Pineapple Jackson at Hollywood ‘80
Tuesday, July 31st, 2007
As an adult, he was featured as an extra in numerous of my favorite TV series: Sanford and Son, Newhart, and Picket Fences, for example. As a child, he starred as Isaiah in the Academy Award winning 1931 feature Cimarron. But, most importantly, Eugene Jackson starred in six of the silent Our Gang films in 1924-25. As the third major black actor in the series, he was brought in to play the big brother to “Farina” after “Sunshine Sammy” Morrison had graduated from the series. He was christened as “Pineapple” because of his afro which seemed to stand on end, resembling the tropical fruit. Read the rest of this entry »
I have always had a love/hate relationship with alligators. They are so ugly and scary that I name them as my biggest fear. This may have stemmed from a dream I had a child that I was descending on an escalator in a giant deparment store into an alligator-filled swamp at the bottom, while Nancy Sinatra’s The City Never Sleeps at Night blasted throughout the building. Yes, as disturbed as I was/am, I still choose to face my fears and check out alligators and crocodiles whenever I get a chance. 
It’s always a distinct pleasure to meet a newly-discovered indentifiable performer from the Our Gang series. Although admittedly only playing a minor role in the Little Rascals, Hugh Chapman is my latest example this. He appeared in three of the Hal Roach one-reelers in 1937: The Pigskin Palooka, Glove Taps, and Mail and Female. He subsequently made a return to the Our Gang in 1939 after the series had been sold to M-G-M, appearing in Time Out for Lessons and Clown Princes. 
While the day’s earlier events are now relatively lost from memory, I can distinctly and vividly recall most of the evening’s activities on Thursday June 29, 1995. The afternoon doubtlessly consisted of Laurel and Hardy location scouting and cemetery haunting. But this was the night that the Los Angeles Conservancy presented a screening of the Alfred Hitchcock masterpiece Vertigo in the majestic State Theatre. I arrived grossly under-dressed and Bob and I prepared to pounce on one of the evening’s special guests while we waited in line to gain entrance to the theater. 
This is a continuation of the memoir I wrote shortly after my October 2005 Hollywood trip, which began