Temple Tuesday: LIFE can be cruel!

At first glance, the above photo is a charming shot of Shirley Temple, former child star and darling of the 1930s, and Mary Pickford, a “child” star from the teens and 1920s. At the time this 1943 photo was taken, Shirley was poised for a comeback under the direction of producer David O. Selznick. Mary had gone behind the camera, producing films for United Artists, which she was one of the founding members back in 1919. LIFE Magazine typically was kind to movie stars and often got exclusive photos and stories as a result; for this particular image, they were rather cruel. It ran full page in the October 4, 1943 issue with the headline, “TWO GREATEST HAS-BEENS.” From the rest of the feature:

Shirley Temple and Mary Pickford are seen here on a Hollywood movie set. Miss Temple is 15. Mary Pickford is 50. They are almost of a size. Their combined careers almost span the history of the motion picture industry. Mary Pickford has appeared in 60 full-length movies, Shirley Temple in 28. They are Hollywood’s two greatest has-beens. They are has-beens in the same peculiar way. Both of them have finished great movie careers. Mary Pickford as “America’s Sweetheart”; Shirley Temple as the screen’s greatest child actress. Miss Temple, for many years a top box-office draw as a curly-headed moppet, is now taking on her first real dramatic role. When Mary Pickford was her age she was appearing in David Belasco’s “Warrens of Virginia.” The occasion for their meeting was an on-the-set party to celebrate the first of shooting on Shirley Temple’s new picture, United Artists’s “Since You Went Away.” Miss Pickford, a part owner of United Artists, is also beginning a new movie career. Recently she paid $410,000 (the top price for a Broadway play) for the screen rights to “Junior Miss,” which she will soon produce. It is rumored that Shirley Temple will have one of leading roles in the movie.

There were so many other ways LIFE could have chosen to describe these two legends, all of which would have been more respectful. Below is another shot of Temple and Pickford from the party:



From the accompanying caption:

In the friendly, informal atmosphere of a typical American home, Claudette Colbert and Producer David O. Selznick recently entertained a group of Hollywood notables at a “housewarming.” Scene of the unusual gathering was the “Hilton Home” set, on which will be shot some of the footage for Selznick’s “Since You Went Away,” story of a typical American home in wartime. Present at the party were Producer Selznick, Director John Cromwell and members of the all-star cast, Claudette Colbert, Joseph Cotten, Jennifer Jones, Shirley Temple, Monty Woolley, Robert Walker, Hattie McDaniel, Neil Hamilton, Eric Sinclair, Rhonda Fleming, Christopher Adams and Vicci Styles. Left to right: Commander Garcia, Shirley Temple and Mary Pickford.

A detail of the pin Mary is wearing:



Below are cast members Robert Walker, current wife Jennifer Jones, Selznick (who would eventually marry Jones), Shirley, and Joseph Cotten. Ingrid Bergman, smiling in the background, was a visitor to the set party.



Another shot with Bergman, Selznick, Temple, and Jones. That’s some purse Jones has tucked under her arm!



Below is a shot of Shirley getting ready. The accompanying blurb:

LADY’S TIME OUT to fix up before returning in front of the cameras. Shirley Temple has her hair done by Cleo, the hair stylist, for a scene in David O. Selznick’s “Since You Went Away.” Others in the all-star cast are Claudette Colbert, Joseph Cotten, Jennifer Jones, Monty Woolley and Robert Walker.



Poor Cleo; no credit or last name could be found for her on imdb. In an attempt to make up (pun intended) for that, below is a color shot of Shirley in the same outfit on the cover of Modern Screen Magazine, circa April 1944:



See more Shirley Temple photos at my main website.

Temple Tuesday: No Jitterbug for Shirley

As soon as she hit the silver screen, Shirley Temple was known for both singing and dancing, as seen above in “War Babies” (1932). In “Miss Annie Rooney” (1942), her first teenage romantic role, it was only natural that Shirley’s footwork kept up with the times. Below, she can be seen getting coached by choreographer Nick Castle and costar Dickie Moore.



Fortunately for Dickie, for this jitterbug dance sequence he was able to get by with just standing still while Shirley did all the work.



