Born Today November 7: Joe Cobb

 

 1916-2002

 

One of the original Our Gang actors, Joe Cobb was also one of the most memorable of the "gangsters." Joe Frank Cobb was born on this day in Shawnee, Oklahoma.  Almost all of his appearances in Hal Roach films came in the 1920's.  He first auditioned for Roach and company in 1921 when he was just five years of age and was cast immediately. His first film for them was The Champeen, filmed in 1922 and released in January of 1923.  All but six of his nearly 100 acting credits came between the beginning of 1923 through the end of 1929; in the vast majority of them, he was credited simply as "Joe."  His first appearance in a film with sound (sound effects & music...in other words a partial silent) came in the film entitled, appropriately enough, Noisy Noises, and released in February of 1929. His first full sound picture, or talkie, Our Gang short was equally appropriately titled Small Talk and was released in May of 1929. He appeared in six more Hal Roach films that year, three of which were full or partial silents, including his last film of the decade, the 20 minute long Saturday's Lesson (November 1929). By this time, Joe had turned 13--officially a teenager, he was aging out of the Hal Roach world. He did appear in three Little Rascals films in the 1930's: Fish Hooky in 1933 was the first. The other two, Pay As You Exit (1936) and Reunion in Rhythm (1937), he had much smaller roles and in the last one, his role was simply as "Fat Kid." He only had three more film acting roles in his young career and his in his first feature length film--A Yank at Oxford--his role as "Boy with Drum"--went uncredited. His last two acting roles came in 1941. The Arthur Lubin musical Where Did You Get That Girl? was his first--and only--feature credit as "Tubby."  His role in the Frank McDonald musical Tuxedo Junction--his last professional film role--also went uncredited. When he quit acting, his adult career was gained during World War II as an aircraft assembler at the North American Aviation in Downey, California. He continued to work there after the war for the remainder of his working life, retiring at the age of 65 in 1981. In 1986 he appeared in the documentary Classic Comedy Teams, which was hosted by Steve Allen. Cobb passed away at the age of 85 on the 21st of May in 2002 in Santa Ana, California. He is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale. 

[Source: AJM (Find A Grave)]

 

 

[Source: AJM (Find A Grave)]

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Born Today October 13: Johnny Downs

 

1913-1994

Johnny Downs [John Morey Downs] was born on this day in Brooklyn, New York.  One of the few (close to) original Our Gang members to go on to have a regular career in the film/television industry, he got his start as a child actor in films when his parents relocated the family to San Diego, California in the early 1920's.  For what ever reason, Downs' mother took him up to Hollywood to audition for the Hal Roach studios (responsible for the Our Gang series).  He was reportedly put in a Hal Roach production--The Champeen--in 1923 to see what he could do as a child actor with other children playing scripted roles; he was later cast in 1925 as Johnny as a bona-fide gang member. His first actual film credit came in Circus Fever, released in February of 1925. The entire cast of kids was credited simply under "Hal Roach's Rascals."  At the beginning of his child acting days he also appeared a couple of Jack White short comedies, including one--Red Pepper--with Al St. John in 1925.  He appeared in over 20 Hal Roach films as "Johnny" or "Johnnie" in the years 1925 thru 1927, including one with Oliver Hardy and Charly Chase:  Thundering Fleas. In 1927, now 14 years old (an "old man" in the Little Rascals world), Downs began to branch out into other films parts. He had a small peripheral role in the Tom Mix film Outlaws of Red River, and had a small and uncredited, but important, part in Jesse James (1927) as James as a child, to western star Fred Thomson's grown James. Also in 1927, he appeared in his last Hal Roach production, Chicken Feed, released in November. In 1928 he got a couple of uncredited appearances in "extra child" parts, before getting another named credit in the Dolores del Rio gold rush western The Trail of '98 as John Downs. It was the first film that he worked in a film released with sound effects (the wide release, was of course, all silent). It was also his last film appearance of the decade.  He next appeared on film in 1931 in a Warner's Vitagraph short The High School Hoofer at the age of 18. He was in a number of shorts and small parts in the early 1930's, but it would not be until 1935 before he was another feature in a credit and that was tiny appearance, which occurred in the King Vidor's Civil War melodrama So Red the Rose (Downs had made an appearance in the Vidor silent The Crowd in 1928 as a child actor). In the meantime, he had gone to college and was active in theater while in school. After his return to full time film acting, he had quite a successful career and as young adult actor in the 1930's and 1940's. He also spent time sporadically on the stage throughout the rest of his acting career. He made his television debut in the music variety show that ran only a few episodes "Girl About Town" (also know as "Around the Town") in 1948 as himself.  His appearances on television for the next few years would be on the same type of programing. He made his acting debut on the small screen in the crime drama Racket Squad in 1951. He only took a few more credited acting roles both on television and in film after this before semi-retirement in 1953. His last professional appearance in a film came in an uncredited role/cameo in the Bob Hope musical Here Come the Girls released in October of '53. He then retired to Coronado, California (near his home town of San Diego) with his family, where he would reside for the remainder of his life. He settled into the real estate business and became a local amateur tennis celeb there, but he wound up (kind of by accident) hosting a local "kids show" there on a local channel starting in 1961. It would eventually be called "The Johnny Downs Show" and more a "hosting" kind of affair, with him providing content in between showings of old Little Rascals reruns and eventually cartoons--mostly Popeye. Downs would play characters, but he was bascially appearing as himself--something that he had been doing since an appearance in a documentary short on the Our Gang in 1925 in Twinkle Twinkle.  This is of course "spooktober" and Downs was in at least one b-grade film, The Mad Doctor, in 1942 with the likes of Glenn Strange (who played Frankenstein's Monster several times, including in a couple of Universal films including Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in 1948) and everyone's favorite b-movie mad scientist George Zucco!  As a member of Our Gang, he also appeared in Shivering Spooks in 1926, but that is more of a "ghost gag" short that has the gang also stumbling on a scam fake seance. Downs was also a avid, if not completely talented, dancer. As mentioned above, Downs stayed in Coronado and died there on the 6th of June at the age of 80.  He is buried at the Holy Cross Cemetery in San Diego along with his long time wife. 

