Shirley Temple's "The Little Princess"

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 257, 28 July 1939, Page 14

Shirley Temple's "The Little Princess"

"PRANCES HODGSON BURNETT. "*■ most popular authoress of her time, wrote the “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” which, as a book, as a stage play, and as a picture, became world-famous. Then Mrs. Burnett wrote “The Little Princess',” which positively rivalled, and in some places outrivalled, “Little Lord Fauntleroy.” Its sales were enormous.

After seeing the film based on “The Little Princess.” one could imagine that Mrs. Burnett might have visioned an abnormally gifted girl such as Shirley Temple for the character of Sarah Crewe, the daughter of a soldier, supposedly killed in the Boer War, who is left to battle for her existence as a drudge in the young ladies’ seminary which she had entered in her father’s lifetime as the star pupil. Sarah faces her troubles and shoulders her burden sustained by an inward conviction that her father is not dead. She steals through the fog and rain to search the hospital wards of soldiers returned from Africa in the hope of finding her “daddy,” and in the end her faith is justified, for she finds him in a demented soldier patient, who mutters through dark days and long nights, the one word, “Sarah.” The sight of his little child and her dramatic insistence that she is “Sarah,” pierces his sick brain, and brings back memory and joyous recognition. The atmosphere of the play is British, and every member of the cast is a player of the highest grade. Richard Greene. Anita Louise, lan Hunter, Cesar Romero. Arthur Treacher, Mary Nash, Sybil Jason, Miles Manader.