I've blogged about that "Baby Burlesque" before. When Temple died in 2014, listing all my earlier blogging of the great child actress, I wrote:
April 29, 2009, a controversy over a photographic presentation of teenaged Miley Cyrus looking overly sexualized led me to show you this clip of Shirley Temple as a toddler playing a seductress. It's simply astounding by today's standards....
It was interesting to watch Rogan seeing this craziness for the first time. Whitney Cummings did an excellent job with the running commentary.
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I'm trying to remember where I saw an analysis that went something like: Temple's audiences were primarily men who had seen the horrors of World War I. She didn't represent sex appeal to them. She represented innocence. They weren't enthralled by her sexuality - there was none. They were enthralled by the hearkening back to a simpler, happier time of childlike pleasure in a world that was still green and good and wholesome. The generations that have grown up since, in the world that has become familiar to us since, have become increasingly adept at seeing depravity and ugliness everywhere, and innocence nowhere.
"Cancel Hollywood's dark side"
Fuck just cancel Hollywood. Actually...maybe just wait a while because from what I understand about what's going on behind the scenes at a lot of major studios, they might do that themselves.
At the end of the clip, Rogan says about Hollywood directors: “I bet they all were, I bet that was the gig.” Meaning that they all expected the actresses to sleep with them if they were to get the part. Of course that was the gig! That’s why Weinstein got away with it for so long. That’s why Woody Allen put his girlfriends in starring roles in his movies. Gene Roddenberry seems to have slept with most of the actresses he cast on Star Trek, until he married one anyways.
Child marriages used to be the norm. Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13 year old cousin in 1958. People used to live just 40-45 years on average, with longer lives happening in the 19th and 20th century. Children routinely worked in mines because their small bodies would fit in small crevices, they also made tiny chains and jewelry because of good eyes and small hands. When a girl hits puberty...she's capable of being a mother...Latin American coming out parts occur at 15 today (quinceañera).
There used to be a sense of urgency about growing up fast. This would have hit much closer to home 75 to 100 years ago.
There was also a tradition of raw ignorance, religious suppression, and/or turning a blind eye to sexually suggestive content. Pre-1960s adult thinking was a lot lot lot more innocent (and wrong) than post-sexual-revolution thinking.
One mitigating factor might be that there was no move afoot to normalize pedophilia in Temple's heyday. Stepping over the line then would have resulted in condemnation. Today it would more likely result in an Oscar nomination.
Wow, snarking Shirley Temple movies. Haha. Boy, Rogan sure is "Cutting edge".
I'm sure given the sexual habits of the Hollywood producers, at the time, they would've snuck in some pedophilia. But few picked up on in the 30s or 40s.
According to Temple, one of the Hollywood producers, Fiedler or Friedman, demanded she give him a blow job. And whipped out his dick. 10 year old Temple just laughed - she thought his dick looked funny. Today, she'd be on TV talking about that incident CONSTANTLY as METO momemnt. But she just told her mother, and wrote about it in her autobiography.
Of course, that people in 2022 think about pedophilia when watching her movies, just shows people are more aware of how twisted and weird Hollywood is.
I can't find it right now, but Elvis had a movie where it was damned uncomfortable watching him drool over a per-pubescent girl dancer.
1) Grahame Greene pulled the "every adult watching Temple is a pedophile" snark back in the 30s and got sued by the Studio. And lost.
2) My Grandmother loved Shirly Temple movies and paid for my mother to have tap dancing lessons. Sadly, they didn't take.
Well...I'm disturbed. At least that was my first instinct.
