Little Mary Ann Jackson, heroine of "Our Gang," who is appearing in person at the Indiana theater, isn't the pampered and spoiled child that people seem to expect from Hollywood. Mary Ann is just a timid, lovable, polite, smiling, freckle-faced and wiggly little girl of eight years.
The little actress' parents are with her in Kokomo, but they don't follow her around to see that she isn't abducted. Mary Ann has her own moments and picks her own amusement. Of course she has a certain amount of work to do, and she frankly admits that being carted around to amuse people isn't all fun. She longs for a chance to get out and romp with the kids and live a normal kid's life. And in Kokomo she is doing just that sort of thing.
Mary Ann didn't spend Wednesday morning (the 25th) cutting paper dolls or doing her 'rithmetic in her room at the hotel. She was out bright and early, dressed like any other youngster on a regular school day. But she didn't go to school. At ten o'clock she was playing with a flock of little kids and telling them about the Gang, in which "there were five of us, counting the dog." And the kids weren't just the crowd you'd expect a hightened young actress to play with, either. They were a group of twenty or thirty tots at the Neighborhood House, who were tickled pink to have her come and see them. Most of them had never seen a movie and didn't know what a famous girl Mary Ann is, but they liked her, because she jumped right into their games.
She's a cute little scamp. There's mischief in her eyes. She's just a happy, unsophisticated kid, much like the thousands of youngsters that make up the average Kokomo family.