FILM WUNDERKIND TEMPLE HONORED.

Byline: Evan Henerson Staff Writer

That's some voyage that ``Good Ship Lollipop'' has provided: from Santa Monica to Hollywood, all around the world and back again to a still-embracing Tinseltown. Shirley Temple Black, the child star turned U.S. ambassador and two-time Rose Parade grand marshal, added another laurel Sunday night when she accepted the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.

The youngest performer to be awarded an Oscar in 1935 at the age of 6 (she also was given an honorary award in 1992), the 77-year-old Black has not acted since she hosted and performed in ``Shirley Temple's Storybook'' and ``The Shirley Temple Show'' in the late 1950s.

Introduced first by Dakota Fanning - who carried a Shirley Temple doll onstage - and later by Jamie Lee Curtis, Black largely downplayed her achievements, saying that above all else, she treasured her role as a ``wife and mother.''

How did Black, who was the box-office champ in the 1930s, manage to become a world-renowned icon? ``Why was Rin Tin Tin the favorite dog star of that time?'' Black asked. ``I think times are reflection of what we're all going through,'' she continued. ``Sometimes the picture is pretty, sometimes it's not attractive. I think I was in the right place at the right time.'' She also said that Fanning was a strong present-day torchbearer for child actors.

``I hugged her three times. We like each other,'' Black said of Fanning. ``She's well taken care of and seems to be very sensible.''

The daughter of a banker and a homemaker, Shirley Jane Temple was discovered in 1932 by director Charles Lamont and made her screen debut in his 1932 ``What's to Do?'' A curly-haired moppet who sang, tap-danced and expertly parodied her more celebrated co-stars, Temple contracted with the Fox Studios (later to become 20th Century Fox). In 1934 alone, she made 10 films, including ``Baby Take a Bow,'' ``Little Miss Marker'' and ``Bright Eyes,'' the film in which she first sang the song ``On the Good Ship Lollipop.''

Young though she was, Temple said she was well protected both within the industry and from the outside. ``My sweet mother - she said go to work, as usual. There was nothing about Shirley Temple being anyone special,'' said Black. ``I had two big brothers, one was in the FBI, the other a professional wrestler. So nobody bothered with me.''

Eventually graduating to teen roles, she retired from show business in the early 1950s. In addition to an unsuccessful bid for a congressional seat in 1967, Black later became a diplomat, serving as the United States' ambassador to Ghana and Czechoslovakia.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

(color) Shirley Temple Black addresses SAG award attendees.

Gus Ruelas/Staff Photographer