Private Screenings: Child Stars

TCM host Robert Osborne gets so many great stories out of the guests on this edition of PRIVATE SCREENINGS, they had to expand the special to 90 minutes. That's hardly surprising given the participants. For this panel on the phenomenon of child stardom in Golden Age Hollywood, Osborne has a spirited conversion with four of the screen's most fondly remembered juveniles -- Darryl Hickman, Dickie Moore, Margaret O'Brien and Jane Withers. Although all built solid adult careers, each was part of a studio system that used children to promote the dream of the all-American family. Hickman was the all-American boy in films like Men of Boys Town (1941) and Leave Her to Heaven (1945). Moore presented a more delicate image of childhood, particularly as the children for whom Barbara Stanwyck and Marlene Dietrich sacrifice everything in So Big! and Blonde Venus (both 1932), respectively. Withers shot to stardom by stealing scenes from Shirley Temple in Bright Eyes (1934), a film she almost turned down for fear that being mean on screen to the box-office champ would sink her career before it started. And O'Brien won a Special Oscar® for her impressive emotional range in Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), which made her MGM's top moppet. Together, they create an image of what it was like to grow up in the dream factory and work with sometimes jealous adult stars.

By Frank Miller