Of Shirley Temple, Hayley Mills, and Patty Duke
Have you ever heard of the Academy Juvenile Award? It was a special, Honorary Academy Award handed out to movie stars under the age of 18. It is an Oscar category that does not exist today, but was handed out as an award from 1934-1960. Only 12 child stars were fortunate enough to receive this award, however, 14 statuettes of this award are known to exist. Initially, the award was presented for the child actor’s number of film’s throughout the year, but the Academy started presenting it for a child’s performance in one specific movie in 1946.
The award was first presented to Shirley Temple in 1935 for her work in 1934 in Fox’s Stand Up and Cheer!, Paramount’s Little Miss Marker, Fox’s Baby Take a Bow, and Fox’s Bright Eyes. The last recipient of this award was Hayley Mills for Disney’s Pollyanna (1960). After that, in 1962, Patty Duke received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar Nomination for her performance as Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker (1962), and ultimately won, making her the first child movie star ever to win an Oscar. That proved to the Academy that child actors could be equally capable of winning and Oscar just like an adult movie star, and the Academy Juvenile Award was dropped from the Oscars. The list of all the recipients of this award and the films that they received it for are as follows.
Shirley Temple-Stand Up and Cheer!, Little Miss Marker, Baby Take a Bow, Bright Eyes (1934). This made Temple the youngest person ever to receive an honor from the Academy, even to this day.
Mickey Rooney-Andy Hardy series, Boys Town (1938). Rooney was the eldest winner of the Academy Juvenile Award.
Deanna Durbin-Mad About Music, That Certain Age (1938). Durbin starred opposite Judy Garland in a film produced by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer entitled Every Sunday (1936). Both Garland and Durbin had hoped to be on the MGM roster as two female singers, but only Garland would go on to officially enlisted on the roster. Durbin, however, would go on to sign with Universal Studios.
Judy Garland-Babes in Arms, The Wizard of Oz (1939). Garland would receive a Best Actress Oscar Nomination for A Star is Born (1954) and a Best Supporting Actress Oscar Nomination for Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), but sadly this would be her only Oscar win.
Margaret O’Brien-The Canterville Ghost, Music for Millions, Meet Me in St. Louis, (starring opposite Judy Garland) (1944). Both Garland and O’Brien would unfortunately loose their Oscars in their lifetimes (O’Brien lost it when she was 17 years old). Garland unfortunately was never able to relocate hers before her death in 1969. O’Brien, however, would recover hers, but it took 41 years to do so.
Peggy Ann Garner-Nob Hill, Junior Miss, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945). Garner received a great deal of acclaim for her work as a child, but she made very few acting appearances as an adult.
Claude Jarman, Jr.-The Yearling (1946). Jarman only made 10 other film appearances after The Yearling (1946), but also found success as a film producer and film festival executive producer.
Ivan Jandi-The Search (1948). Being a native of the Czech Republic, Jandi was the first and only foreign actor ever to be nominated with a Juvenile Oscar.
Bobby Driscoll-So Dear to My Heart, The Window (1949). In addition to starring in several Disney live-action films, i.e. Song of the South (1946), So Dear to My Heart (1949), and Treasure Island (1950), Driscoll is also best-known throughout the history of Disney as the voice of Peter Pan (1953).
John Whiteley and Vincent Winner-The Little Kidnappers (1954).
Hayley Mills-Pollyanna (1960). Mills’s dad, Sir John Mills acted in another film for the Disney studios, Swiss Family Robinson (1960), released the same year as Pollyanna.
It’s extraordinary how children can, every once in a while, give an emotionally-moving performance that’s worthy of an Oscar, same as an adult. It’s good knowing that today, children are being nominated in the same category against adult actors, instead of having a category of their own.
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