In this Book
University of California Press
- Precocious Charms: Stars Performing Girlhood in Classical Hollywood Cinema
- Book
- 2013
- Published by: University of California Press
summary
In Precocious Charms, Gaylyn Studlar examines how Hollywood presented female stars as young girls or girls on the verge of becoming women. Child stars are part of this study but so too are adult actresses who created motion picture masquerades of youthfulness. Studlar details how Mary Pickford, Shirley Temple, Deanna Durbin, Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Jones, and Audrey Hepburn performed girlhood in their films. She charts the multifaceted processes that linked their juvenated star personas to a wide variety of cultural influences, ranging from Victorian sentimental art to New Look fashion, from nineteenth-century children’s literature to post-World War II sexology, and from grand opera to 1930s radio comedy. By moving beyond the general category of "woman," Precocious Charms leads to a new understanding of the complex pleasures Hollywood created for its audience during the half century when film stars were a major influence on America’s cultural imagination.
Table of Contents
Download Full Book
- Title Page, Copyright, Dedication
- pp. i-viii
- List of Illustrations
- pp. xi-xiv
- Acknowledgments
- pp. xv-xviii
- Introduction
- pp. 1-18
- Conclusion
- pp. 235-248
- Selected Bibliography
- pp. 289-298
Additional Information
ISBN
9780520955295
Related ISBN(s)
9780520274242
MARC Record
OCLC
966756827
Pages
324
Launched on MUSE
2017-01-01
Language
English
Open Access
No