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Shirley Temple
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Shirley Jane Temple (born April 23, 1928) is an Academy Award-winning actress and tap dancer, most famous for being an iconic American child actress of the 1930s, who enjoyed a notable career as a diplomat as an adult. After rising to an amazing burst of fame at the age of six with her breakthrough performance in Bright Eyes in 1934, she starred in a series of highly successful films which won her widespread public adulation and saw her become the top grossing star at the American box-office during the height of the Great Depression.
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Encyclopedia
Shirley Jane Temple (born April 23, 1928) is an Academy Award-winning actress and tap dancer, most famous for being an iconic American child actress of the 1930s, who enjoyed a notable career as a diplomat as an adult. After rising to an amazing burst of fame at the age of six with her breakthrough performance in Bright Eyes in 1934, she starred in a series of highly successful films which won her widespread public adulation 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 United States ambassador and diplomat.
Personal life
Temple was born in Santa Monica, California to George Francis Temple (1888–1980), a businessman and banker, and Gertrude Amelia Krieger (1893–1977). She had two brothers, Jack (1915-1985) and George Jr. (1919-1996). Her mother loved dancing, which 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 famous "Shirley Temple Curls" off another famous actress known for her little girl roles, Mary Pickford.
The curls were also under the control of Alex, who ensured that there were exactly 56 ringlets in her hair for each take . Temple remade several of Pickford's silent films including Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. Temple would later sign with Pickford's company United Artist. 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.
At the age of 17, Temple was married to 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 and fell in love with 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 , and one great-granddaughter, Lily Jane Caltabiano (born 2007).
Movie career
Early films
Temple's popularity earned her both public adulation and the approval of peers. At the age of five, the hallmark of her acting work was her professionalism: she always had her lines memorized and dance steps prepared when shooting began.
In Temple's earliest films, she danced and was able to handle complex tap choreography. She was teamed with famed 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, as a consequence of the segregationism common at the time. Shirley Temple once tap danced all the way down a staircase singing a line of her song on every single one of the 45 steps.
Temple made pictures with Cary Grant, John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Ronald Reagan, Gary Cooper, Randolph Scott, Robert Young, Carole Lombard, 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.
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.
Temple worked at Educational from 1931 to 1934, and appeared in two series of short subjects for the studio. Her first series, Baby Burlesks, satirized recent motion pictures and politics. In the series, 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 by some viewers. 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 role. 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.
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 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."
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.
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. Shirley'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.
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.
Temple, via her studio, was the successful plaintiff in a British libel case in 1938 against Greene's review. The damages awarded were enough to close the magazine.
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 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. She retired from motion pictures in 1949.
Film career highlights
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. It was an honor she held until 1974. In 1974, Tatum O'Neal, age 10, became the youngest actress ever to win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, in Paper Moon) Shirley is also the youngest actress to add foot and hand prints to the forecourt at Grauman's Chinese Theatre.
The role of Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz was originally meant for Judy Garland. However, 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.
Product line
There were many Temple-based products manufactured and released during the 1930s. Ideal's Temple dolls, first made in 1934, dressed in costumes from the movies, were top sellers. Original Shirley Temple dolls bring in hundreds of dollars on the secondary market today. Other successful Temple items included a line of girls' dresses, hairbows, 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. 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. She frequently lent her likeness and talent to promoting various social causes, including the Red Cross.
Hollywood return
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 last aired on September 10, 1961. Both shows featured adaptations of fairy tales and other family-oriented stories. Shirley Temple was the hostess and occasional narrator/actress in both series.
In later years, Temple made occasional appearances on television talk shows, especially when she promoted her memoirs.
Political, business and diplomatic career
Temple ran unsuccessfully for Congress against retired Korean War veteran Pete McCloskey in 1967. She ran on a platform supporting America's involvement in the Vietnam War.
She 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 Shirley Temple Black was in the first car of the convoy to the Czech border, apparently facilitating escape of the Westerners by her name recognition.
Temple 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. She was appointed United States 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 United States Ambassador to Czechoslovakia (1989–92) and witnessed the Velvet Revolution. She commented, about her Ambassadorship, "That was the best job I ever had." She was designated the first Honorary Foreign Service Officer in U.S. history by then U.S. Secretary of State, George Shultz in 1987.
Temple 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.
Temple received honorary doctorates from Santa Clara University and Lehigh University, a Fellowship from College of Notre Dame, and a Chubb Fellowship from Yale University. Temple now lives in Woodside, California.
Breast cancer
Temple is often remembered as the first celebrity to publicly discuss her involvement 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."
Temple 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, Temple 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, Temple served as a consultant on the ABC Television Network production of Child Star: The Shirley Temple Story, based on part one of her autobiography.
In 2004, Temple teamed with Legend Films to restore, colorize and release her earliest black and white films, as well as episodes of her 1960 television series (originally shot on color videotape), The Shirley Temple Storybook Collection.
On September 12, 2005, Screen Actors Guild president Melissa Gilbert announced that Temple would receive the Guild's most prestigious honor, the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award . 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.
In April 2008, Shirley Temple Black broke her arm just before her 80th birthday in a fall at her suburban San Mateo County home of Woodside.
See also
External links
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