She is the definition of a “child prodigy” in the spectacle and especially in the cinema, as she became a star at the age of five, by the age of six she had already acted in forty films, won the Oscar at the age of seven and “retired”, as she came of age, in her first youth. Shirley Temple is a unique case of an actress, who was born in the golden age of Hollywood, immediately after the advent of sound, but mainly after the “great crash”, when the cinema gave an outlet to the suffering of millions of people. President Roosevelt said at the time: “It is wonderful that for 15 cents an American can go to the movies, look at the smiling face of a baby and forget his troubles.”

And to be precise, the smiling face of an angel, with blonde curls, who sang, danced and acted with the ease of an accomplished actress, conveying in those difficult times the message “be optimistic”, from the song of the same name. And at the same time the ultimate commercial “product” of Hollywood that exploited it beyond all limits, even torturing it, since the powerful of the big studios never respected its tender age, on the contrary, in fact, some even saw it as a sex game! A child who on the big screen gave laughter and optimism and behind the scenes got to know much of the dark side of Hollywood.

Shirley

Completing 10 years since her death (February 10, 2014), it is an opportunity to remember how she started her legendary journey in the cinema and how she managed to fill the theaters with millions of viewers, but also to detox from Hollywood.

The vain mother

Shirley Temple was born on April 23, 1928, in Santa Monica, California, the third child of housewife, but particularly vain Gertrude Temple, and banker George Temple. The family – of English, Dutch and German descent – moved to Los Angeles, where Temple’s mother encouraged her to develop her talents in singing, dancing and acting. In fact, her mother also had the idea for her hair curls. Temple was spotted at dance school by Charles Lamont, casting director of Educational Pictures, who invited her to audition, and her mother immediately signed a contract with the studio in 1932.

Shirley

She would make her big screen debut in ‘Baby Burlesks’, first 10-minute and then 20-minute comedies that satirized adult films of the time, featuring her performance as a saloon singer, complete with silk underwear, lollipop kisses and more. , playing sexy star Mae West! These insinuations will not long after create the most odious among Hollywood circles and power players. A perversion, an abnormal fantasy, that apart from certain facts, which have come to the public, we cannot know until the abuse has arrived.

Autograph to Santa Claus

Shirley Temple, not surprisingly, stopped believing in Santa Claus from the age of six, when her mother took her to see him in a mall and he asked for her autograph! Beyond that, however, the treatment he received from the studios was not just a paradox. The girl with the golden curls and baby face was often mistreated. A typical case was during the 1932 film “Runt Page”, when he got an ear infection and had to be hospitalized. The producer insisted that if she was not in the studio the next morning, he would replace her.

Love game

In the relatively recent film noir “Los Angeles, Confidential” (1997), the story revolves around a business promoter, who shoots porn with well-known stars of the time, but also organizes orgies with the same “protagonists”. In one shot of these orgies, at one end a little girl is seen “playing” with a middle-aged man. The kid was back, but the trademark curls were clearly a nod to Temple.

As it turns out, before Shirley even goes to High School, the climax of her childhood exploitation, her first sexual abuse, will come when she meets the powerful MGM producer for the first time. Arthur Freed unzipped his pants in Temple’s face. Rumor has it that she unconsciously dealt with the sad incident with a nervous laugh. Continuity is ignored. Also, by the time she was 17, the powerful and top blockbuster producer David O. Selznick was literally chasing her around his office demanding that she give in to his sexual urges.

Rumors and the Vatican

Rumors surrounding the Shirley Temple phenomenon were so intense in her heyday that they bordered on legend. Some were disproved by time and rudimentary logic. Others remain up there, accentuating the Hollywood legend. The first rumors were leaked to the public sphere by Fox’s public relations, claiming that Temple was a natural talent, without training. Also, there were rumors that she was wearing a wig, which is why many fans were pulling her hair to see if it was real.

But the most extreme rumor was that Temple was not a child, but a 30-year-old dwarf! In fact, the Vatican sent Father Silvio Masante to investigate if he was really a child…

Therapist

Shirley Temple played in countless films, while it is characteristic that before she was six years old she had already played in 40 films. According to her biographer John Casson, in almost all the films she played the role of “emotional therapist”, usually uniting the members of an estranged family, providing solutions to conflicts between traditional and modern attitudes. Often an orphan, he created a feeling of love and protection for her, while always radiating a sense of optimism, a necessary ingredient in the deep depression, with its armies of unemployed and economically impoverished Americans.

Shirley

Oscar

In 1935, at the age of 7, he won the Oscar A for a young role, which has not been awarded since. Her success was incredible but by no means accidental. People lined up at checkouts to laugh at her antics, while Shirley Temple dolls, which were released very soon after her first hits, sold over six million.

Retirement

At the age of 21, Temple, even though she had already suffered some failures in her career, since the world preferred her as a child prodigy, with her curls, will make the decision to retire from the movie sets. Having a divorce, from the well-known actor George Agar, a daughter and a new husband, businessman Charles Black, with whom she had two more children, she would be active in both radio and television shows, but never returned to the movies. Her last film was in 1948 in John Ford’s wonderful western “March at Dawn”, playing Henry Fonda’s daughter, besieged by her first husband Agar.

As an adult, Shirley Temple found a way out by devoting her life to the public. As a member of the Republican party she will become the US ambassador to Ghana, while in 1989 she became the ambassador to Czechoslovakia.

Temple died at the age of 85 in 2014 at her home in Woodside, California, from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. She was an avid smoker but never flaunted her habit, in contrast to the breast cancer that struck her at the age of 44 and she made it public in order to limit the guilty whispers around the disease and public awareness.

Shirley Temple, even today, continues to be a unique phenomenon, a child who lost the age of innocence, who knew the good and the bad of Hollywood and paid a serious price for her immortal glory.