Temple began her film career in 1932 at the age of three and, in 1934, found international fame in Bright Eyes, a feature film designed specifically for her talents. She received a special Juvenile Academy Award in February 1935 for her outstanding contribution as a juvenile performer to motion pictures during 1934, and film hits such as Curly Top and Heidi followed year after year during the mid-to-late 1930s. Licensed merchandise that capitalized on her wholesome image included dolls, dishes, and clothing. Her box office popularity waned as she reached adolescence, and she left the film industry in her teens. She appeared in a few films of varying quality in her mid-to-late teens, and retired completely from films in 1950 at the age of 22. She was the top box-office draw four years in a row (1935–38) in a Motion Picture Herald poll.
Temple returned to show business in 1958 with a two-season television anthology series of fairy tale adaptations. She made guest appearances on television shows in the early 1960s and filmed a sitcom pilot that was never released. She sat on the boards of corporations and organizations including The Walt Disney Company, Del Monte Foods, and the National Wildlife Federation. In 1988, she published her autobiography, Child Star. Temple was the recipient of awards and honors including Kennedy Center Honors and a Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.
Temple ranks 18th on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest female American screen legends of all time.
Temple began dance classes at Meglin's Dance School in Hollywood in 1931, at the age of 3. Her film career began when a casting director from Educational Pictures visited her class. Although Temple hid behind the piano in the studio, she was chosen by the director, invited to audition, and, eventually, signed to a contract with Educational.
Temple worked at Educational from 1932 to 1933, and appeared in two series of short subjects for the studio. Her first series, Baby Burlesks, satirized recent motion pictures and politics. In the series "Baby Burlesks", Shirley would dress up in a diaper, but then be wearing adult clothes everywhere else. The series was considered controversial by some viewers because of its depiction of young children in adult situations. Her second series at Educational, Frolics of Youth, was a bit more acceptable, and cast her as a bratty younger sister in a contemporary suburban family.
While working for Educational Pictures, Temple also performed many walk-on and bit player roles in various films at other studios. She is said to have auditioned for a lead role in Hal Roach's Our Gang comedies (later known as The Little Rascals) in the early 1930s; various reasons are given for her not having been cast in the role. Roach stated that Temple and her mother were unable to make it through the red tape of the audition process, while Our Gang producer/director Robert F. McGowan recalls that the studio wanted to cast Temple, but they refused to give in to Temple's mother's demands that Temple receive special star billing. Temple, in her autobiography Child Star, denies that she ever auditioned for Our Gang at all. However, Temple had some connection with Our Gang in that Temple's carpool friend, David Holt, had a small role in the 1933 Little Rascals film Forgotten Babies.
Temple was finally signed to Fox Film Corporation (which later merged with 20th Century Pictures to become 20th Century Fox) in late 1933 after appearing in Stand Up and Cheer! with James Dunn. Later, she was paired with Dunn in several films.
Temple would stay with Fox until 1940, becoming the studio's most lucrative player. Her contract was amended several times between 1933 and 1935, and she was loaned to Paramount for a pair of successful films in 1934. For four solid years, she ranked as the top-grossing box office star in America. Shirley's birth certificate was altered to hold on to her babyhood; her birth year was advanced from 1928 to 1929. She was not told her real age until her twelfth (actually thirteenth) birthday.
Her popularity earned her both public adulation and the approval of her peers. Even at the age of five, the hallmark of her acting work was her professionalism: she always had her lines memorized and dance steps prepared when shooting began.
Temple also made pictures with Carole Lombard, Gary Cooper, Adolphe Menjou, and many others. Arthur Treacher appeared as a kindly butler in several of Temple's films.
Temple's ability as a dancer (especially a tap dancer) is well known and celebrated. Even in her earliest films she danced, and she was able to handle complex tap choreography by the age of five. She was teamed with famed dancer Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in The Little Colonel, The Littlest Rebel, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and Just Around the Corner. Robinson also coached and developed her choreography for many of her other films. Because Robinson was African-American, and the South was replete with racism, his scenes holding hands with Temple had to be edited out in many cities in the South.
Aside from the films, there were many Shirley Temple product during the 1930s. Ideal's numerous Temple dolls, dressed in costumes from the movies, were top sellers. Original Shirley Temple dolls bring in hundreds of dollars on the secondary market today. Other successful Temple items included a line of girls' dresses and hairbows. Several of Temple's film songs, including "On the Good Ship Lollipop"(from 1934's Bright Eyes), "Animal Crackers in My Soup" (from 1935's Curly Top) and "Goodnight My Love" (from 1936's Stowaway) were popular radio hits. She frequently lent her likeness and talent to promoting various social causes, including the Red Cross.
Temple was the first recipient of the special Juvenile Performer Academy Award in 1935 for recognition of her outstanding contribution to screen entertainment in 1934. Seventy years later, Temple is still the youngest performer ever to receive this honor, or any Oscar. She is also the youngest actress to add foot and hand prints to the forecourt at Grauman's Chinese Theatre.
Animal Crackers in My Soup
Shirley Temple Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
You ought to learn your alphabet!"