Later in the film, wrong-side-of-the-tracks Annie (Shirley) finds favor with the rich kids by teaching them how to cut a rug. “Drizzlepuss” Stella Bainbridge (June Lockhard) refuses to join the fun and stands off to the right. 



When Shirley returned to the screen a little over a year later in David Selznick’s “Since You Went Away” (1944), the producer was adamant against Shirley doing any singing or dancing. According to publicity of the time, the movie “…definitely is not ‘another Temple picture.’ It is based on a series of letters written by Margaret Buell Wilder, Dayton, Ohio, newspaper-woman and mother of two teenaged daughters, to her husband in the Army. It is the every-day story of their problems and efforts to make ends meet by taking in boarders. And it is definitely not another Temple role. Shirley plays a straight dramatic part. No dancing and no singing.” In one of his famous memos, Selznick wrote, “I’m anxious to get the accent off this as a Temple vehicle and start hammering away at its tremendous cast.” Selznick would even go so far as to admonish Shirley against singing and dancing on her War Bond Tours. What a fink! Below is Shirley with costar Claudette Colbert who played her mother, Anne Hilton.



As in Selznick’s “Gone with the Wind,” a military dance plays a central part to the story of the film. Here, Jennifer Jones (playing Shirley’s older sister) arrives to the thrill of the soldiers who get a temporary break from World War II to dance with some pretty girls.



Shirley is not even in this scene at all; instead, the focus is on the romantic leads (Robert Walker and Jones) and their chaperones, Colbert and Joseph Cotten, who plays a close friend of the Hilton family.



According to the AFI website, the hangar dance was shot in a reproduction of an Army aviation hangar that encompassed two sound stages, over 20,000 sq. ft. of floor space and utilized 100 electricians. Below, director John Cromwell coaches Cotten and Colbert as they dance and recite their dramatic dialogue.



Colbert and Cotten rest between takes:



With Cromwell watching at right, Jones and Walker (married at the time the film was being made) perform their scene:



Silver Screen Magazine shot a series of dance photos during filming of the movie. From their publicity blurbs:

Jitterbugs Elsie Peritz and Jack Arkin warm up their motors, so to speak for an aerial take-off in the hangar dance sequence of “Since You Went Away,” first picture made by David O. Selznick since his Academy Award winning “Gone with the Wind” and “Rebecca.”



Peritz also had an uncredited role in the Robert Benchley Paramount Technicolor short, “Boogie Woogie” (1945). Arkin had a few small uncredited roles, including the Judy Garland film, “The Clock” (1945) and “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo” (1944) where he also danced the Jitterbug.

Below: Jack gives a spin and—oops!—we got something in our eye, so we didn’t see that.



Now Elsie is really getting up in Hollywood. The lady in the background, if she had it to do over again, would never learn how to knit but would concentrate on jitterbugging, as Elsie has, so that she too could be the life of the party.



Don’t feel bad for Shirley; she continued to dance for her fans, including in Central Park with former dance partner and close friend, Bill Robinson, Summer 1944:



She gave Franchot Tone Jitterbug lessons in “Honeymoon” (1947):



In the 1970’s, Shirley performed the Jitterbug with talk show host Mike Douglas. I have yet to find a clip of it on YouTube. From what I recall she was magnificent!

See more “Since You Went Away” photos at my main website.

Temple Tuesday: Memos and Letters

Producer David Selznick was known for his prolific memos; a rather large book was published in 1972 filled with his correspondence titled Memo from David O. Selznick. Two of the memos from the compilation include our gal Shirley. In a June 15, 1943 memo the producer wrote to his Director of Advertising and Publicity, Joseph Henry Steele:

When we’re ready, the story on “Since You Went Away” should be built on the following:

David O. Selznick today announced that…“Since You Went Away” will mark the return to production of Selznick, and be his first picture since “Gone With the Wind” and “Rebecca.” At the same time, Selznick confirmed previously published reports that Claudette Colbert will play the role of the young wife and mother in the film, which is based upon the Whittlesey House and Ladies’ Home Journal story of the same title…

With Claudette Colbert, Jennifer Jones, Monty Woolley, and Shirley Temple, the cast looms as one of the most important of recent years. Selznick also stated that there would be other important players cast shortly, to give the film a cast rivaling that of the producer’s famous production of “Dinner at Eight.”

