Historically, the appearance of a 56-year-old African-American dancing alongside a six-year-old white girl was a huge leap in interracial interactions in cinema. When veteran tap dancer Bill Robinson, a.k.a. Bojangles, took Shirley Temple's hand while the two tapped their way up and down a staircase in February 1935's "The Little Colonel," this was the first time on the screen where the two races joined hands and danced. Filming the sequence began a life-long friendship between the two stars.
Meeting for the first time while Robinson was about to instruct Shirley how to perform the tap dance scene, the little girl with the curly hair asked the towering, lanky former vaudeville performer as they were walking to the set, "'Can I call you Uncle Billy?'" Temple recalled years later. "'Why sure you can,' he replied. 'But then I get to call you darlin.' From then on, whenever we walked together it was hand in hand, and I was always his 'darlin.' Bill Robinson treated me as an equal, which was very important to me. He didn't talk down to me, like to a little girl. And I liked people like that. And Bill Robinson was the best of all."
Robinson, born and raised in Richmond, Virginia, was a veteran of the Spanish-American War before joining the vaudeville circuit tap-dancing his way to stardom. He had a unique way of dancing, calling his foot tapping "up on the toes," moving just at the waist down, earning him the nickname "Father of Tapology." His schtick of dancing on stairs began in 1918, which he perfected throughout the years. Appearing in several Broadway and off-Broadway shows, Robinson emerged as a film star with 14 movies in ten years beginning in 1932. "Little Colonel" was his seventh screen appearance. Bojangles claims he originated the idea for the two to dance on the Colonel's house staircase, receiving inspiration from a dream. "I was being made a lord by the King of England and was standing at the head of a flight of stairs. Rather than walk, I danced up," he said.
Robinson figured that Temple, who already showed her talent for tap-dancing in 1934's "Stand Up And Cheer," hadn't enough time to learn the complex routine he designed for the two of them. He gave her simple lessons on how to tap the riser and face each stair with her toes. She soon was nailing it. Robinson then decided to follow her patter on the stairs even though on film it looks like she's following his foot steps.
Robinson and Temple appeared in four films together, and the actress claimed Bojangles was her favorite co-star. Another actor who eventually bonded with the little girl throughout his life, but had a rocky beginning with her, was Lionel Barrymore. He played her grandfather in "Little Colonel," a passionate Southerner and ex-Confederate soldier who was bitter his daughter, Elizabeth (Evelyn Venable), was marrying a Northerner, Jack Sherman (John Lodge). Temple had a knack for remembering not only her lines but others as well. During one scene, Lionel forgot his line. The six-year-older, in front of the film crew, told him what his scripted words were. The actor turned red and walked off the set embarrassed. After politely being informed that maybe it wasn't the best tactic to employ, Temple, quick on her feet, got her autograph book, went to his dressing room, and humbly asked for him to sign it. The cuteness of Shirley and the way she approached him immediately calmed him down and the two returned to the set to resume filming.
Film reviewer Dennis Schwartz labels the "highly entertaining film is perhaps Shirley's best and remains an American classic." With already five movies under her belt, February was a special month for Shirley Temple: at the Academy Awards ceremony she was the first of twelve child actors under 18 years old to receive a miniature Juvenile Oscar, this in recognition for her collective 1934 films. When Fox Films merged with Twentieth Century Pictures to adopt its new name 20th Century-Fox, the man in charge of the enlarged studio Darryl F. Zanuck considered Shirley his greatest asset. She received special treatment for her talents, having 11 writers, called the Shirley Temple Story Development team. These writers created original plots all centered around her, complete with her dimples and curly hair. She even had her own four-room house on the studio grounds, and a personal body guard assigned to protect her from adoring fans.
Meeting for the first time while Robinson was about to instruct Shirley how to perform the tap dance scene, the little girl with the curly hair asked the towering, lanky former vaudeville performer as they were walking to the set, "'Can I call you Uncle Billy?'" Temple recalled years later. "'Why sure you can,' he replied. 'But then I get to call you darlin.' From then on, whenever we walked together it was hand in hand, and I was always his 'darlin.' Bill Robinson treated me as an equal, which was very important to me. He didn't talk down to me, like to a little girl. And I liked people like that. And Bill Robinson was the best of all."
Robinson, born and raised in Richmond, Virginia, was a veteran of the Spanish-American War before joining the vaudeville circuit tap-dancing his way to stardom. He had a unique way of dancing, calling his foot tapping "up on the toes," moving just at the waist down, earning him the nickname "Father of Tapology." His schtick of dancing on stairs began in 1918, which he perfected throughout the years. Appearing in several Broadway and off-Broadway shows, Robinson emerged as a film star with 14 movies in ten years beginning in 1932. "Little Colonel" was his seventh screen appearance. Bojangles claims he originated the idea for the two to dance on the Colonel's house staircase, receiving inspiration from a dream. "I was being made a lord by the King of England and was standing at the head of a flight of stairs. Rather than walk, I danced up," he said.
Robinson figured that Temple, who already showed her talent for tap-dancing in 1934's "Stand Up And Cheer," hadn't enough time to learn the complex routine he designed for the two of them. He gave her simple lessons on how to tap the riser and face each stair with her toes. She soon was nailing it. Robinson then decided to follow her patter on the stairs even though on film it looks like she's following his foot steps.
Robinson and Temple appeared in four films together, and the actress claimed Bojangles was her favorite co-star. Another actor who eventually bonded with the little girl throughout his life, but had a rocky beginning with her, was Lionel Barrymore. He played her grandfather in "Little Colonel," a passionate Southerner and ex-Confederate soldier who was bitter his daughter, Elizabeth (Evelyn Venable), was marrying a Northerner, Jack Sherman (John Lodge). Temple had a knack for remembering not only her lines but others as well. During one scene, Lionel forgot his line. The six-year-older, in front of the film crew, told him what his scripted words were. The actor turned red and walked off the set embarrassed. After politely being informed that maybe it wasn't the best tactic to employ, Temple, quick on her feet, got her autograph book, went to his dressing room, and humbly asked for him to sign it. The cuteness of Shirley and the way she approached him immediately calmed him down and the two returned to the set to resume filming.
Film reviewer Dennis Schwartz labels the "highly entertaining film is perhaps Shirley's best and remains an American classic." With already five movies under her belt, February was a special month for Shirley Temple: at the Academy Awards ceremony she was the first of twelve child actors under 18 years old to receive a miniature Juvenile Oscar, this in recognition for her collective 1934 films. When Fox Films merged with Twentieth Century Pictures to adopt its new name 20th Century-Fox, the man in charge of the enlarged studio Darryl F. Zanuck considered Shirley his greatest asset. She received special treatment for her talents, having 11 writers, called the Shirley Temple Story Development team. These writers created original plots all centered around her, complete with her dimples and curly hair. She even had her own four-room house on the studio grounds, and a personal body guard assigned to protect her from adoring fans.