“Forgotten Hollywood”- Good Ship Lollipop Farewell Voyage…
Manny P. here…
Shirley Temple Black was THE top film actress of the 1930s. A darling of the screen, her mother began styling her daughter’s hair in ringlets similar to those of silent movie star Mary Pickford, which became a signature look for the tot. Many Temple-inspired products were manufactured during the 1930s. Shirley Temple dolls realized $45 million in sales before 1941.
Temple began her film career in 1932 at the age of three. She found international fame in Bright Eyes, and she received a special Academy Award on February 1935 for her outstanding contribution as a juvenile performer in motion pictures during 1934. Her signature roles included Little Miss Marker, Curly Top, The Littlest Rebel, Dimples, Heidi, Poor Little Rich Girl, Wee Willie Winkie (Temple’s personal favorite), Captain January, and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. In The Little Colonel, she performed an indelible dance routine with Bill Bojangles Robinson on a plantation staircase. With differences in race, age, and height, they were nevertheless a perfect match. Shirley also topped the popular hit parade with Animal Crackers in My Soup and On the Good Ship Lollipop
Providing inspiration to families during the Depression, Temple received praise from President Franklin D. Roosevelt for lifting the spirits of a nation during a gloomy time. She embodied the economic and inspirational power of movies, and she’s credited in helping save 20th Century Fox from bankruptcy. Later, Darryl F. Zanuck declined a substantial offer from MGM to loan their star to play Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, and he cast her instead in Susannah of the Mounties; her last money-maker for Fox. When her contract expired, MGM toyed with the notion of teaming Shirley with Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney in the Andy Hardy series.
In 1944, David O. Selznick signed Shirley Temple to a personal four year contract. She appeared in two wartime hits for him: Since You Went Away and I’ll Be Seeing You. The mogul, however, became involved with Jennifer Jones and lost interest in developing Temple’s career. She was loaned to other studios, with Fort Apache and The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer being her few good films at the time. After losing the role of Peter Pan on the Broadway stage, Temple announced her official retirement from films on December 16th, 1950. She briefly was married to actor John Agar.
In 1958, she hosted and narrated a successful NBC television anthology series of fairy tale adaptations called Shirley Temple’s Storybook. She continued to work on the small screen, making guest appearances on the Red Skelton Show and Sing Along with Mitch. In 1999, she hosted the AFI’s 100 Years… 100 Stars awards show on CBS. And, in 2001, she served as a consultant on an ABC production of her autobiography, Child Star: The Shirley Temple Story.
She entered politics, Black made an unsuccessful bid for Congress as a Republican in 1967. She was appointed as the Ambassador to Ghana, Czechoslovakia, and later, Representative to the United Nations General Assembly. She additionally served as the US Chief of Protocol. Shirley Temple excelled as a diplomat under President’s Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Bush Sr.
Throughout her life, she remained an inspiration to many Americans. She became one of the first prominent women to speak openly about breast cancer, having been diagnosed with the disease in 1972. The tumor was removed and a modified radical mastectomy was performed. Following the operation, she announced this to the world via radio, television, and a February, 1973 article for the magazine McCall’s.
Temple served on the board of directors of enterprises and organizations, such as the Walt Disney Company, Bank of America, Commission for UNESCO, Fireman’s Fund Insurance, Del Monte, and National Wildlife Federation. She was a recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors, National Board of Review Career Achievement, and Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award. On September 11th, 2002, a life-size bronze statue of the child actor was erected on the 20th Century Fox lot.
Turner Classic Movies will celebrate her life on Sunday, March 9th, starting at 1:30pm PST with eight back-to-back films. The quite remarkable Shirley Temple Black was 85.
Until next time> “never forget”
This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 12th, 2014 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog by Manny Pacheco. You can follow any comments to this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
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