 

 [source: Lot Lzrd (Find A Grave)]

[source: Lot Lzrd (Find A Grave)]

 

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Born Today September 17: Donnie 'Beezer' Smith

 

 

Born: 1924

 

Lesser known "Our Gang" actor Donnie "Beezer" Smith was born Donald R. Smith on this day in Kern County, California.  Donnie got into acting due to being the younger brother of "gangster" Jay R. Smith who was almost ten years his senior. "Beezer's" first film with the gang came in 1928 the in one of the last silent Rascals films: Fair and Muddy when he was just 4 years old. In total Smith was in a total of four Little Rascal films, one of them--Boxing Gloves--with full sound.  His last Our Gang film was the partial silent Cat, Dog & Co.  in 1929. 

 

 

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Born Today September 15: Jackie Cooper (Not So Silent Edition)

1922-2011

Well known actor of the large and small screen, Jackie Cooper, born John, was a child actor and a member of the Our Gang cast in the late 1920's. He was born on this day in Los Angeles. While he actually made his film debut as a small boy in an tiny film appearances when he was as young as three--appearing with his grandmother--and he apparently appeared in short comedies under the name of "Leonard," there is scant information at this time on this part of his life. We do know that he appeared in the Fox Movietone Follies of 1929 in an uncredited part; his actual proper debut came that same year in the all talking Our Gang short Boxing Gloves in the role of "Jackie," which is how he got the nickname that stayed with him for life.  Cooper appeared in three more late 20's Little Rascals shorts in 1929: Bouncing Babies (where he went uncredited again), Moan & Groan, Inc. (where he is again playing Jackie) and Sunny Side Up (again, uncredited).  Over the next couple of years he appeared in multiple Little Rascals films, including a couple of Spanish language productions. His first credit outside the franchise came pretty early though. He is credited as Jackie Cooper in the role of Skippy Skinner, taking top billing in Norman Taurog's 1931 family comedy Skippy (he reprised the role later that year in Sooky). Cooper wound up being one of the most prolific child film actors to date. All of this was due to his family involvement in the business. His uncle (mother's brother) was a screenwriter and his maternal aunt was actress Julie Leonard who was the first wife of Taurog (himself a a former child actor), making him Jackie's uncle at the time Skippy was made [Taurog actually won the Oscar for Best Director for the film, making him the youngest director to do so]. After his father abandoned the family when he was 2 years of age, his mother--a theatrical musician--married a studio man, a production manager. So young John/Jackie was surrounded by movie workers in his immediate family completely. Given those circumstances, and owed to his very real acting talent, it is no surprise that he would go on to have a very long, varied and successful career. In just the early years of the 1930's alone he appeared in films with the likes of Wallace Beery (whom Cooper as good reason not to like), Oscar Apfel, Irene Rich, Lewis Stone, Lionel Barrymore and Richard Dix.  By the time he was 18, he was already occupying adult roles and in 1940 appeared along side Henry Fonda and Gene Tierney in The Return of Frank James.  Cooper took time off to serve in the Navy during World War II, and he served in the Naval Reserves until 1982, retiring with a rank of Captain.  His first post war role came in the 1947 comedy Stork Bites Man.  Cooper made his television debut just two years later in an episode The Chevrolet Tele-Theatre (Jinxed)--an anthology series which aired live (talk about pressure!).  This would be the beginning of a career on the small screen that would last over 40 years.  