Shirley Temple

Shirley Temple
in Glad Rags to Riches (1932)
Born	Shirley Jane Temple April 23, 1928 (1928-04-23) (age 81) Santa Monica, California, U.S.
Other name(s)	Shirley Temple Black
Occupation	Actress, dancer, singer, diplomat
Years active	1931 – 1961 (performer) 1967 – present (politics)
Spouse(s)	John Agar (1945 – 1950, divorce) Charles Alden Black (1950 – 2005, his death)
Official website

Shirley Jane Temple (born April 23, 1928), known for most of her adult life by her married name, Shirley Temple Black, is an actress, singer, and tap dancer, who is best known for being an iconic American child actress of the 1930s. After her film achievements she began a notable career as a diplomat.

Temple rose to fame at the age of six in Bright Eyes in 1934, and subsequently starred in a series of films which won her positive critical acclaim and saw her become the top grossing star at the American box-office during the height of the Great Depression. In later life she became a politician and a diplomat representing the United States, including appointments as U.S. Ambassador to Ghana and to Czechoslovakia, but she is currently retired from public life.^[1]

In 1935, Shirley Temple received a special miniature Academy Award Oscar "in grateful recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment during the year 1934." She also received Kennedy Center Honors in 1998, and was presented with a Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award in 2006.

Personal life

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Temple was born in Santa Monica, California to George Francis Temple (1888–1980), a businessman and banker, and Gertrude Amelia Krieger (1893–1977) a retired dancer. She had two brothers, Jack (1915-1985) and George Jr. (1919-1996). Her mother loved dancing, and directed Temple toward performing. Gertrude was a constant presence on the lot during Temple's childhood acting years, helping her learn her lines and controlling her wardrobe. She modeled the "Shirley Temple Curls" off another actress known for her little girl roles, Mary Pickford,^[2] and Gertrude ensured that there were exactly 56 ringlets in her hair for each take ^[3]. Temple remade several of Pickford's silent films including Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.^[4] Temple would later sign with Pickford's company United Artists. Pickford thought highly of Temple, asking her to portray herself in a biopic about Mary and her mother, Charlotte Hennessy in 1940. Temple declined and the film was never made.^[5]

At the age of 17, Temple married soldier-turned-actor John Agar (1921–2002) on September 19, 1945. They had daughter (Linda) Susan Agar (sometimes known as Susan Black or Susan Falaschi) on January 30, 1948; she is now a librarian at Woodside Priory School. Temple filed for divorce in late 1949, with the divorce becoming final on December 5, 1950.

In early 1950, while vacationing in Hawaii, Temple met California businessman Charles Alden Black (1919–2005). They married on December 16 that year. Together, they had two children: Charles Alden Black Jr. (born April 29, 1952) and Lori Black (born April 9, 1954). They remained married until Charles's death from myelodysplastic syndrome, a bone marrow disease, on August 4, 2005; he was 86. Temple has one granddaughter, Teresa Falaschi Caltabiano (born 1980), who is Susan's daughter,^[6][7] and two great-granddaughters, Lily Jane (born 2007) and Emma Anne (born 2009) Caltabiano.^{[8][not in citation given]}

Movie career

Early films

At the age of three, Temple began dance classes at Meglin's Dance School in Los Angeles, California. Her film career began when Charles Lamont, a casting director from Educational Pictures, visited her class. Although Temple hid behind a piano in the studio, she was chosen by Lamont, invited to audition, and eventually signed to a contract with Educational.^{[citation needed]}

Temple worked at Educational from 1931 to 1934,^[9], appearing in two series of short subjects for the studio. Her first series, Baby Burlesks, satirized recent motion pictures and politics. Temple would dress up in a diaper, but would otherwise wear adult clothes. Because of its depiction of young children in adult situations the series was considered controversial. Her second series at Educational, Frolics of Youth, was a bit more acceptable, and cast her as a bratty younger sister in a contemporary suburban family.

While working for Educational Pictures, Temple performed many walk-on and bit player roles in various films at other studios. She was reported to have auditioned for a lead role in Hal Roach's Our Gang comedies (later known as The Little Rascals) in the early 1930s, although various reasons are given for her not having been cast in the part. Roach stated that Temple and her mother were unable to make it through the red tape of the audition process, while Our Gang producer/director Robert F. McGowan recalls the studio wanted to cast Temple, but they refused to give in to Temple's mother's demands that Temple receive special star billing. Temple, in her autobiography Child Star, denies auditioning for Our Gang at all.^[10]

In Temple's earliest major studio films, she danced and was able to handle complex tap choreography. She was teamed with dancer Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in The Little Colonel, The Littlest Rebel, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, and Just Around the Corner. Robinson coached and developed her choreography for many of her other films. Because Robinson was African American, the scenes of him holding hands with Temple were cut in many cities in the South^{[citation needed]}, as a consequence of the segregationism common at the time.

