Mickey Rooney by James A. MacEachern

Author:James A. MacEachern
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: McFarland
Published: 2017-05-12T04:00:00+00:00

There was a little luck involved in Rooney’s resurgence as well. Duke had secured for him a nice gig in Las Vegas performing at the Flamingo hotel just a few weeks after it opened. On the plane back from Vegas, Rooney and Duke met the Pulitzer Prize‒winning writer James Michener. Michener and Rooney began to talk and the actor impressed him greatly. In fact, Michener liked him so well that he promised to write a nice part for him in the screenplay he was doing based on his book The Bridges at Toko-Ri. Rooney did the picture and, although he wasn’t paid a lot of money, the 1954 film was a major Hollywood production that starred William Holden and Grace Kelly. The movie was a success and Rooney received some very good reviews; there was even talk of a possible Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He caused quite a stir during the shooting. His was a small but pivotal part as rescue helicopter pilot Mike Forney. Because it was a supporting role there was a lot of down time during the shooting. The location was an aircraft carrier, and the director, George Seaton, went looking for Rooney for one of his scenes and couldn’t find him. There was a frantic search and genuine fear that he may have fallen overboard. Then late in the day one of the carrier’s planes landed and a smiling Rooney emerged. He had gotten bored and bribed one of the pilots to fly him to Tokyo to one of their better racetracks and a day of admiring and betting on the ponies.

Duke was instrumental in helping secure some of Rooney’s best work during the mid-to-late ’50s. The actor did a low-budget war movie called The Bold and the Brave (1956), for which he received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He also appeared in the title role of Don Siegel’s Baby Face Nelson in 1957. This is one of his truly great performances and, although it received mixed reviews when it was released, it has grown in stature over the decades. Rooney received the Caesar, the French equivalent of the Oscar, for his performance.

Duke also secured for Rooney a headlining stage gig with his partner Joey Forman at the Riviera in Las Vegas. Mickey’s salary was a tidy $17,500 a week, but he ended up blowing it all when he lost fifty grand at the crap tables in one night. He became so depressed after losing the money that he told the audience at the following performance that he was retiring from show business. It was headline news in the papers, but everyone knew it would be short-lived. The mild-mannered comedian Wally Cox was performing at the Dunes Hotel and his dry humor was not going over well with the rambunctious Vegas crowds. Duke called and asked if Rooney might un-retire for $17,500 per week, and he was on the next plane back to Vegas.

It was not long after the Vegas episode that Duke reached his boiling point with Rooney and his craziness.

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