Rewrite the above as much as you want to, but please be careful to: (a) handle the mother and sister angles almost exactly as above; (b) use the casting in the recapitulation as stated above, i.e., Colbert first, Jones second, Woolley third, and Temple fourth; (c) I’m anxious to get the accent off this as a Temple vehicle and start hammering away at its tremendous cast.…I’m getting tired of being referred to solely as the producer of Gone With the Wind and Rebecca, and would like to get some of the other pictures alluded to as often as possible (I can see my obituary now: ‘Producer of Gone With the Wind dies!’)…



The above shot of Shirley taken in October 1943 was accompanied by this publicity blurb:

Fresh Start for Shirley Temple

Brentwood, Calif. – Now 15 and a typical teen-age girl, Shirley Temple is launching a “second” career. As a child actress, she was at the top as film box office drawing card from 1935 to 1939, under a 20th Century-Fox contract. Since 1941, she has made only two movies, and in 1942 she starred in a radio series, “Junior Miss.” At the same time she gave more attention to her school work at the Westlake School for Girls, and to growing up as a normal girl.



Now, under a new contract with David O. Selznick, a new program is being worked out, with adult stardom as the aim for the future. For the present Shirley will continue her schooling and make occasional pictures in which she will have important roles but not be starred. She is at work now on“Since You Went away,” in which she plays the tomboy daughter. These photos were made at the Temple home here. Shirley is seen with her new friend Abby Wilder, whose mother, Margaret Buell Wilder, wrote the novel “Since You Went away.” Shirley plays Brig Hilton, who in real life is Abby Wilder.

The below image shows Ingrid Bergman visiting Selznick (who she was under contract to at the time), Shirley, and Jennifer Jones on the set of “Since You Went Away.” Selznick may have been looking at Shirley, but his romantic attentions were about to be focused on Jones, who he would eventually marry.



This November 3, 1944 memo from the Producer was to Reeves Espy, a Selznick executive:

Shirley is exceedingly hot at the moment. We can”t commence to fill demands for interviews and other press material on her from newspapers and magazines; and this is, of course, an indication of the interest of the public. At the preview of “I’ll Be Seeing You,” costarring Ginger Rogers, Joseph Cotten, and Shirley Temple, Shirleys name was received with the biggest applause of all three, despite the fact that the Gallup poll shows that Cotten is the great new romantic rage, and that Ginger is one of the top stars of the business.

Shirley’s publicity in the New York press, both in connection with this appearance and in connection with her prior trip East to sell bonds, received more publicity_including, astonishingly, big front-page breaks in the middle of a war—thank I think has been accorded the visit of any motion-picture star to New York in many, many years. Indeed, it is said (and I believe a check would confirm it) that her visit received more space than that of General de Gaulle! She has made a great hit in Since You Went Away; and in her first grown-up part, that in “I’ll Be Seeing You,” is a sensational success. Her fan mail is great than that of any other star on our list—actually exceeding by a wide margin that of Ingrid Bergman, Jennifer Jones, and Joan Fontaine, who are the next three, in that order.

If Shirley was so hot, why didn’t her teen career flourish more? You can probably chalk it up to Selznick’s obsession with promoting Jones. All the choice lead roles for a young woman went to her, as the Producer ended up loaning Temple out to other studios while he focused on building up Jones’ career.



See more teenage Shirley Temple photos at my main website.

Judy Goes To New York City

Judy Garland is seen here talking to a reporter at a party thrown in her honor at the Sherry-Netherland Hotel in New York City circa 1945. Judy was in town to promote her upcoming film, "The Clock," starring Robert Walker. Here are two contemporary shots of the Sherry-Netherland:





"The Clock" was directed by Vincente Minnelli, who had recently married Garland. This lesser known film was a dramatic departure from the musicals Judy had been cranking out for the last five years. The story takes place during a 48 hour time period and covers the whirlwind romance of Judy's character (Alice Maybery) and Walker's (Corporal Joe Allen). The two decide to get married and find it challenging to do so before his leave from the war (WWII) is over.



Because World War II had not yet ended, filming on location was not considered cost-effective. These two photos show MGM's version of Penn Station on their soundstages in Culver City, recreated at a cost of $66,000.





See more Judy Garland photos on my Judy Garland web page.