50 free Shirley Temple trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Shirley Temple trivia quiz covers the biggest child star Hollywood ever produced and the second career she built as a diplomat. The easy questions handle the basics: 'On the Good Ship Lollipop', Bojangles Robinson and the staircase dance, the Juvenile Oscar, her ambassadorship to Ghana and the mocktail that carries her name. From there it moves through the Baby Burlesks, her breakthrough in Stand Up and Cheer!, the salary fights with Fox, Curly Top and Heidi, and the strange rumours about wigs, teeth and dwarves. The harder half is for classic-film and history buffs: the Dalí painting, F. Scott Fitzgerald's screenplay, the Arthur Freed episode, her lone MGM film, the gun pointed at her on radio, her 1967 congressional run, the Kissinger party, the 1976 running-mate rumour, the Soviet tanks she watched in Prague in 1968 and her flight to Washington with Václav Havel. If you enjoyed our classic Hollywood or child stars quizzes, this is the deep dive on one life. Every answer was checked against Shirley Temple's encyclopaedia entry before publishing.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which years was Shirley Temple Hollywood's number-one box-office draw?
1934 to 1938
She was a child star through the whole run, retiring from film in 1950.
Q 02Where was Shirley Temple born on 23 April 1928?
Santa Monica, California
Her father was a bank employee and her mother a homemaker who styled her hair in ringlets.
Q 03How old was Temple when she began her film career in 1931?
Three
A casting director spotted her at dance school, where she hid behind a piano.
Q 04What was the name of the series of 10-minute shorts that used preschool children in every role, in which Temple got her start?
Baby Burlesks
They satirised recent films; she played a saloon singer in a parody of Mae West.
Q 05Which 1934 film, with the song 'Baby, Take a Bow', was Temple's breakthrough at Fox?
Stand Up and Cheer!
She had auditioned on 7 December 1933 and won a $150-a-week contract.
Q 06What was Temple's weekly salary under her first Fox contract in 1933?
$150
By the end of 1935 she was earning $2,500 a week.
Q 07Which 1934 film, written specifically for her, contains her signature song 'On the Good Ship Lollipop'?
Bright Eyes
It was her third film with James Dunn.
Q 08What special honour did the six-year-old receive in February 1935?
A Juvenile Academy Award
The miniature Oscar recognised her contribution as a juvenile performer during 1934.
Q 09Which tap dancer, her favourite co-star, performed the famous staircase dance with her in The Little Colonel?
Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson
They made four films together.
Q 10How many blond curls was Temple famously said to have?
56
Setting them each night was tedious, with weekly vinegar rinses that stung her eyes.
Q 11Which president said it was 'a splendid thing that for just 15 cents, an American can go to a movie and look at the smiling face of a baby and forget his troubles'?
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Her films were seen as a natural balm for the Depression.
Q 12Which 1935 film gave her the signature song 'Animal Crackers in My Soup'?
Curly Top
It was her last film before 20th Century Pictures merged with Fox.
Q 13At which famous filming location in Chatsworth was a rock feature eventually named after her?
Iverson Movie Ranch
Elaborate sets for her films were built there in Chatsworth.
Q 21An audience member pointed a handgun at the star during her 1939 radio debut, believing what?
She had stolen a dead daughter's soul
The daughter had died on the day the woman wrongly believed Temple was born.
Q 22Temple's 1942 CBS radio series, based on Sally Benson's stories, was called what?
Junior Miss
Sponsored by Procter & Gamble, it ran from March to August.
Q 23From 1958 she hosted a television anthology of fairy tales called what?
Shirley Temple's Storybook
Q 14Which surrealist painted her in 1939 as 'The Youngest, Most Sacred Monster of the Cinema in Her Time'?
Salvador Dalí
That same year she was animated alongside Donald Duck in The Autograph Hound.
Q 15Which novelist wrote a screenplay based on his story Babylon Revisited that a producer insisted must star the 12-year-old Temple?
F. Scott Fitzgerald
He first thought her too worldly for the part, then changed his mind after meeting her; her mother said no.
Q 16Which producer, at MGM, allegedly exposed himself to Temple at a preliminary interview?
Arthur Freed
When she responded with nervous giggles he threw her out and ended the contract.
Q 17Temple's only film for MGM was which unsuccessful 1941 picture?
Kathleen
MGM feared Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland would upstage her in Babes on Broadway and dropped her from it.
Q 18Which 1947 film paired Temple with Cary Grant?
The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer
It was one of her few hits of the 1940s.
Q 19Which future US president appeared with Temple in That Hagen Girl (1947)?
Ronald Reagan
Decades later she was disappointed not to receive an ambassadorship from him.
Q 20What was the title of Temple's last film, released in 1949?
A Kiss for Corliss
She formally announced her retirement from films in 1950.
It moved to NBC in 1960 as The Shirley Temple Show, now in colour.
Q 24Ideal Toy Company's Shirley Temple dolls accounted for roughly what share of all dolls sold in the US by the mid-1930s?
Almost a third
Her only rival as a merchandising star was Mickey Mouse.
Q 25A false rumour claimed Temple was not a child at all but what?
A 30-year-old dwarf
She claimed the Vatican even sent a priest to investigate.
Q 26Why did fans sometimes yank Temple's hair?
To test the rumour that she wore a wig
She said she wished all she had to do was wear a wig, given the nightly curling ordeal.
Q 27How did Temple hide the gaps from her lost baby teeth on screen?
Dental plates and caps
At her Grauman's Chinese Theatre ceremony she put her bare feet in the concrete to distract from her face.
Q 28In 1967 Temple ran unsuccessfully for what office?
US Congress
She came second in the open primary for California's 11th district behind Pete McCloskey.
Q 29Who overheard Temple discussing South West Africa at a party, sparking her diplomatic career?
Henry Kissinger
He was surprised she knew anything about it.
Q 30Which president appointed Temple a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly in 1969?
Richard Nixon
She worked at the US Mission under Ambassador Charles Yost.