But then I remembered growing up watching Shirley Temple movies and, back then, they were considered just wholesome entertainment. And we were more taken by her talent. We weren't looking for the sexual end of it. That's not how the world at large worked back then. Sure...it was everywhere. But it was unspoken. It was behind the scenes. And we were, as kids, still allowed to be kids back then. We did not have our lives sexualized until we were a bit older. Not like today where it's in your face from your Kindergarten teacher on up, and you be likin' it or you're some kinda prude. Or worse- a Conservative. It's a badge of honor these days to be a slut- male or female. It's di rigueur in entertainment, to dress the look, talk the talk, and act the act of open and obvious sexuality. And it's not enough for a man to love a woman. Now you have to be a former man, loving a former woman, but not having sex with each other, only with your friends who dress as cats.
Still...the video on the Joe Rogan clip was creepy. And my mind went directly to Joe Biden. Tell me each of us- Republican and Democrat alike- could not see Joe Biden in that starring role.
I met her once...well, I was in a very small jewelry store in Menlo Park when she walked in. I give famous people their space so I did not approach her.
She had an aura; a presence that is hard to explain.
I've often thought about what it would be like (for her) to be one of the most famous people on earth in the 1930s in the middle of a worldwide depression, especially as a child.
After she had left, the store manager assured me that she was very nice...
Little Miss Sunshine (2006) mocked the regular parents, from the scriptwriters' point of view, and the grandfather's point of view too. The kid was in on it.
Child pornography were a part of Hollywood’s vast arsenal of audience attractions. Leading ladies who did not sleep around with producers were the oddballs.
do we know he put his finger in the butthole?
she's fully clothed.
-Wet Ass Pussy wants to know. So does Madonna and her coke bottle crotch.
how old was Ambassador Temple, when she made this?
Was she as old as Aisha was when she was married to Mohammad? As old as when Aisha's marriage was consummated?
I wonder if there was any behind the scenes bestiality going on with Lassie. There are a lot of stories floating around about Rin Tin Tin. His big break didn't come with playing dead or so they say.
Dostoevsky and Proust both wrote about the urge to "dandle" a little girl on their knee. I guess meaning so they can put their hand up the dress ... Just gotta do it for some reason.
This "dandling" was a thing.
Then the nasty parents have the audacity to demand payment! These petty, conniving beggars!
*Pays them off*
The funny thing is:
for years and years (and years!) uptight prudish religious types condemned Hollywood as Gomorrah.
and year and year (and years!) stylish hip trendy types said:
"Good Grief! they EVEN Think that Hollywood is sinful!! ha ha! (ha ha!)
And now, the stylish hip trendy types are saying; you know What? Hollywood is EVIL!
and uptight prudish types are sitting with their children, rolling their eyes.
What's next?
Will we have some sixties child being AGHAST! at the fact that Star Trek costumes showed leg?
"Child marriages used to be the norm. Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13 year old cousin in 1958."
And it was treated as a huge outrage!
I recently watched Antonioni's "The Blow Up". The movie was from 1966 and was the iconic movie of Swinging London. The movie starred David Hemmings. He looked like Paul McCartney, except with blonde hair and better looks.....He played the part of a fashion photographer. While taking some casual photos of a pretty girl in the park, he inadvertently captured a photo of a gunman in the background.....Hemmings was supposed to be some kind of anti-hero, but he played the role with a cool swagger that made the role sympathetic. The girl he photographed in the park later came to his studio. She took off her clothes and offered to have sex with him in return for the photos. Still later, two girls who wanted to be models came to the studio and had sex with him in order to procure that employment.....Hemmings was a full on Harvey Weinstein in the movie, but I guess when you look like him and not like Weinstein, you're not a dick. You're phallic and ambrosial. The movie made Hemmings a star. I read several contemporary reviews. The movie was critically acclaimed, and none of the reviewers criticized his Me-Too behavior. There was some criticism that his character did not report the murder, but no reviewer thought his sexual behavior worthy of criticism.
@Althouse: "And it was treated as a huge outrage!"
How does that differ from my thesis that attitudes toward early sexuality were split/bifurcated? The naïve sexual innocence of many co-occurred with child marriages and child labor.
