Shirley Temple filmography

This article is about Shirley Temple's theatrical films. For her television show, see Shirley Temple's Storybook.

Shirley Temple (1928–2014) was an American child actress, dancer, and singer who began her film career in 1931, and continued successfully through 1949. When Educational Pictures director Charles Lamont scouted Meglan Dancing School for prospective talent, three-year-old student Temple hid behind the piano. Lamont spotted her and immediately decided she was the one he was looking for. Starting at $10 a day, she was eventually under contract for $50 per film.^[1] The production company generated its Baby Burlesks one-reeler film short satires of Hollywood films in 1931–1933, produced by Jack Hays and directed by Lamont. Temple made eight Baby Burlesks films, and 10 other short films, before being signed to star in feature-length motion pictures.

Shirley Temple in 1938

The role that launched her feature film career was a short song-and-dance sequence in the 1934 movie Stand Up and Cheer! for Fox Film, with James Dunn as her father. Her performance impressed studio executives so much that they immediately cast the duo in a follow-up film, Baby Take a Bow, with Temple again playing Dunn's daughter.^[2] Following the release of that film, Temple's parents negotiated two 7-year Fox contracts, one for Shirley as the performer, and the other for her mother as her guardian. Her parents had stipulations inserted to protect their daughter's privacy, while Fox retained control of all her public appearances. The bulk of the financial recompense went into revocable trusts.^[3] Later that same year, the film Bright Eyes was written as a starring vehicle for Temple, teaming her once again with Dunn.^[4] In this film, Temple sang the song most identified with her: "On the Good Ship Lollipop".^[5]

Temple and Robinson in the staircase tap dance from The Little Colonel (1935)

In addition to Dunn, Temple danced in her films with some of the most famous and accomplished entertainers of her era: Buddy Ebsen, Jack Haley, Alice Faye, George Murphy, Jimmy Durante, Charlotte Greenwood, and Jack Oakie. Bill "Bojangles" Robinson was her favorite partner.^[6] "It was kind of a magic between us", she later reminisced, and said he taught her how to execute her dance moves by syncing with the rhythm of the music, as opposed to watching her steps.^[7] In 1935's The Little Colonel, the first of their four films together, they made history as the first on screen interracial dancing partners.^[8][9]

Temple's films, made for between $400,000 and $700,000 each, earned millions of dollars in gross receipts in the United States and Canada.^[10] Her films ranked number-one at the box office in 1935, 1936, 1937, and 1938.^[11][12] The success of her films was also credited with saving her studio, 20th Century Fox, from bankruptcy during the Great Depression.^[11]

At the 7th Academy Awards in 1935, Temple was honored with the first Academy Juvenile Award.^[13] That same year, her hand prints and bare foot prints were immortalized in cement at Grauman's Chinese Theatre. At previous hand and foot print ceremonies, other celebrities traditionally left hand and shoe prints in the cement. The bare feet distraction was her idea to divert attention away from a gap in her smile left by a baby tooth that had fallen out.^[14] She received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 8, 1960.^[15] Following the end of her film career, Temple had a two-season run of Shirley Temple's Storybook anthology on the NBC television network.^[16]

During the years 1974–1989, she served in the United States diplomatic corps under her married name of Shirley Temple Black.^[17]

Features

James Dunn and Temple in Bright Eyes (1934)

Temple in The Little Princess (1939)

Johnny Russell, Eddie Collins, and Temple in The Blue Bird (1940)

Temple in Miss Annie Rooney (1942)