Temple made pictures with Cary Grant, John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Ronald Reagan, Gary Cooper, Randolph Scott, Robert Young, Carole Lombard, Jimmy Durante, Joel McCrea, Claire Trevor, Claudette Colbert, Myrna Loy, Joseph Cotten, Robert Walker, Victor McLaglen, James Dunn, Buddy Ebsen, Adolphe Menjou, Lionel Barrymore, and many others. Arthur Treacher appeared as a kindly butler in several of Temple's films.

20th Century Fox

After appearing in Stand Up and Cheer! with James Dunn, Temple was signed to Fox Film Corporation (which later merged with 20th Century Pictures to become 20th Century Fox) in late 1933. Later, she was paired with Dunn in several films, notably her breakthrough film Bright Eyes, produced by Sol M. Wurtzel. This was the film that saved Fox from near bankruptcy in 1934 at the height of the Great Depression. It was in Bright Eyes that Temple first performed the song that would become one of her trademarks, "On the Good Ship Lollipop". This was closely followed by the film Curly Top, in which she first sang another trademarked song, "Animal Crackers in My Soup". It was during this period, in the depth of the Great Depression, when her films were seen as bringing hope and optimism, that President Franklin D. Roosevelt is reported to have proclaimed that "as long as our country has Shirley Temple, we will be all right."^[11]

In 16 of the 20 films Temple made for Fox, she played characters with at least one dead parent. This was part of the formula for her films, which encouraged the adults in the audience to take on the role of her parent.^[3]

Temple became Fox's most lucrative player. Her contract was amended several times between 1933 and 1935, and she was loaned to Paramount for a pair of successful films in 1934. For four years, she was the top-grossing box-office star in America. Temple's birth certificate was altered to prolong her babyhood; her birth year was advanced from 1928 to 1929. She did not find out her real age until she was 13 years old.^[12]

Temple's films were not always seen in a positive light. The novelist Graham Greene wrote in a review for the magazine Night and Day of her appearance in Wee Willie Winkie:

Her admirers - middle-aged men and clergymen - respond to her dubious coquetry, to the sight of her well-shaped and desirable little body, packed with enormous vitality, only because the safety curtain of story and dialogue drops between their intelligence and their desire.^[13]

Temple, via her studio, was the successful plaintiff in a 1938 British libel case against Greene's review. The huge fine imposed by the judge was enough to cripple and close the magazine.^[13]

In 1940, Temple left Fox. Working steadily, she juggled classes at Westlake School for Girls with films for various other studios, including MGM and Paramount. Her first on screen kiss was in Miss Annie Rooney (1942). Her most successful pictures of the time included Since You Went Away with Claudette Colbert, The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer with Cary Grant, and Fort Apache with John Wayne. Temple retired from making motion pictures in 1949.^[14]

Film career highlights

Temple with the Prime Minister of Canada William Lyon Mackenzie King (October 21, 1944)

Temple was the first recipient of the special Juvenile Performer Academy Award in 1935 for recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment in 1934. Six-year-old Temple was the youngest performer ever to receive this special award, an honor she held until 1974 when Tatum O'Neal, age 10, became the youngest actress ever to win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, in Paper Moon.^[15] Temple is also the youngest actress to add foot and hand prints to the forecourt at Grauman's Chinese Theatre.

Although the role of Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz was originally meant for Judy Garland, MGM executives were concerned with Garland's box office appeal. Temple was considered for the role, although she was unable to appear in the film when a trade between Fox and MGM fell through. However, Terry, who played Temple's beloved dog Rags in Bright Eyes, was cast in The Wizard of Oz as Toto. In 1940, Temple starred in The Blue Bird, another fairy story with plot similarities to The Wizard of Oz. It was her first box-office flop. Temple was also rumored to be the inspiration for Bonnie Blue Butler in Gone with the Wind and was one of the early contenders for the role in the motion picture, but was too old by the time the film went into production.

Temple appeared in her first Technicolor film, The Little Princess, produced by Fox in 1939, near the end of her contract with them.

Merchandising and endorsements

There were many Temple-based products manufactured and released during the 1930s. Ideal Toys' Temple dolls, first made in 1934, dressed in costumes from the movies, were top sellers.^[16] Original Shirley Temple dolls bring in hundreds of dollars on the secondary market today.

