla: I don't know anything about him, really, only that he was "my father" on the set. So many people, because they called him "Mr. Hood," thought that he was my father. Many people would come up to me and say, "How wonderful! You and your father can play father and daughter in the movies." But outside of working with him, he was a really super man, nice with all the children, but I really know anything about his personal life.
Q: Darla, has "The He-Man Women Haters Club" been disbanded?
Darla: Well, I hope so. I've been working at it ever since the "Our Gang" comedies.
Q: About what year did the "Our Gang" comedies become popular?
Darla: I don't know if you're talking about the screen comedies or the T.V. comedies.
McCabe: That's a big question, because "Our Gang" goes back to 1922.
Darla: They started in 1922, and they went to 1943. I assume they had popularity through the years. If the question is referring to the T.V. shows, they were first released in 1951, and I wasn't really aware of their popularity until the early 60's. It has snowballed ever since then.
McCabe: Darla, what kind of boys were Spanky and Stymie? This is some handwriting, folks! I hope the writer knows of Dick Bann's book. Dick and Len Maltin wrote a magnificent book called "Our Gang." It's plenty available.
Darla: I never worked with Stymie. He was replaced by "Buckwheat" in the "Gang" I was in. I met him about 2 years ago, for the first time, when we were guests on Tom Snyder's "Tomorrow Show." Spanky was wonderful to work with. He was well behaved, and considerate, and of course, he was a real pro by the time I came in the "Gang." He was about 18 months old, or something, when he made his first "Gang." He was already, maybe, 7 years old when I came in the "Gang," so he knew the whole business. Anyhow, it was nice, me being the only girl in the school room. The boys, of course, were told to respect me, and be nice to me. But he was the one who certainly always did.
Q: Darla, what was it like working in the "Our Gang" comedies after the group left Hal Roach?
Darla: Well, it was different. When you work as long as we had at Hal Roach, it was equivalent to going to junior highschool and then starting highschool. It's very difficult to fit in, and get in the groove with all new producers and directors. The whole thing is totally different. At Hal Roach I always felt it was a more relaxed, family type atmosphere. Everybody knew everybody on the lot. I could wander in and out of Stan and Ollie's set. I could walk around any place I wanted to. I felt rather lost at M.G.M. because it was so enormous, and I didn't know anybody there, I sort of sensed the differences in the comedies too, because they seemed to become, suddenly, terribly professional. They suddenly considered the kids putting on a show, as if Busby Berkeley produced it, and it became suddenly like a small major film. I thought it lost a little bit of the quality that made the "Gang" famous originally. That's my own personal opinion. I know it was difficult for the "Gang" to adjust to new and different directors. Many of them were young directors, just getting started. They had to work with children, which is quite a task in itself for anyone.