Mickey Rooney Net Worth

How much was Mickey Rooney worth?

About Mickey Rooney

Mickey Rooney, also known as Ninnian Joseph Yule Jr., was an American stage and film actor, comedian, radio host, and producer. He was born on September 23, 1920, and his estimated net worth is $18,000. He passed away on April 6, 2014. Rooney was one of MGM’s most consistently successful actors, appearing in more over 300 motion pictures. Laurence Olivier saw him as “the best there has ever been” However, due to his lifelong gambling habit, Mickey Rooney lost all of his money, and when he passed away in 2014, the worth of his personal property was only $18,000.

Mickey Rooney, one of the most enduring actors in movie history, benefited greatly from the popularity boom of the 1930s thanks to his portrayal of Andy Hardy and his on-screen friendship with Judy Garland. Rooney was propelled to superstardom and turned into Hollywood’s top box office draw in the early 1940s because to his unwavering optimism and aw-shucks, can-do image.

But when Rooney returned to the United States after serving in World War II, his career began a long, steady fall from which he never fully recovered. He frequently took on jobs for the pay in order to cover his mounting gambling debts and child support obligations. He had eight marriages, including one to Ava Gardner before she became famous, slept with untold numbers of actresses, and suffered from despair after his fifth wife Barbara Ann Thomason was killed and Judy Garland tragically overdosed shortly after.

Despite the numerous setbacks in his life and profession, Rooney continued to work and maintained his unwavering optimism. Rooney was one of Hollywood’s actors who had been working the longest by 2013 and showed no signs of slowing down.

Early Years

Born Joseph Yule, Jr. on September 23, 1920 in Brooklyn, New York, Rooney was raised in a show business family by his vaudeville actor father Joe and chorus girl mother Nell. He started performing on stage with his parents at just a little over a year old, and they traveled throughout the nation from one event to the next.

However, the strains of being a parent and working in show business eventually caused his parents to divorce in 1924, leaving Rooney in the care of his mother. They relocated to California, where his mother relentlessly pursued his profession. Eventually, he appeared as Mickey McGuire in a number of short films from 1927 to 1934 as a result of her efforts.

Beginning with Mickey’s Circus (1927), Rooney starred in 78 movies as the cheeky, street-smart youngster with coal black hair. In a pretty cunning scheme to help the producers battle their refusal to pay the writers royalties, Rooney’s mother attempted to get both her son’s and her own name changed to McQuire, but the scheme was unsuccessful. However, it resulted in him assuming the name Mickey Rooney.

His career blossoms

With Mickey’s Medicine Man (1934), the young actor finally brought an end to the Mickey McGuire series and was well on his road to stardom. In the 1930s, he naturally did other movies in addition to the series, getting supporting parts in movies like Emma (1932), The Big Chance (1933), and Clarence Brown’s romantic melodrama Chained (1934), which starred Joan Crawford and Clark Gable.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s well-known comedy co-starring James Cagney, Dick Powell, and Olivia de Havilland, garnered positive reviews for Rooney’s noteworthy performance as Puck. After parts in Ah, Wilderness! (1935) and Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936), Rooney’s career underwent a radical change when he played Andy Hardy for the first time in A Family Affair (1937). Rooney played the son of Judge James Hardy (Lionel Barrymore), a supporting role, but his presence helped the movie become a great smash.

Rooney took on the part 13 more times over the course of the following nine years, and in the fourth iteration, Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938), in which Judy Garland also starred, he took over the role’s lead role. Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry (1937), an adventure with a racing horse theme, was the beloved pair’s first appearance together. They grew close after that. In fact, their connection both on and off-screen was so deep that it was reasonable to assume they were romantically linked. Although they weren’t, they stayed close until Garland’s untimely passing in 1969.

While on television Rooney radiated wholesome, aw-shucks charm, in real life he was a notorious womanizer. At the age of 18, he began an affair with Norma Shearer, a legendary starlet who was 20 years older than him and had recently become widowed after the passing of her husband, renowned producer Irving Thalberg.

Rooney made a successful attempt to break into the dramatic acting world in 1937 when he appeared with Spencer Tracy in Captains Courageous. The following year, he appeared with Garland in Boys Town, and they continued their successful collaboration in a number of well-known musicals, including their most well-known collaboration, Babes in Arms (1939). Rooney received a nomination for Best Actor at the Academy Awards for the latter.

Top Star in Hollywood

Rooney had ascended to the top of the heap by 1939 and was now Hollywood’s top box office draw, a position he held for three straight years. He collaborated with Garland once more for two musicals directed by Busby Berkeley, Strike Up the Band (1940) and Babes on Broadway (1941), both of which only served to increase their notoriety as a vivacious on-screen couple.

Rooney joined the war effort like the majority of actors at the time, and his Andy Hardy movies continued to be huge hits. In National Velvet (1944), where he co-starred with a young Elizabeth Taylor, he attained the pinnacle of his acting career. He gave a great performance as a former jockey-turned-drifter who coaches a young woman (Taylor) to become a champion rider.

