General Spanky
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General Spanky | |
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Cover for VHS release of General Spanky. |
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Directed by | Fred Newmeyer Gordon Douglas |
Produced by | Hal Roach |
Written by | Richard Flournoy John Guedel Carl Harbaugh Hal Yates |
Starring | George "Spanky" McFarland Phillips Holmes Rosina Lawrence Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer |
Music by | Marvin Hatley |
Cinematography | Art Lloyd Walter Lundin |
Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
Release date(s) | December 11, 1936 |
Running time | 71 min. |
Language | English |
Allmovie profile | |
IMDb profile |
General Spanky is a 1936 motion picture produced by Hal Roach. A spin-off of Roach's popular Our Gang short subjects, the film stars George "Spanky" McFarland, Phillips Holmes, Rosina Lawrence, Billie "Buckwheat" Thomas, and Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer. Directed by Fred Newmeyer and Gordon Douglas, it was originally released to theatres on December 11, 1936 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).
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.