Other successful Temple items included a line of girls' dresses, hair bows, bracelets and handkerchiefs. A popular breakfast set, consisting of a mug, pitcher and cereal bowl in cobalt blue and featuring a decal of Temple, was given away as a premium with Wheaties and Bisquick.^[16] Aside from commercial endoresement, Temple also frequently lent her likeness and talent to promoting various social causes, including the Red Cross.

Several of Temple's film songs, including "On the Good Ship Lollipop" (from Bright Eyes), "Animal Crackers in My Soup" (from Curly Top) and "Goodnight My Love" (from Stowaway) were popular radio hits.

Return to show business

Temple returned to show business with the television series Shirley Temple's Storybook, which premiered on NBC on January 12, 1958, and last aired December 1, 1959. Shirley Temple Theatre (also known as The Shirley Temple Show) premiered on NBC on September 11, 1960, and ran until September 10, 1961. Both shows featured adaptations of fairy tales and other family-oriented stories. For both series, Shirley Temple was the hostess and occasional narrator/actress.

In later years, Temple made occasional appearances on television talk shows, especially when she was promoting her memoirs.

Political, business and diplomatic career

Temple (left) as the U.S. Ambassador to Czechoslovakia (October 25, 1990)

Contrary to a rumor, Temple was never blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) as a Communist supporter, despite a sensationalistic news headline from August 22, 1938 which proclaimed that she was assisting the Communists. In testimony before HUAC headed by Martin Dies, Jr., James B. Matthews claimed that sixty senators and members of the United States House of Representatives and six film stars had unwittingly served to spread Communist propaganda. In March 1938, Temple's signature had been included in an anniversary telegram greeting sent by the Twentieth Century Fox publicity department to Ce Soir, a Paris daily newspaper that Matthews claimed was owned outright by the French Communist Party. At the conclusion of the Washington hearings, the committee published int its report in the Congressional Record that "... Shirley Temple ... unwittingly served the purposes of the Communist Party ... The above testimony has never been denied by the screen star mentioned." Years later, the Los Angeles Times observed: "Shirley Temple was ten years old at the time. Since then she has become quite respectable."^[17]

As a political public figure, Temple exclusively used her married name of Shirley Temple Black. She is associated with the Republican Party in the U.S. state of California, where, in 1967, she ran unsuccessfully for the United States House of Representatives against retired Korean War veteran Pete McCloskey, on a platform supporting America's involvement in the Vietnam War.^{[citation needed]}

Black was in Prague, Czechoslovakia, on August 21, 1968, when the Prague Spring was ended by an invasion executed by the Warsaw Pact. A convoy of vehicles was assembled for hundreds of Westerners to leave Prague and Black was in the first car of the convoy to the Czech border, apparently facilitating escape of the Westerners by taking advantage of the name recognition.

Black went on to hold several diplomatic posts, serving as the U.S. delegate to many international conferences and summits. She was appointed a delegate to the United Nations by President Richard M. Nixon in 1969, and was later appointed U.S. Ambassador to Ghana (1974–76). She became the first female Chief of Protocol of the United States in 1976, which put her in charge of all State Department ceremonies, visits, gifts to foreign leaders and co-ordination of protocol issues with all U.S. embassies and consulates. She was in office from 1 July 1976 until 21 January 1977.^[18] In 1987, she was designated the first Honorary Foreign Service Officer in U.S. history by then U.S. Secretary of State, George Shultz.^{[citation needed]}

The peak of Black's diplomatic career came when she was United States Ambassador to Czechoslovakia from 1989 to 1992, and witnessed the Velvet Revolution. She commented about her Ambassadorship, "That was the best job I ever had."

Black served on the board of directors of some large enterprises including The Walt Disney Company (1974–75), Del Monte, Bancal Tri-State, and Fireman's Fund Insurance. Her non-profit board appointments included the Institute for International Studies at Stanford University, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Council of American Ambassadors, the World Affairs Council, the United States Commission for UNESCO, the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, the United Nations Association, and the U.S. Citizen's Space TaskForce.^{[citation needed]}

Shirley Temple Black received honorary doctorates from Santa Clara University and Lehigh University, a Fellowship from College of Notre Dame, and a Chubb Fellowship from Yale University. She now lives in Woodside, California.^{[citation needed]}

Breast cancer

Shirley Temple Black is often remembered as the first celebrity to publicly discuss her affliction with this form of cancer. In an interview published on the web page of the American Cancer Society, actress Barbara Barrie is quoted as saying:

Shirley Temple Black was the first person who said, on national television, 'I have breast cancer.' It wasn't Betty Ford, it was Shirley Temple, child star. One of the greatest stars of the world ever. And, she was so brave to say that, because first of all, people never said "cancer" and they never said "breast", not in public. She said it and she set the whole ball rolling. People don't remember that, but she did it.^[19]

Black appeared on the cover of People magazine in 1999 with the title "Picture Perfect" and again later that year as part of their special report, "Surviving Breast Cancer". She appeared at the 70th Academy Awards and also in that same year received Kennedy Center Honors.