So in my soup I used to get
All the letters of the alphabet
I learned them all from A to Z
And now my Mother's giving me
Animal crackers in my soup
Gosh, oh gee! but I have fun
Swallowing animals one by one
In every bowl of soup I see
Lions and tigers watching me
I make 'em jump right through a hoop
Those animal crackers in my soup
When I get hold of the big bad wolf
I just push him under to drown
Then I bite him in a million bits
And I gobble him right down!
When they're inside me where it's dark
I walk around like Noah's Ark
I stuff my tummy like a goop
With animal crackers in my soup!
Animal crackers in my soup
Do funny things to me
They make me think my neighborhood
Is a big menagerie
For instance, there's our Janitor
His name is Mr. Klein
And when he hollers at us kids
He reminds me of a lion
The grocer is so big and fat
He has a big mustache
He looks just like a walrus
Just before he takes a splash!
The song "Animal Crackers in My Soup" by Shirley Temple is a delightful and whimsical tune. It tells the story of a little girl who enjoys her soup but finds it even more interesting with animal-shaped crackers inside. The song starts with her mother telling her to learn her ABCs, and she discovered a fun way to do it by finding all the letters in her soup. Shirley then goes into the chorus, where she sings about monkeys and rabbits "loop the looping," and "swallowing animals one by one."
The song has a playful manner to it that showcases how easy it is for a child's imagination to run wild. The girl discovers lions and tigers in her soup as well and makes them jump through hoops. She even talks about biting the big bad wolf in a million bits and gobbling him right down. The lyrics of the song paint a picture of a child's playful imagination, and how the little things in life, like animal-shaped crackers, can be exciting and fun.
Line by Line Meaning
Once Mother said "My little pet
My mother encouraged me to learn the alphabet when I was young
You ought to learn your alphabet!"
She believed it was important for me to have a strong educational foundation
So in my soup I used to get
To help me learn, she would put alphabet noodles in my soup as a fun way to practice my letters
All the letters of the alphabet
Through this fun method, I was able to learn all the letters from A to Z
I learned them all from A to Z
I successfully learned every letter in the alphabet
And now my Mother's giving me
Now that I have learned the alphabet, she has moved on to another fun treat
Animal crackers in my soup
Now my mother puts animal crackers in my soup as a fun snack
Monkeys and rabbits loop the loop
The animal crackers come in fun shapes like monkeys and rabbits that I can play with
Gosh, oh gee! but I have fun
I am really enjoying this new treat
Swallowing animals one by one
I like eating each of the animal crackers one at a time
In every bowl of soup I see
Now every bowl of soup I have feels like a wild animal exhibit
Lions and tigers watching me
I imagine seeing lions and tigers in the soup bowl
I make 'em jump right through a hoop
I even pretend I am a circus trainer making my animal crackers perform tricks
When I get hold of the big bad wolf
I often focus on the storybook characters that the animal crackers represent
I just push him under to drown
In my imagination, I put the animal cracker of the big bad wolf in the soup and pretend to drown him
Then I bite him in a million bits
And then I eat the wolf cracker in many small bites
And I gobble him right down!
I enjoy eating the animal crackers
When they're inside me where it's dark
The animal crackers move from my bowl of soup to my stomach
I walk around like Noah's Ark
When I eat many different animal crackers at once, I feel like I am walking around with an ark full of animals
I stuff my tummy like a goop
Eating the animal crackers makes me feel as though I am filling up my tummy with a variety of animals
Animal crackers in my soup!
Animal crackers have become a fun addition to my bowl of soup
Do funny things to me
I enjoy pretending and imagining it as a menagerie
They make me think my neighborhood
The animal crackers make me feel like my surroundings have become a wild animal habitat
Is a big menagerie
Or in other words, a large zoo
For instance, there's our Janitor
When I see people around me, they begin to look like animals too
His name is Mr. Klein
My school was filled with animal-like people
And when he hollers at us kids
Even the janitor, Mr. Klein, reminds me of a wild animal when he yells at us
He reminds me of a lion
I imagine him as a lion with a loud roar
The grocer is so big and fat
Other people, like the local grocer, seem larger-than-life to me but still resemble animals with their physical features
He has a big mustache
This is highlighted when I see his large moustache
He looks just like a walrus
And he reminds me of a walrus with his stout build and large moustache
Just before he takes a splash!
I even imagine him swimming like a walrus when he takes a bath
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Written by: IRVING CAESAR, RAY HENDERSON, TED KOEHLER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@Bremonade
Who else remembers that commercial about buying her movies. its been so long and this suddenly popped in my head
@Isaiahkool1671
Bremonade ! That's exactly why i came here, i still remember those commercial when i was younger 😂😂
@kimtkb
Bremonade ! Me too! And i clearly remember this song out of all the others haha
@ARS_Time_Bomb
Bremonade ! me! I loved this commercial.
@PrudenceStar
Same
@timberbee1197
Bremonade
SAME
@mez666rocks
I remember the Shirley Temple collection set commercials from Cartoon Network and boomerang early in the morning when I was little :P love these. Classics
@queenteeteeeditx9971
Same
@2k_jayy
Cartoon network this was annoying to me when I was little but I still singed it 🤣😂
@Jenny-kl8hj
Omggggg me too!! Miss those days:((