A Protracted Decline and World War II

Rooney served in the military during the war, just like any other actor of his caliber would have, and spent 21 months providing entertainment for the troops overseas. He had a prosperous period of time abroad, but upon his return to the United States, his career began a long, steady fall from which he never fully recovered. He was only 26 years old at the time.

Rooney’s on-screen relationship with Judy Garland came to an end with Norman Taurog’s Words and Music (1948), a musical largely based on the collaboration of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, after which he returned to his hallmark character in Love Laughs at Andy Hardy (1946).

With Force of Evil (1948) and The Sun Comes Up (1949), Rooney tried his hand at supporting parts. He even made the transition to crime with an unusually energetic performance in the noir Quicksand (1950). Rooney’s career, however, had already started to significantly wane and showed no signs of improvement by this point.

It did seem as though he was poised to make a comeback at a few points, such as when he played an unfortunate helicopter pilot in Mark Robson’s World War II drama The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954), which also starred William Holden and Grace Kelly. Any dreams of a comeback were dashed, however, by failures like All Ashore (1953), The Atomic Kid (1954), and The Twinkle in God’s Eye (1955).

Turning to the Small Screen

Francis in the Haunted House, a 1956 film that did poorly with audiences, put a stop to Francis the Talking Mule’s career and almost destroyed Rooney’s, was when Rooney experienced his lowest moment.

By portraying the legendary gangland killer in Don Siegel’s action-packed gangster film Baby Face Nelson (1957), the actor tried vainly to shed his wholesome image. Unfortunately, the film was unable to revive Rooney’s waning reputation. In the meantime, Rooney desperately tried to recapture his former fame by resurrecting Andy Hardy for Andy Hardy Comes Home (1958), but he was wise enough to make this movie his final outing in the part.

Rooney began dabbling in television at the start of the decade, but by the end of the decade, he had fully committed to the medium. He went on to find success as a guest star on a variety of well-known series.

Hope for a Restoration wanes

When Rooney was finally chosen for a major role in a film, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, by Blake Edwards, he caused one of the biggest scandals of his career by putting on a set of buck teeth and giving a stereotypical portrayal as a Japanese man (1961). The Truman Capote novel was the basis for the film adaptation, and Audrey Hepburn’s ground-breaking performance more than made up for Rooney’s callous performance.

Rooney accepted any position that was offered to him because of that performance and the fact that he had been married several times and owing money for child support, which frequently led to him appearing in one schlock movie after another. While juggling a hectic television schedule that barely kept him solvent, he even attempted his hand at directing with the comedy The Private Lives of Adam and Eve (1960).

Rooney occasionally produced high-caliber work, as he did with the boxing epic Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962), but he was more frequently seen slogging it out in inferior films like How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965) and 24 Hours to Kill (1966). Even working with renowned filmmaker Otto Preminger on the 1968 film Skidoo failed to revive hopes.

All-American Boy to Newsstand Material

Despite his several marriages, Rooney’s extensive extramarital romances were something of a well-kept secret for the majority of his career. But when his fifth wife, Barbara Ann Thomason, who also engaged in serial infidelity, was killed in a murder-suicide by a jealous boyfriend in their Brentwood home, he unexpectedly found his reputation severely damaged. Rooney returned to the United States after filming Ambush Bay (1966) in the Philippines to face simmering controversy that was partly sparked by the crime that his own gun was used to perpetrate.

To make matters worse, when Judy Garland passed away in 1969 from an unintentional drug overdose, Rooney had to deal with one of the most sad events of his life. The incidents sent Rooney into a profound melancholy, which was undoubtedly exacerbated by escalating financial issues brought on by a worsening gambling addiction.

In His Elder Years, A New Life

The 1970s weren’t the best decade for Rooney, and if it hadn’t been for the box office triumph of The Black Stallion (1979), which gave the actor the chance to pour his personal struggles into his final truly brilliant performance, the decade would have been a complete wash. Kelly Reno and a young boy (Rooney) who is learning to ride a wayward stallion have immense potential, according to Henry Dailey, a former successful horse trainer, who sees it.

Rooney received an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal, marking the first time since his work in The Bold and the Brave that garnered him a nomination (1956). The Black Stallion was Rooney’s last genuine success, despite the actor playing countless roles over the following four decades. Surprisingly, he spent those years with the same spouse, his eighth wife Jan Chamberlin, and he turned into a champion for senior rights, testifying against elder abuse before the U.S. Senate in 2011. Rooney was one of the older actors that appeared in silent-era films as of 2013.

Death

Rooney passed away in Los Angeles on April 6, 2014, at the age of 93, from natural causes. Mickey Rooney’s net worth was only $18,000 at the time of his passing. Despite making millions of dollars from his acting career, Rooney couldn’t break his addiction to gambling. His riches was ultimately gone.