Title	Year	Role	Notes	Ref(s)
The Red-Haired Alibi	1932	Gloria Shelton		[18]
Out All Night	1933	Child	Credited as Shirley Jane Temple	[19]
To the Last Man		Mary Stanley	Uncredited	[20]
Carolina	1934	Joan Connelly	Scenes cut	[21]
As the Earth Turns		Child	Uncredited	[22]
Stand Up and Cheer!		Shirley Dugan	Dance partner: James Dunn	[23]
Baby Take a Bow		Shirley Ellison		[24]
Bright Eyes		Shirley Blake		[25]
Change of Heart		Shirley (girl on airplane)	Uncredited	[26]
Little Miss Marker		Marthy "Marky" Jane		[27]
Now I'll Tell		Mary Doran	Preserved at the UCLA Film and Television Archive	[28]
Now and Forever		Penelope "Penny" Day		[29]
George White's Scandals	Daughter of Scandal Girl		[30]
The Little Colonel	1935	Lloyd Sherman	Dance partner: Bill Robinson	[31]
Our Little Girl		Molly Middleton		[32]
Curly Top		Elizabeth Blair		[33]
The Littlest Rebel		Virginia "Virgie"' Cary	Dance partner: Bill Robinson	[34]
Captain January	1936	Helen "Star" Mason	Dance partner: Buddy Ebsen	[35]
Poor Little Rich Girl		Barbara Barry	Dance partners: Jack Haley and Alice Faye	[36]
Dimples		Sylvia "Dimples" Dolores Appleby		[37]
Stowaway		Barbara "Ching-Ching" Stewart		[38]
Wee Willie Winkie	1937	Priscilla "Winkie" Williams		[39]
Heidi		Heidi Kramer		[40]
Ali Baba Goes to Town		Herself	Uncredited cameo	[41]
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm	1938	Rebecca Winstead	Dance partner: Bill Robinson	[42]
Little Miss Broadway		Betsy Brown Shea	Dance partners: George Murphy	[43]
Just Around the Corner		Penny Hale	Dance partner: Bill Robinson	[44]
The Little Princess	1939	Sara Crewe		[45]
Susannah of the Mounties		Susannah "Sue" Sheldon		[46]
The Blue Bird	1940	Mytyl		[47]
Young People		Wendy Ballantine	Dance partners: Charlotte Greenwood and Jack Oakie	[48]
Kathleen	1941	Kathleen Davis		[49]
Miss Annie Rooney	1942	Annie Rooney		[50]
Since You Went Away	1944	Bridget "Brig" Hilton		[51]
I'll Be Seeing You		Barbara Marshall		[52]
Kiss and Tell	1945	Corliss Archer		[53]
Honeymoon	1947	Barbara Olmstead		[54]
The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer		Susan	Released in the UK as Bachelor Knight	[55]
That Hagen Girl		Mary Hagen		[56]
Fort Apache	1948	Philadelphia Thursday		[57]
Mr. Belvedere Goes to College	1949	Ellen Baker		[58]
Adventure in Baltimore		Dinah Sheldon		[59]
The Story of Seabiscuit		Margaret O'Hara Knowles		[60]
A Kiss for Corliss		Corliss Archer		[61]

Baby Burlesks

Shirley Temple in Glad Rags to Riches (1932)

Baby Burlesks credits of Shirley Temple

Title	Year	Role	Notes	Ref(s)
Runt Page	1931/1932	Lulu Parsnips	uncredited	[62]
War Babies	1932	Charmaine		[63]
The Pie-Covered Wagon		Shirley		[64]
Glad Rags to Riches		Nell/La Belle Diaperina		[65]
Kid in Hollywood		Morelegs Sweettrick		[66]
The Kid's Last Fight		Shirley		[67]
Kid 'in' Africa		Madame Cradlebait		[68]
Polly Tix in Washington	1933	Polly Tix		[69]

Other short films

Other short film credits of Shirley Temple

Title	Year	Role	Notes	Ref(s)
Dora's Dunking Doughnuts	1933	Shirley	Educational Pictures, Inc.	[70]
Merrily Yours		Mary Lou Rogers		[71]
What's to Do?				[72]
Pardon My Pups	1934			[73]
Managed Money				[73]
Mandalay				[74]
The Hollywood Gad-About		Herself	Educational Films, Inc.	[75]
Our Girl Shirley	1942	Herself	Re-issue combined Managed Money and Pardon My Pups	[76]
American Creed	1946	Herself		[77]

Bibliography

• Temple Black, Shirley (1988). Child star. McGraw-Hill. ISBN 978-0-07-005532-2.
• Edwards, Anne (2017). Shirley Temple: American Princess. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-1-4930-2692-0.
• Pitts, Michael R. (2019). Astor Pictures: A Filmography and History of the Reissue King, 1933–1965. McFarland. ISBN 978-1-4766-7649-4.
• Windeler, Robert (1978). The Films of Shirley Temple. Secaucus, N.J. : Citadel Press. ISBN 978-0-8065-0615-9.

The American Creed (1946)