Wild Poses

Infobox Film
name = Wild Poses


image_size =
caption =
director = Robert F. McGowan
producer = F. Richard Jones
Hal Roach
writer = Carl Harbaugh
Hal Roach
H. M. Walker
Hal Yates
starring = George McFarland
Matthew Beard
Jerry Tucker
Tommy Bond
Emerson Treacy
Gay Seabrook
Franklin Pangborn
Stan Laurel
Oliver Hardy
music = Marvin Hatley & Leroy Shield
cinematography = Francis Corby
editing = William H. Terhune
distributor = Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
released = October 28, 1933
runtime = 20 minutes
country = USA
language = English
preceded_by = "Bedtime Worries"
followed_by = "Hi'-Neighbor!"
amg_id = 1:225669
imdb_id = 0024775

"Wild Poses" is two-reel (twenty minute) short subject in the "Our Gang" (a.k.a. "The Little Rascals") series.

It was produced and directed by Robert F. McGowan for Hal Roach Studios and first released on October 28, 1933 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. cite web |url=http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/225669/Wild-Poses/overview |title=New York Times: Wild Poses |accessdate=2008-09-19|work=NY Times] It was the 125th "Our Gang" short that was released.

A sequel to the previous "Our Gang" short, "Bedtime Worries," "Wild Poses" features a brief cameo by Laurel & Hardy.

Plot

The short features comedian Franklin Pangborn as Otto Phocus, a haughty photographer who attempts to take some family portraits of the uncooperative Treacy family. Just outside the photographer's studio, Spanky is told by his friends (among them Matthew "Stymie" Beard and Tommy Bond), that Phocus plans to "shoot" him; thinking the camera is a cannon. This leads Spanky to avoid having his picture taken, and his habit of punching Phocus in the face with regularity.

Phocus serves as Spanky's foil in other ways as well. He tries to get Spanky to pose with an exaggerated sweet smile on his face; when Spanky sees Phocus' ridiculous grimace he turns to his Dad and says, "Hey Pop, do you see what I see?" Later, when Spanky's friends have filled the rubber shutter bulb with water, and Phocus squeezes it, squirting Spanky's Dad with water, his Mom tells Spanky, "That's how they take watercolor pictures."

Cast

* George McFarland - Spanky
* Matthew Beard - Stymie
* Georgie Billings - Darby
* Tommy Bond - Tommy
* Jerry Tucker
* Pete the Pup - Petie
* Oliver Hardy - Baby
* Stan Laurel - Baby
* Franklin Pangborn - Otto Phocus, the portrait photographer
* Gay Seabrook - Gay, Spanky's mother
* George Stevens Jr. - Role unknown (scenes deleted)
* Emerson Treacy - Emerson, Spanky's father

Laurel and Hardy cameo

At the beginning of the film, a salesman is seen soliciting Otto Phocus' services throughout a residential neighborhood. At one home, he tells a housewife that she has "two of the most photogenic children" he has ever seen. The camera cuts to reveal the womans two children, portrayed in a brief cameo by Laurel and Hardy, dressed in baby clothes and using giant sets from their 1930 short "Brats". Laurel and Hardy briefly fight over a baby bottle, until Laurel eye-pokes Hardy and emerges victorious as the scene transitions to set the main plot in motion.

ee also

* Our Gang filmography

References