Wasn’t I a dish?

In the 1997 blockbuster, “Titanic,” Gloria Stuart portrayed Rose, a centenarian who survived the sinking disaster of the luxury liner in the title of the film. Stuart was 86 when she filmed the role. As her character looks at a sketch that was drawn of her aboard the ship, she exclaims, “Wasn’t I a dish?”



Why yes, Gloria; you really were! In the 1936 film “Poor Little Rich Girl,” Stuart was given the thankless task of playing the romantic lead in this Shirley Temple musical. She wasn’t given much to do except look pretty in the few scenes that she had.



Above she is shown with Michael Whalen, who portrayed Shirley’s father in the film. Below, with Claude Gillingwater and Shirley.



In a 1996 interview Gloria had this to say about working with Shirley:

“My agent called me one day and said, ‘You’re going to make a Shirley Temple film!’ I said, ‘Oh no!’ He said, ‘Gloria, it’s wonderful!’ I said ‘What’s wonderful about it?’ W.C. Fields said never be in a movie or on the stage with dogs or children. It’s a losing battle. So I asked to see Darryl Zanuck and I said, ‘Mr. Zanuck, I’m a dramatic actress. It’s not for me.’ He said, ‘Gloria, you could be in film for the next ten years or on the stage and nobody would ever see you or hear about you, but if you’re in a Shirley Temple film, millions of people will see you.’ She was really a get-away girl. You watched her and she was so completely composed and happy and talented and up up up. She was a real tonic. She was a miracle. Indescribable. It’s impossible that one child was all those wonderful things but she was.”



Stuart reconnected with Shirley sixty years later at the 1998 Academy Awards ceremony. “I was sitting at the banquet afterwards and she came up and put her arms around me,” Stuart recalled. “I was the only one left that she worked with.”



Perhaps in a nod to her less-than-enthusiastic response to playing alongside Temple, studio head Darryl Zanuck had the publicity machine crank out some fashion shots of Stuart. This caption accompanied the below image:

Three high fashion notes of the spring season, a strictly tailored suit, men’s wear fabric, and the newly favored shade of grey striped in chalk white, are incorporated in this costume worn by Gloria Stuart playing in “The Poor Little Rich Girl” for 20th Century-Fox. Horizontal bands of the material finish the seams of the skirt and the slot pockets, evidence of the meticulous tailoring of this suit. The blouse of white pique has a pleated frill for collar and closing. A grey felt hat and grey suede accessories complete the outfit.



Neither one of these outfits were visible in the final film.



Stuart co-starred with Temple again in 1938’s “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm” alongside Randolph Scott. At least she was given more to do in this film and a number of comic zingers which she delivered perfectly.



Yes Gloria - you were a dish!

See more photos at my main website.

Dying to get in

This July 1967 photo of Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion looks as if the iconic attraction is ready for business. Not so. It would be over two years before it opened for anxious guests. Zooming in, you can see the teaser sign that was posted outside the closed gates.



A better look at the sign from April 1968:



1966 publicity images taken with the gates slightly ajar and a bicycle just out of view on the right.



Want to apply?



The exit area in 1966:





The earliest shot in my collection showing the sign is from June 1965. This mother was so nervous about the ghosts that she had to light up in front of her kid.



See more Disneyland Haunted Mansion photos at my main website.

Shirley’s Birthday Cakes

On what would have been Shirley Temple’s 98th birthday, Daveland will celebrate with a few new (to my collection at least!) shots of the child actress and diplomat on that special day. In 1934, Fox celebrated Shirley with a party. From the publicity blurb:

SHIRLEY TEMPLE, five year old Fox starlet, made her social bow as hostess at her birthday party (April 21st), when she entertained a bunch of her kid friends to tea, birthday cake, ice cream and a puppet show, in the Café de Paris at Movietone City.

Sharp-eyed readers with a calculator realize that Shirley was actually six in 1934, but thanks to the studio and Shirley’s parents’ attempt to make her appear more precocious to the public, they shaved a year off of her age. Other sharp-eyed readers will see the kid on the right picking his teeth, the same little boy gawking at Shirley as he hands her a gift. Thanks to Shirley expert supreme Rita Dubas I learned a bit more about his story:

The little boy on the right who picked that unfortunate moment to perform some oral hygiene at Shirley's 1934 birthday bash is Pat McCall, nephew of journalist Peggy McCall. Pat had a monthly column in Childen's Play Mate Magazine, "Adventures in Movie-Land", with stories "told" to his aunt. Peggy was a publicist for Fox as well as a freelance writer for Play Mate and other magazines, according to IMDb. Shirley's party was featured in the September 1934 Play Mate issue, using the same pic and identifying Pat as the boy on the right. All of the guests were the children of Hollywood writers. Pat goes into great detail describing the party, including the event's photographer, "Max" (Max Munn Autrey) and that the favors were beach balls and autographed photos.



Two years later in 1936, Shirley was celebrating her “seventh” birthday (wink-wink-nudge-nudge) and was given this ginormous card from her Cleveland fans:

Shirley Temple was 7 years old today and she celebrated by doing no work before the film camera, playing with gifts, which included a pony and a bicycle, and later visiting crippled children at a hospital. She is shown here with a huge birthday greetings scroll sent by admirers in Cleveland.



That’s a lot of signatures!



Below she is shown with a birthday cake from that same year. From the accompanying caption:

Shirley Temple turns seven years old today; at the same time, she receives a higher weekly salary—namely, $1,000 a week! This most precious of all little girls is the darling of every nation. Our picture shows Shirley at the "dress rehearsal" in front of her birthday cake, complete with seven candles.



For the age old question, can one ever have too much cake? The expression on Shirley’s face seems to say it all.



See more Shirley Temple birthday photos at my main website.