In the decades that followed he would appear some of the most successful series of their times; including (but, of course, not limited to!):  Danger, Studio One in Hollywood (the 1950's) The Twilight Zone, The Dick Powell Theater (the 1960's); Hawaii Five-O, Ironside, Columbo, Kojak, The Rockford Files (the 1970's); St. Elsewhere and Murder, She Wrote (the 1980's).  He also had the lead in  Hennesey as Lt. Charles "Chick" Hennesey--a Navy physician (a role, so obviously close to his heart).  The series ran for three seasons between 1959 and 1962 for 95 episodes.  Cooper was introduced to a whole new generation of young movie goers as the character Perry White, who appeared in all four Superman films starring Christopher Reeve (between 1978 and 1987).  His last film role came in the comedy Surrender starring Sally Field and Michael Caine in 1987. His last acting role(s) came in two episodes of the short lived series Capital News in 1990.  Cooper retired from acting and devoted the rest of his life to training racing horses (he was also an avid auto-racer). He passed away at the age of 88 in Santa Monica on the 3rd of May in 2011. For his life-long naval service, he was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia.  

 

 

[retrieved from Pinterest]

[source: Anne W (Find A Grave)]

 

 

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Born Today September 15: Fay Wray

1907-2004

No introductions needed here!  Every horror fan knows her as the original "scream queen"--mostly for her turn in King Kong 1933, but she was plenty "screamy" in other films she made around this time as well.  My personal favorite of these is The Mystery Of The Wax Museum starring Lionel Atwill, directed by the great Michael Curtiz, also made in 1933, and up until the late 1960's was considered to be a lost film.  So much is made of her appearances and noise in early talking horror films, that not much attention is paid to her silent career.  Born Vina Fay Wray in Cardston, Alberta, Canada; the family soon relocated to Los Angeles here in the US.  She began as an extra when she was barely into her teens, and was one of the few child actors that seemed to weather the transition to adult actor better than most.  Far from being a silent horror star, she was in a number of short slapsticks early on.  If she can be said to have specialized in any genre in the 1920 it was westerns ironically.  She passed away at the age of 96 on the 8 of August 2004, in New York City.  She is another very famous celebrity interred in the famous Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

Her Early Film Work:

Gasoline Love (1923) (short)

Sweet Daddy (1924) (short)

Just A Good Guy (1924) (short)

The Coast Patrol (1925) (the first feature length film she was in.)

Sure-Mike! (1925) (short slapstick)

What Price Goofy? (1925) (short)

Isn't Life Terrible? (1925) (short with Charley Chase & Oliver Hardy)

Thundering Landlords (1925) (short, first featured credit in title cards)

Chasing The Chaser (1925) (short)

Madame Sans Jane (1925) (short written by Hal Roach)

No Father To Guide Him (1925) (short)

Unfriendly Enemies (1925) (short)

Your Own Back Yard (1925) (an Our Gang short)

A Lover's Oath (1925) (partially lost film)

Moonlight And Noses (1925) (partial lost short)

Ben-Hur (1925) (her slave girl appearance in this is still unconfirmed)

WAMPAS Baby Stars Of 1926 (the fist time she is credited with "self")

Our Wild Time (1926) (short)

Don Key (Son Of Burro) 1(926) (short)

The Man In The Saddle (1926)

Don't Shoot (1926)

The Wild Horse Stampede (1926)

The Saddle Tramp (1926)

The Snow Cowpuncher (1926) (short, part of the Mustang Western series)

Lazy Lightning (1926)

Loco Luck (1927) (A Blue Streak Western)

A One Man Game (1927) (A Blue Streak Western)

