Shirley Temple, the Youngest, Most Sacred Monster of the Cinema in Her Time (Salvador Dalí, 1939).
See also, Graham Greene on Shirley Temple - via David Ehrenstein here.
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Happy 80th Birthday, Shirley Temple!
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4 comments:
Is that the face that launched a thousand Good Ship Lollipops?
Stupid, stupid, stupid. 20 lashes for that one.
wow, thanks for that link, C. Jerry. An old girlfriend used to make me buy her Shirley Temple tapes and I loved them, clandestinely. Now that the gf's long gone--and took the Temples with her--I feel like it would be "suspect" of me to revisit them on my own. Thanks to Graham Greene, I now know why that is.
In 1961, my father took work at Stanford as Professor. We all moved to a fine university provided house on Seal Avenue. Palo Alto is an upscale suburb half -way between San Fransico and San Jose. Across the street from our rather large ranch style house which boasted of three large redwoods, there stood a much larger corner property with high hedges built in the California missionary timber and wattle style.
I remember being quite lonely and sad the first weeks there on Seal Avenue,as I missed my home in New Jersey and my gang of ten year olds there. On the third or forth Monday, however, things got better as I was walked across the street by Dad and handed over to some housemaid.
I remember then following reluctantly thru what seemed a long way around the house to the back lot garden where a party with balloons, cakes, and free candies was in progress. I was led up to (eg practically dragged along) and presented to an aged crone dressed in black, who despite her age, seemed rather friendly and jolly. She asked me did I like "cookies" and "California". I told her that I liked New Jersey and missed my home there. She laughed while introducing me around to some other kids. There must have been thirty or forty, all from the neighborhood, and soon to become my mates.
I went to her weekly party many times. I recall she had a funny name (at least to a child) : Mrs Black or sometimes Mrs X. I was told she had been an important person once but that now she was now just a nice lady who wanted to remain annoymous. I did not know then what that meant.
Of course, she was Shirley Temple (Black).
I was 18 or so before I recall seeing her on TV. She was probably about 35 when I attended her parties.. In the movies, I liked her in her youngest efforts but not as she matured...
I believe her last performance was as the less than sizzling love interest of the two Lt's in Ford's FORT APACHE.
She later also graduated from being a hostess for kids to becoming a political hostess -- at one time in the seventies or so she was appointed goodwill ambassador to some West African country like Gabon or Ghana. Unfortunately, the Africans were not pleased, by having a "Shirley Temple" in charge of their strategic affairs with the United States and are said to have treated her badly. Too bad, she deserved better.
Check out this youtube channel dedicated to Shirley Temple:
http://www.youtube.com/user/sarahluvsshirley
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