Also, a 1958 TV rock star was a generation later. Before mass media in the 20th century, small communities lived the way they lived and it wasn't publicized further.
50 shades of human grooming less the trans/gender, trans/social motives. Sustainable liberty is premised on a conservative (i.e. temperate) model.
She represented innocence. They weren't enthralled by her sexuality - there was none
Exactly. It's the same affection that a mother or father has for their child.
'And it was treated as a huge outrage!'
Yes, I don't think that burnished his reputation.
But I also met Jerry Lee...he was very pleasant...
Next time Joe shows a video, he might want to make sure that half the screen isn't out of frame.
Should be kind of obvious for someone who is a TV actor...
The worst part about the moral depravity of Hollywood people is how they pretend to be better than us and in a position to tell us how we should live our lives. What do they think a normal person is like that we need their guidance on how life should be lived!?
The film Rogan and Cummings are watching is very early in Temple's career. The movies where she's the star are handled differently. She plays a child in those movies, not an imitation adult. The charm and innocence is handled beautifully. It brings so much uplift and happiness. She is often paired with a gruff old man who opens up into a good person because of her, but not through sexuality.
The first one I ever saw was "Captain January." I love that. Also special favorites that I would recommend to everyone: "The Little Princess" and "Heidi."
"The Little Princess" is free on Amazon Prime right now: https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B088G1THZJ/ref=atv_dp_amz_c_UTPsmN_1_1
You have to pay a few dollars for "Heidi" and "Captain January," but they're on Amazon Prime too.
Really, if you watch those 3 movies... well, I don't know what will happen to you. But if I watched those 3 movies over the next 3 days, I would feel very very happy.
Graham Greene had to pay a libel settlement to Shirley Temple for saying she was a "hotsy little totsy" in a movie review.
Here's the Elvis clip with the 10 year-old harem dancer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76oMu9irnJc
The most charitable thing you could call it is ... bizarre.
"There was some criticism that his character did not report the murder, but no reviewer thought his sexual behavior worthy of criticism."
Why would his sexual behavior in the film have been criticized? I saw it years ago but cannot recall clearly. Were the teen girls he had sex with actually underage? Did he force himself upon them, or did they happily participate or even initiate the sexual interlude? Remember, this was during the swinging 60s, when London was the Swingin'est place to be, (until that became San Francisco). The characters' sexual behavior would have considered the ideal paradigm of the sexual behavior of all hip young people at the time. (Not that all or even most young people were necessarily actually having such bountiful free sex.)
As for the character's not reporting the murder, part of the point of the movie was to bring into question whether he actually witnessed what he thought he saw in his photos...was there actually a murder at all? How much can we trust our perception of the events around us, or the meaning of what we think we have witnessed, especially as our experience is mediated through cameras, recordings, and other distancing technologies that stand between us and the world we "experience" at a remove?
"The Little Princess"
The everlasting love of a daughter for a father. The goodwill of people unrelated in social harmony with childhood is probably a universal trait. A tale... story of optimism about the human condition.
"The worst part about the moral depravity of Hollywood people is how they pretend to be better than us and in a position to tell us how we should live our lives."
Do they "pretend to be better than us" or "tell us how we should live our lives?"
I was a kid when I saw Shirley Temple movies on tv. I hated them. They seemed so cloying and cutesy, (not that I knew the term "cloying" at the time). Yecchhh! I've never seen any of them as an adult, (or any time after I was 9 or 10).
She plays a child in those movies, not an imitation adult.
To be fair, Temple plays a child who is mature beyond her years, and while Nature is part of the whole, it is separable in context, and the adults are not disposed to conflation. Good for the child. Good for the adult.
Whitney Cummings is a comedian who created and starred in a TV sitcom about her life, called "Whitney." To play her boyfriend, she hired another comedian, Chris D'Elia, about whom... well, let's just say this topic is relevant.
