"Lotta Crabtree" (1954) is a Season Two episode of "Death Valley Days" and charts the rise to fame of a girl in California during the Gold Rush whose innate knack for learning songs and dances leads to a performing career in ramshackle theaters found in the mining towns dotting the landscape back then. Legendary entertainer Lola Montez (Yvonne Cross) is the first to spot her talent and give her some lessons. Lotta's fame grows enough to get bookings in major cities across the country and she travels to New York, Boston and San Francisco, among other cities. We see Lotta as a child perform a dance under the guidance of Montez and then again in a scene with a local performer/theater manager who, after she steals his thunder during a sidewalk display, goes to her mother to recruit her to appear as a regular attraction. Since Lotta's disapproving father is off on a wild prospecting goose chase, Lotta's mother takes over and devotes herself to the child's performing career fulltime. We see an extended Irish-themed song-and-dance number in a theater, followed by a montage of her tour around the west. Then we see Lotta as a beautiful young woman and a star in the making and we see her sing a few numbers, including in a lavish San Francisco theater where the Mayor (Lyle Talbot) bestows a tiara on her and a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle courts her.
There's a lot of performance footage in this episode, so we get a sense of how audiences experienced this entertainer and why she was such a sensation. It certainly helps that Sharon Baird, the girl playing Lotta as a child, is such a phenomenal tap dancer herself. She has at least three full numbers in the episode and each is an absolute delight. (Baird went on to become a Mouseketeer on the first incarnation of "The Mickey Mouse Club.") As a grown woman, Lotta is played by Gloria Jean, a one-time musical star at Universal, and she sings full songs in her performance sequences, minus the dancing.
I was not very familiar with Ms. Crabtree when I sat down to watch this episode on the Encore Western Channel. According to Wikipedia, "Lotta Crabtree would go on to become one of the wealthiest and most beloved American entertainers of the late 19th century. From her beginnings as a 6-year-old until her retirement at the age of 45, she entertained and was named "The Nation's Darling"." In 1951, she was the subject of a Technicolor musical from 20th Century Fox, THE GOLDEN GIRL, starring Mitzi Gaynor as Crabtree. She was also portrayed on the long-running western series, "Bonanza," in two different episodes eleven years apart, one starring Yvonne De Carlo in the role and the other starring Sally Kellerman. Interestingly, supporting character Lola Montez would become the subject of German filmmaker Max Ophuls' final film, LOLA MONTES (1955), a year after this TV episode aired.
