Biography
Born on 23 September 1920 in Brooklyn, New York, Joseph Yule Jr. grew up to become a multifaceted performer whose five-foot-three frame radiated boundless energy across acting, singing, comedy, dance, and songwriting before his death on 6 April 2014 in North Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. Vaudeville parents raised him, and he stepped onto the stage at just 18 months; his mother soon relocated the family to Hollywood. At six he landed his breakthrough, launching more than fifty two-reel shorts built around the comic-strip figure Mickey McGuire. Throughout the 1930s most of his assignments remained small, yet 1935 brought praise for his work in Ah Wilderness! and for portraying Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
The year 1937 forged two lasting partnerships: Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry paired him for the first time with Judy Garland, while A Family Affair introduced the long-running Andy Hardy series that ran through 1946. In 1938 he delivered what critics called cinema’s first punk kid in Boys Town opposite Spencer Tracy; that same year Garland appeared with him again in Love Finds Andy Hardy. Their strongest joint successes arrived in the lavish musicals Babes in Arms (1939), Strike Up the Band (1940), Babes on Broadway (1941), and Girl Crazy (1943). At that point Rooney topped box-office lists across America and beyond.
After Thousands Cheer, MGM’s salute to the armed forces, and his own wartime service, he completed only two further musicals, Summer Holiday and Words and Music (both 1948). His fortunes fell sharply afterward, though several 1950s dramas showcased his dramatic range. Bankruptcy in 1962 marked his lowest point, yet he kept performing in films, nightclubs, dinner theater, and on television. A 1979 Oscar nomination for The Black Stallion sparked a triumphant Broadway return in Sugar Babies, a nostalgic tribute to burlesque packed with vintage songs and classic routines. Co-starring with Ann Miller, the show ran nearly 1,500 performances in New York and toured for years, reaching London in 1988.
An Emmy arrived in 1981 for the television film Bill, followed a year later by an honorary Oscar recognizing sixty years of versatile screen work. Four decades earlier he and Deanna Durbin had shared a special Academy Award for embodying youthful spirit and setting high standards as juvenile performers. Into the 1990s he appeared in dozens more pictures, ultimately exceeding two hundred films. In 1990 he returned to Broadway for the final weeks of The Will Rogers Follies, playing Clem, the father of Will Rogers.
Eight marriages produced nine children; among his wives were Ava Gardner, whom he met while costumed as Carmen Miranda, Barbara Thomason, later murdered by a lover, and country singer Jan Chamberlain. He remained resilient despite massive alimony payments drawn from earnings estimated at twelve million dollars against three billion in total box-office revenue for his pre-1965 films. In 1998 he took the road again as the Wizard in a touring stage adaptation of The Wizard of Oz, with Eartha Kitt as the Wicked Witch, culminating at Madison Square Garden. Even in the twenty-first century he and his wife mounted the live revue Let’s Put On a Show!, embodying the motto of the Mickey Rooney Old People’s Association: “Never Retire But Inspire.” He continued working until his death at age ninety-three, surrounded by family at his North Hollywood home.
The year 1937 forged two lasting partnerships: Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry paired him for the first time with Judy Garland, while A Family Affair introduced the long-running Andy Hardy series that ran through 1946. In 1938 he delivered what critics called cinema’s first punk kid in Boys Town opposite Spencer Tracy; that same year Garland appeared with him again in Love Finds Andy Hardy. Their strongest joint successes arrived in the lavish musicals Babes in Arms (1939), Strike Up the Band (1940), Babes on Broadway (1941), and Girl Crazy (1943). At that point Rooney topped box-office lists across America and beyond.
After Thousands Cheer, MGM’s salute to the armed forces, and his own wartime service, he completed only two further musicals, Summer Holiday and Words and Music (both 1948). His fortunes fell sharply afterward, though several 1950s dramas showcased his dramatic range. Bankruptcy in 1962 marked his lowest point, yet he kept performing in films, nightclubs, dinner theater, and on television. A 1979 Oscar nomination for The Black Stallion sparked a triumphant Broadway return in Sugar Babies, a nostalgic tribute to burlesque packed with vintage songs and classic routines. Co-starring with Ann Miller, the show ran nearly 1,500 performances in New York and toured for years, reaching London in 1988.
An Emmy arrived in 1981 for the television film Bill, followed a year later by an honorary Oscar recognizing sixty years of versatile screen work. Four decades earlier he and Deanna Durbin had shared a special Academy Award for embodying youthful spirit and setting high standards as juvenile performers. Into the 1990s he appeared in dozens more pictures, ultimately exceeding two hundred films. In 1990 he returned to Broadway for the final weeks of The Will Rogers Follies, playing Clem, the father of Will Rogers.
Eight marriages produced nine children; among his wives were Ava Gardner, whom he met while costumed as Carmen Miranda, Barbara Thomason, later murdered by a lover, and country singer Jan Chamberlain. He remained resilient despite massive alimony payments drawn from earnings estimated at twelve million dollars against three billion in total box-office revenue for his pre-1965 films. In 1998 he took the road again as the Wizard in a touring stage adaptation of The Wizard of Oz, with Eartha Kitt as the Wicked Witch, culminating at Madison Square Garden. Even in the twenty-first century he and his wife mounted the live revue Let’s Put On a Show!, embodying the motto of the Mickey Rooney Old People’s Association: “Never Retire But Inspire.” He continued working until his death at age ninety-three, surrounded by family at his North Hollywood home.
Albums