I never watched Shirley Temple movies. At least, never fully through. Hated them. They were on all the time in my house- my sister liked them. (or turned them on because I hated them- either is a possability)
And I'm not going to watch clips or movies to see what all the fuss is about.
Granted, the past is another country, where they do things differently... But, some things cannot be unseen, once seen through the lens of knowledge.
It used to be an unspoken given that you got roles through sex. Even the kids. I had an acquaintance who claimed a lot of familiarity with the Hollywood types. She's got an IMDB entry, which leads me to conclude that she was either a really good fabulist with an excellent plastic surgeon, or telling me at least a version of the truth about her life on the periphery of Hollywood's child star scene.
The stuff she described going on made Harvey Weinstein look saint-like. The tales told by Corey Feldman were in perfect consonance with the ones she related to me, and that was well before Feldman imploded publicly.
I knew some other people, including a wannabe stage mom who found out that she really didn't want her daughter in that life. At. All. She'd done some work in Japan while she was stationed over there, and wanted to continue it here in the US. Let's just leave it at "It was better being a gaijin blond little girl working in Japan than trying to get work in the Hollywood milieu, and Japan was a paradise of care and concern for the well-being of the kids compared to the US..."
Which, if you're familiar with Japan's media...?
The entire milieu has been corrupt since day one. Much of LA went out there in the first place because Thomas Edison wouldn't let them do the crap they wanted to, and demanded some standards. Or, so I've read... There are other stories.
Frankly, looking at how messed up a lot of the kids wind up, I think there's good objective evidence available in the open-source documentation to argue that Corey Feldman and the rest of the people on his side are probably right. This is an industry which lionized (and still does, to this day...) Roman Polansky, after all...
It was comedy. Meant to be cute and funny, not seductive or erotic. At least I hope it was.
In Britain in the Thirties, Graham Green wrote an article attributing Shirley Temple's appeal to lasciviousness.
Her admirers -- middle aged men and clergymen -- respond to her dubious coquetry, to the sight of her well-shaped and desireable little body, packed with enormous vitality, only because the safety curtain of story and dialog drops between their intelligence and their desire.
The result was lawsuits and the magazine having to shut down.
I thought we put Freud behind us, but we're just getting deeper into his world.
People who tell "us" what to do generally are people who think they are better than "us," are they not?
You'll never go broke looking for sexism in old movies. Mark Rappaport, the documentary filmmaker I mentioned a few days back, is a good example. Everything is lasciviousness and the rapacious male gaze. He has much sympathy for the plight of women in old Hollywood, but to me he came across as too censorious about those days.
rcocean said...
According to Temple, one of the Hollywood producers, Fiedler or Friedman, demanded she give him a blow job. And whipped out his dick. 10 year old Temple just laughed - she thought his dick looked funny. Today, she'd be on TV talking about that incident CONSTANTLY as METO momemnt. But she just told her mother, and wrote about it in her autobiography.
I would personally prefer that any man that whipped his dick out and told a 10 year old to suck it should be a social pariah in any decent society.
And if the 10 year old girl is actually forced to consummate the man should just be killed.
Some things are taboo for a reason.
"Here's the Elvis clip with the 10 year-old harem dancer"
Thanks. That's the one. Hard to believe no one found tht too creepy to include in the flick.
Robert Cook 11:30
answer: yes.
Lurker21 said...
It was comedy. Meant to be cute and funny, not seductive or erotic. At least I hope it was.
Society is shaped by the pressures placed on the individual.
Everyone involved in this should be shamed mercilessly. None of this should be considered an acceptable joke.
I would prefer a society where men are scared to go anywhere near a prepubescent girl in any sort of sexual manner to the point they should be worried to be alone with young girls outside of immediate family.
Robert Cook said...
"The worst part about the moral depravity of Hollywood people is how they pretend to be better than us and in a position to tell us how we should live our lives."
Do they "pretend to be better than us" or "tell us how we should live our lives?"
