Shirley Temple Thesis

Lisa Wadman
Dance
Summer Semester
Shirley Temple
Shirley Temple was the greatest child star who ever lived, but the work her movies accomplished
was mostly for the benefit of adults. That’s true in the economic sense, of course: from 1935 to
1938, when she was between the ages of seven and ten, Temple was the biggest box-office draw
in Hollywood, and it was her popularity that pushed Fox Studios into the black. In 1935, when
Fox merged with Twentieth Century, Temple was the guest of honor at a grand banquet to
celebrate the deal, and one of the other guests picked her up. A horrified silence fell on the room
as the combined bankers, business executives, producers and moneylenders realized that the
gentleman was holding all the assets of the

company in his two hands, yes she was that big of a
deal!! Fortunately for everyone, he didn’t drop her.
One of Shirley’s very memorable performances was with Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, the first
black man to appear onscreen with a white child in the movie called “The Little Colonel,” in
which the staircase dance became one of the most iconic scenes in American movie history.
They were the first interracial couple to dance onscreen. But their partnership was more than just
a movie milestone. He was in his 50s. She was 6. He called her darlin'; she called him Uncle
Billy. Robinson taught Shirley his joyful, elegant tap-dancing routines. She thought he was the
perfect partner. The pint-size movie star was tapping up a storm with a giant of the art form. But

on- and off-screen, they were far from equal. At the time, Shirley didn’t know of racism or
discrimination, one memory in particular she carried in her mind till her death was, Once when
they were both in Palm Springs working on a movie, she stayed in a private cottage; he stayed in
a room above a drugstore. When she asked him why he was staying there, he told her not to fret,
that his chauffeur was staying there too.
Despite all that separated them, she considered Robinson a real friend, she never felt that he
talked down to her, or made her feel like she was a “little girl,” they were equals.
Shirley and her iconic screen presence were a tribute to an America that believed in innocence,
even during a dark era when millions of Americans were out of work and desperate to find a path
back to normalcy. Temple’s screen presence, a cherubic, delightful, utterly charming persona,
was a balm for those in the audience who needed a respite from the daily terrors of insolvency
and loss of faith in their future. More than anything, Temple represented the wide-eyed
innocence that America once believed was the natural province of childhood.
All of that has changed now. Our children can no longer turn on the TV without seeing rampant
sexual activity paraded in front of them; without being instructed in their schools about sexual
issues that once were assumed to be more appropriately discussed by adults; society is highly
preoccupied with sexual matters and uses them to vilify those who believe in innocence, and runs
rapid with its obsession for speaking on matters once considered private.

The loss of innocence of our children is a national disgrace; the yielding of values that protected
their innocence is cause for mourning. We are dealing with a culture that is hell-bent on
destroying any semblance of the traditional American reverence for protecting the innocent.

The death of Shirley Temple at the age of 85 left many fans and movie buffs alike saddened.
Shirley was the icon of exactly how joyful a childhood can be without the burdens of matters that
more properly belonged to adults, people should see this as a wake-up call for those of us who
still believe in the innocence of children and a clarion call to action to take our culture back from
those who seek to steal that innocence away.
Thank you, Shirley, for giving us images that we can use to remember what innocence was and
inspire us to fight to restore it.
SOURCES:
www.shirleytemple.com

www.cnn.com/2014/02/11/.../hollywood-shirley-temple-death
www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/.../The-Little-Colonel
WWW.black-face.com/Bill-Bojangles-Robinson.htm