Darla Hood was born in a small rural Oklahoma town on Sunday, November 8th, 1931, she grew up as dark-banged cute girl, Darla Hood began her association with the motley "Our Gang" group at the tender age of 2 1/2, as she stated on the The Jack Benny Program (1950). Her father, James Claude Hood, Jr., a banker, and especially her mother, Elizabeth ...
The Bat, Hearts Are Thumps, The Bohemian Girl, Our Gang Follies of 1936, Our Gang Follies of 1938, Arbor Day, Bored of Education, Wedding Worries, Hide and Shriek, Waldo's Last Stand, Reunion in Rhythm, Three Men in a Tub, Came the Brawn, Rushin' Ballet, Glove Taps, Tiny Troubles, Pay as You Exit, B...
TV Shows
Our Gang
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Quote
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I felt I had let [my fans] down by not remaining a child. They'd be dying to meet me and yet I could see their faces fall when I walked into the room. What do you say to someone whose fantasy has just been disturbed?
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Fact
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Darla's name is mentioned in the song "Purple Stain" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
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She had a hit record in 1957, with "I Just Wanna Be Free," and in January of 1959, she released a record, Quiet Village. One-time Hal Roach talent agent, Joe Rivkin, who discovered Darla as a child, saw the cover and cast her in her first adult role in a movie. She acted as a secretary, in Vincent Price's cult horror classic movie, The Bat (1959). Vincent Price had the leading role.
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Claimed that her parents never gave her a penny of the earnings she made from the "Our Gang" shorts.
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Initially tutored on the Roach Studio lot by a Mrs. Alma Rubens, the series was later sold to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and the gang then attended the famous "little red schoolhouse" on the MGM lot.
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After she grew up, fans who requested an autographed photo seemed disappointed when they received a current shot, so she sent out newly signed photos from her "Our Gang" days instead.
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Once made a 1960 guest appearance on The Jack Benny Program (1950) in which they did a spoof on the "Our Gang" series, with Jack Benny as Alfalfa and Don Wilson as Spanky.
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Appeared as a celebrity contestant on Groucho Marx's Tell It to Groucho (1962) game show on CBS-TV in 1962. She was also the voice of the mermaid in the "Chicken Of The Sea" TV commercials. Ms. Hood made her last public appearance at the "First Bi-Annual Sons Of The Desert" convention at the O'Hare Airport Hotel (outside Chicago) from August 18 to 20, l978, and she did the voice of "Spanky's" mother on "The Little Rascals TV Cartoon Special" in l979.
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She was the most prominent of "Our Gang" and "Little Rascals" comical female children. Her tenure, with the "Little Rascals" was from 1935 to 1941. "Our Gang" shorts were in earlier years and a majority of them are silent.
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Interred at Hollywood Memorial Cemetery (now called Hollywood Forever), Hollywood, California, USA, in the Abbey of the Psalms, Sanctuary of Light, top row, halfway down the hall.
$19 Million