When you resort to humor like this is interesting.
You did mean this as a joke right?
'I wonder if there was any behind the scenes bestiality going on with Lassie. There are a lot of stories floating around about Rin Tin Tin.'
Don't even get me started on Mr. Ed.
Although localized, sexual abuse of children was similarly common back then when we "were more innocent".
I don't believe a journeyman actor sexually assaulted the world's most famous actress in front of her mother and hundreds of people and through her clothing. Rogan and Cummings are liars engaged in systemic misandry.
Don't even get me started on Mr. Ed.
Or that Arnold on Green Acres.
Yeah, Baby Burlesque is deliberately weird, but seeing pedophilia in this clip is pretty absurd.
jg said...
Although localized, sexual abuse of children was similarly common back then when we "were more innocent".
This is still true around the world.
When allowed there are many people, mostly men, who will fuck anything they can get their hands on. It is a biological imperative.
But we should strive for a society where the consequences of child rape and molestation are so severe that these people choose not to act on their impulses. These kind of jokes should revolve around the nasty things that happen to molesters.
Education Realist said...
Yeah, Baby Burlesque is deliberately weird, but seeing pedophilia in this clip is pretty absurd.
The insinuations in the video are pretty clear. His arm angle does no go to her waste. Her reaction when she sits is clearly meant to revolve around where the finger he licked went. It went below the waste.
The dialogue clearly reinforces this insinuation.
The video should have ended the career of everyone involved in producing it.
Two people who made their fortunes in Hollywood are shocked, shocked they say, now that they have their fortunes and it's social media trendy to notice such things.
If you go on Twitter, Ann, and start talking about how pedophiles groom children, they'll ban you.
If instead, you agree not to use the word "groomer" and start using other euphemisms for this practice of enticing young children, they'll ban you.
I'm starting to think that Twitter is the way that pedophiles initially meet up with their victims.
Twooming, I'm calling it.
Certain to be added to the list of banned terms that pedophiles don't want used to out them.
You once were instrumental in taking down a child predator (serial child groomer Anthony Weiner). It's sad you'll not be allowed to do that ever again.
"Do they "pretend to be better than us" or "tell us how we should live our lives?"
I guess you have spent the last half century in cryogenic suspension while Hollywood has painted that dark land between the coasts as Mordor. Pretty much any TV show or movie that takes place in the suburbs involves some deep dark secret that makes the place Hell on Earth. You also missed the rise of wokeness in pretty much everything produced. The Message has replaced actual entertainment. Yes they believe they are better than the folks in fly-over country, and they are more than happy to tell you why.
It's hard to see in this clip, but looks like he licked his finger to smooth one of her curlylocks. His hand goes to her hair, but either he does it quickly or skips it after all. Maybe he sees in her eyes that she will "break scene" if he adds this unrehearsed business. Then as she climbs onto his lap he slides his hand down to support her. Honi soit qui mal y pense.
When I was a kid Shirley Temple movies were rarely shown on TV, and I didn't like what little I saw of them. But she seems to have grown up to be a decent and reasonable adult, so good on her.
I'm with Greene.
Achilles suggests that grown men should avoid close contact with prepubescent females; Prof van Creveld is of like mind, and predicts the return of rigid gender separation of Handmaid or Islamic tinge. I think things may go that way over time.
Never could stand Shirley Temple, so can't comment on her ouevre and won't watch the Rogan.
For a moment there I thought rcocean regretted his mother not learning to lap dance. Dirty computer screen!
I took a few weeks of tap as a PE elective in college. That stuff is hard to do.
Temple still acted into her young adult years; she had a significant role in "Fort Apache" with Henry Fonda. While the dialog was a little stilted, her talent was there. She acted in that film with her husband, John Agar, whose alcoholism made for a tough situation. She was always candid about the casting shenanigans when she was a child, but it seems as if she had enough support to overcome it.
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