Recent activity

In 1999, Shirley Temple Black hosted the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars awards show on CBS, a special list from the American Film Institute and part of the AFI 100 Years... series. She was also ranked #18 in the list.

In 2001, she served as a consultant on the ABC-TV production of Child Star: The Shirley Temple Story, based on the first part of her autobiography, while in 2004, she teamed with Legend Films to restore, colorize and release her earliest black and white films, as well as episodes of her 1960 television series The Shirley Temple Storybook Collection, which was originally shot on color videotape.

On September 12, 2005, Screen Actors Guild president Melissa Gilbert announced that Black would receive the Guild's most prestigious honor, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.^[20] Gilbert said:

I can think of no one more deserving of this year's SAG Life Achievement Award than Shirley Temple Black. Her contributions to the entertainment industry are without precedent; her contributions to the world are nothing short of inspirational. She has lived the most remarkable life, as the brilliant performer the world came to know when she was just a child, to the dedicated public servant who has served her country both at home and abroad for 30 years. In everything she has done and accomplished, Shirley Temple Black has demonstrated uncommon grace, talent and determination, not to mention compassion and courage. As a child, I was thrilled to dance and sing to her films and more recently as Guild president I have been proud to work alongside her, as her friend and colleague, in service to our union. She has been an indelible influence on my life. She was my idol when I was a girl and remains my idol today.^[21]

In April 2008, Black broke her arm just before her 80th birthday, in a fall at her suburban San Mateo County home in Woodside.^[22]

Awards and honors

• 1935 - Academy Award - Juvenile Award, "In grateful recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment during the year 1934."
• 1992 - National Board of Review - Career Achievement Award
• 1998 - Kennedy Center Honors
• 2006 - Screen Actors Guild - Life Achievement Award
• unknown - Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, at 1500 Vine Street
• unknown - American Center of Films for Children - Life Achievement Award

Legacy

Shirley Temple will long be remembered for the characters she played, for her dimpled disposition, and for lifting the spirits of people burdened by the Great Depression of the 20th century. She has been celebrated, modeled and parodied time after time in popular culture. She is one of the celebrities featured on the cover of The Beatles' 1967 album Sgt. Pepper. In television there were two episodes of the Madeline animated series that featured a child star named Sugar Dimples, a thinly-veiled reference to the actress. She was parodied in two episodes of The Simpsons, the first time in "Treehouse of Horror III". There was a brief cameo of her singing "On the Good Ship Lollipop" before being eaten by a parody of another 1930s icon, King Kong. The second episode, "Last Tap Dance in Springfield" features a former child star turned dance instructor, "Little Vicky Valentine", along with with several references to Temple's films and songs.

In films, the 1997 movie Tower of Terror featured "Sally Shine", a 1939 child movie star who is killed in an elevator along with four others. Modeling Shirley Temple with her curly blonde mop, sweet demeanor, and short, flouncy dress, Sally even sported her own doll modeled after her. That same year the animated film Cats Don't Dance featured a character named "Darla Dimple", who was an amalgam of precocious child stars of the Golden Age of Hollywood.

Los Angeles' Fox Studios has erected a life-size bronze statue of Shirley Temple. It was permanently installed at the Fox lot on September 11, 2002, where it welcomes children and their families to the Shirley Temple Day Care Centre. The citation on the dedication plaque reads simply "Inspiring children of all ages - Shirley Temple".^[23][24] In 1990 a biography titled Shirley Temple Scrapbook paid homage to the child actress. "This film offers tribute to Temple's joyful spirit, remarkable talent, and enduring legacy."^[25]

See also

• Salvador Dalí's painting Shirley Temple, The Youngest, Most Sacred Monster of the Cinema in Her Time
• Martin Dies, Jr., section: Shirley Temple and Hollywood

References

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External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Shirley Temple

Wikinews has related news: Many SAG Awards presenters announced

• "Official site" (Legend Films memorabilia and merchandise site authorized by Shirley Temple Black)
• Shirley Temple at the Internet Movie Database
• Shirley Temple at the TCM Movie Database
• ShirleyTempleFans.com
• Female Frontiers QuestChat Archive: Shirley Temple and biography
• Shirley Temple movies for free download
• Shirley Temple Theatre
• Shirley Temple's Storybook
• Photographs of Shirley Temple