Curly Top (film)
| Curly Top | |
|---|---|
Film poster by Joseph A. Maturo
|
|
| Directed by | Irving Cummings |
| Produced by | Winfield R. Sheehan |
| Written by | Patterson McNutt Arthur J. Beckhard |
| Starring |
Shirley Temple John Boles Rochelle Hudson |
| Music by |
Ray Henderson Oscar Bradley R.H. Bassett Hugo Friedhofer Arthur Lange |
| Cinematography | John F. Seitz |
| Edited by | Jack Murray |
|
Production
company |
|
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
|
Release date
|
|
|
Running time
|
74 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $1.1 million |
Curly Top (1935) is an American musical film directed by Irving Cummings. The screenplay by Patterson McNutt and Arthur J. Beckhard focuses on the adoption of a young orphan (Shirley Temple) by a wealthy bachelor (John Boles) and his romantic attraction to her older sister (Rochelle Hudson).
Together with The Littlest Rebel, another Temple vehicle, the film was listed as one of the top box office draws of 1935 by Variety. The film's musical numbers include "Animal Crackers in My Soup" and "When I Grow Up".
This film was the first of four films that Shirley Temple and Arthur Treacher cooperated in; others were Stowaway (1936), Heidi (1937) and The Little Princess (1939).
Young Elizabeth Blair (Shirley Temple) lives at the Lakeside Orphanage, a dreary, regimented place supervised by two decent but dour women. Her older sister Mary (Rochelle Hudson) works in the kitchen, laundry, and dormitory. Elizabeth is a sweet child but her high spirits often lead her into trouble with the superintendent.
When the trustees descend on the orphanage for a tour of inspection, Elizabeth is caught playfully mimicking the head trustee and is threatened with being sent to a public institution. Young, rich, handsome trustee Edward Morgan (John Boles) intervenes. He takes a liking to Elizabeth and, in a private interview with the child, learns that most of her life has been spent obsequiously expressing her gratitude for every mouthful that has fallen her way. He adopts her but, not wanting to curb Elizabeth's spirit by making her feel slavishly obligated to him for every kindness, he tells her a fictitious "Hiram Jones" is her benefactor and he is simply acting on Jones's behalf as his lawyer. He nicknames her "Curly Top." Meanwhile, he has met and fallen in love with Elizabeth's sister Mary but will not admit it.
...
Wikipedia