Gas House Kids

Genre: Drama
Released: 1947
Directed by: Sam Newfield
Starring: David Reed, Rex Downing, Rocco Lanzo, Hope Landin
Alfalfa portrays: Sammy Levine, a neighborhood kid and member of the local "Houlihan Social Club" who tries to help out a disabled returning vet.
Alfalfa's screen time: 16:33
Lines of dialogue spoken by Alfalfa: 42

"Gas House Kids" and images © American Standard Motion Picture Classics



"Gas House Kids" opens with a shot of a busy New York City tenement street, presumably the Lower East Side (the so-called "Gas House District" was, in real life, located around East 20th Street, between 1st and 2nd Avenues near the East River. The area was so named because of the many gas tanks that dotted the area around the turn of the century.) Out of one of the tenement windows, Mrs. Levine calls down on the street for her son Sammy (Alfalfa), who reluctantly breaks away from his game of catch.


Alfalfa, as "Sammy Levine", sees what his mother wants.
Click left-hand image to enlarge.


Alfalfa [walking towards the sidewalk and looking up to the window]: Whaddya want, ma?
Mrs. Levine: I want you should go to the delicatessen, and no monkey business! [she lowers a metal pail on a rope. It contains the money for her order]
Alfalfa [reaching into the pail]: Yeah—but where's the note, ma?
Mrs. Levine: Look—eighteen years old you were last Sunday. It's time you used your brains.

Mrs. Levine then recites what she wants her son to pick up at the deli, and asks him to repeat it back to her.

Alfalfa: Uhh—for forty cents I want some herring, and for fifteen cents...uh, spuds, and for ten cents, bread.
Mrs. Levine: What is this "spuds"?
Alfalfa: Alright, potatoes.
Mrs. Levine: See, that's a nice boy. You got more brains than your father said you have!

Alfalfa shrugs and walks off to the deli.

So begins "Gas House Kids", the first of Alfalfa's "Gas House" triumvirate, and the only drama in the series. In fact, this first entry is totally unlike the other two, "Gas House Kids Go West", and "Gas House Kids In Hollywood", which were both broad slapstick-type comedies.




Above: Alfalfa greets the returning war hero, then plots with
his pals to raise some cash so the vet can buy a chicken farm
over in Jersey. Upper left image enlarges.


Despite the lighthearted opening described above, "Gas House Kids" is a melodrama about a returning disabled vet (named "Eddie") and the local gang's efforts to collect money so he can buy a chicken farm over in Jersey with his soon-to-be-bride, the sister of one of the gang. The early sequences of the film are quite nicely done, especially a scene when Eddie, a returning war hero, is helped out of the cab by his mother and his fiancee. Gathered around the cab are the local neighborhood housewives (there only seems to be housewives in this movie; no husbands are ever seen). Their expectant smiles soon turn to expressions of horror and disappointment when they realize their local boy is disabled. The camera pans slowly and silently across the line of faces as the women sneak nervous glances at one another.


Alfalfa makes like Bundini Brown and cheers on his fellow
Houlihaner Tony in a neighborhood boxing match. Left image
enlarges.

From this, probably the high point of the film, we get a standard forties-era melodrama concerning amateur boxing clubs, gangsters, neighborhood kids wrongly jailed, and kindly, elderly judges who administer benign justice at the end. Alfalfa and his cohorts spend most of the movie trying to come up with schemes to raise the dough for the chicken farm down payment. In so doing, one of them discovers a bag of loot dumped out the window by a soon-to-be murdered rent collector. Predictably, the gang gets arrested for the murder of the rent collector until Eddie —who happens to be a former beat patrolman in the neighborhood— manages to get the kids cleared and paroled to work on his chicken farm, recently purchased via a loan given from the gang to Eddie from their reward money, earned from catching the real killer.


Above left: It looks like Alfalfa (standing) and crew are
visiting someone in jail. Actually, they're the ones in jail.
Right: A relieved Alfalfa (second from right) is paroled
along with his buddies. Image at right enlarges.


Just as it began, the film ends with some light comedy. The final sequence shows the gang working cheerfully on the Eddie's chicken farm. Alfalfa is seen warily milking a cow (see below). He tastes some of the milk from his fingertips and calls out to his buddies.

Alfalfa: Hey, which one of these things gives chocolate milk?




Opening credits from "Gas House Kids". Right image enlarges.

"Gas House Kids" does not feature Tommy Bond, who would co-star with Alfalfa in the two other "Gas House" films as his buddy's nominal straight man.

Alfalfa turns in a serviceable but unremarkable performance in this one, making the most of the lukewarm material. He is probably at his best in the film in the opening sequence, receiving his mother's delicatessen order. In "Gas House Kids Go West" and "Gas House Kids In Hollywood", Alfalfa's performance will be much less restrained; in fact, "Gas House Kids" is one of the most low-key performances of Alfalfa's grownup career.

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