Spurs And Saddles (1927) (A Blue Streak Western)

A Trip Through The Paramount Studio (1927) (as Herself)

The Legion Of The Condemned (1928) (lost film)

Street Of Sin (1928) (lost film)

The Fist Kiss (1928)

The Wedding March (1928) (an Erich von Stroheim directed film)

The Honeymoon (1928) (another Stroheim film)

The Four Feathers (1929) (early talkie, William Powell and Noah Berry were in this, dialog by Western Electric, soundtrack and sound effects by MovieTone)

Thunderbolt (1929) (two versions circulated, one silent the other in mono, with sound by Western Electric)

Pointed Heels (1929) (early musical, sound by MovieTone, early two strip technicolor, with some parts in black and white)

Born Today September 12: Dickie Moore (RIP!)

1925-2015

This is a sad one for me!!  Mr. Moore only passed away this past Monday in Wilton, Conn. and the age of 89; and today would have been his 90th birthday (crying a bit while writing this).  I would have loved nothing more than to wish him a very happy 90th! Though reports of cause of death have been dementia, so I'm not sure it would have been so happy.  Born John Richard Moore, Jr. exactly 90 years ago today in Los Angeles, he like, Wally Albright (also born in 1925) was an early credited child actor and also a member of the Our Gang Little Rascals.  His first acting credit came in 1927 when he was not just two years of age.  Past his teens, he has only one (that I can find) moving picture acting credit in his twenties and then he quit acting, though his pursuits in life where not far from the theatrical world.  He even appeared on Broadway before his acting retirement.  He served in WWII and wrote for stars and stripes, a skill that would become helpful later in life when he found transitioning from child actor to adult acting basically unbearable (something that so many child actors can attest to--just ask Macaulay Culkin).  He became a active in the actors union in the New York area and founded a successful public relations firm called Dick Moore and Associates to represent actors.  It is still in business and it was their president that announced his death this week.  He became known as an inside man in the entertainment biz and (I'm jealous) reportedly had his own booth at famed New York restaurant Sardis.  He is also known for writing an important book on child actors of his era entitled Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (But Don't Have Sex or Take The Car) published in 1984, in which he recounted his own difficulties as a child actor at the time and interviewed several contemporary child actors for the book, one of the most memorable reportedly with Shirley Temple (as a point of trivia, Temple received her first on screen kiss form Moore).  He also interviewed actress   Jane Powell, herself born in 1929, for the book; it was their first meeting, but not their last.  The two were married in 1988 and she is now his widow.  Condolences go out to his family--he had one son, who has children--associates and friends.  It is also with great sadness that I report and that another Our Gang star Jean Darling passed away Friday week ago--Sept. 4, at the ripe old age of 93 in Germany.  Condolences to her friends and family as well.  May the both be at peace. [Added note here, Internet Movie Database has his date of death wrong, for anyone looking up the movies from links here.  Hopefully it will be corrected.]

Moore and Powell--Happy Couple

His Silent Era Work:

The Beloved Rogue (1927) (a John Barrymore film)

Object: Alimony (1928) (Roscoe Karns starred in this)

Blue Skies (1929) (partial silent, soundtrack and sound effects by MovieTone)

Madame X (1929) (early talkie, sound by Western Electric.  Lionel Barrymore directed)

Born Today September 3: Wally Albright

Wally Albright 1925-1999

Born Walton Algernon Albright, he was a child actor in the late silent era and was a member of the Our Gang cast, more popularly known later on as "The Little Rascals," where he was billed as "Wally Albright."  He appeared in 6 Little Rascals. He was one of the very first well recognized child actors of the end of the silent era.  He also worked as a child/teen actor in various talking roles, right up through the 1940's.  His last two acting credits are from the 1950's as an adult.  He was sometimes billed as Wally Albright Jr.  He is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, CA.

He served in World War II and later in life went on to found a very successful trucking company.  He was also a well known water sportsman .

Silents And Early Talkies

Going Ga-Ga  1929 (this is a partially lost film--exists in fragments only)

The Case Of Lena Smith 1929 (exists in one fragment only)

Scandal  1929 (partial talkie)

Thunder 1929 (early talkie Western Electric) [Lost Film]

Wonder Of Women 1929 (partial talkie)

The Single Standard 1929 (this Garbo partial talkie, was one of the first films to feature it's own composed soundtrack, written especially for the silent parts of the movie.)

His "Our Gang" credits date from 1934

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