This Is Your Life: Mickey Rooney

Mickey ROONEY (1920-2014)

The first edition broadcast with new presenter Michael Aspel

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - Mickey Rooney, actor, was surprised by Michael Aspel during the curtain call of the musical Sugar Babies at the Savoy Theatre in London, from where the programme was then recorded.

Mickey, who was born in Brooklyn, New York, performed in vaudeville as a child and made his film debut at the age of five. As a leading child actor, signed to MGM Studios, he starred as Andy Hardy in a series of 16 films, which made him the top box office attraction between 1939 and 1941. He also starred in a series of musicals with Judy Garland, including Babes in Arms and Strike Up the Band and dramatic roles in National Velvet and Boy's Town.

During the Second World War, Mickey entertained over two million troops on stage and radio before returning to acting in supporting roles in films such as Breakfast at Tiffany's, Requiem for a Heavyweight, and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Following a lean period, he made his Broadway debut in 1979 in the musical revue Sugar Babies, for which he received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical.

"What the hell's this? What a thrill!"

programme details...

Edition No: 738
Subject No: 732
Broadcast date: Wed 19 Oct 1988
Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
Recorded: Tue 11 Oct 1988
Venue: Savoy Theatre
Series: 29
Edition: 1
Code name: Andy

on the guest list...

Ann Miller
cast members of Sugar Babies
Jan - wife
Mark - stepson
Chris - stepson
Ann Rutherford
message from Elizabeth Taylor
Bobs Watson
Jimmy Cook
Eddie Bracken
Donald O'Connor
Mickey Jr - son
Tim - son
Ted - son
Kelly - daughter
Kim - daughter
Kerry - daughter
Jonelle - daughter
Jim - son
Benny Hill
Maureen O'Sullivan
Bob Hope
Stewart Granger
Anthony Quinn
Jackie Cooper
Vic Damone
George Peppard

production team...

Researcher: Caroline Blackadder
Writer: Roy Bottomley
Directors: Brian Klein, David Clark
Producer: Malcolm Morris

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

The Glamorous Life

Hollywood in the spotlight

Michael Aspel

a career review

New Lease of Life

the programme's relaunch

Timeline

the show's fifty year history

Stewart Granger

Bob Hope

Ann Miller

Mickey Rooney This Is Your Life Big Red Book

Screenshots of Mickey Rooney This Is Your Life - and a photograph of Mickey Rooney's big red book

Scriptwriter Roy Bottomley recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in his book, This Is Your Life: The Story of Television's Famous Big Red Book...

At the time, Hollywood and Broadway legend Mickey Rooney was opening in the West End with his American hit musical Sugar Babies. Nothing could have been sweeter for us than when we got the nod to mount a Life on Mickey. Researchers set out to find Mickey's children from all nine of his marriages. They flew in to London on the night, 11 October 1988, and followed Michael Aspel on stage at the Savoy Theatre at the curtain call for Sugar Babies.

By this time, Mickey Rooney's story had reached the proportions of the most far-fetched musical script.

Sugar Babies was based on burlesque - a saucy American form of revue - and couldn't have been more appropriate for Mickey, because his mother was a burlesque chorus girl and his Edinburgh-born father the 'top banana' (the show's main attraction). When his parents' marriage broke up, the young Mickey moved with Mum to Los Angeles. There he made fifteen films in four years as the all-American youngster Andy Hardy.

He also made National Velvet with Elizabeth Taylor, who wrote from her sickbed a letter for Michael Aspel to read on the programme.

Wrote Elizabeth: 'National Velvet will always be one of my favourite films because I worked with one of the dearest, warmest and most giving human beings – you. All my love, Elizabeth.'

Ann Rutherford, his screen girlfriend in the Andy Hardy films, flew in, as did Donald O'Connor, legendary star of great movie musicals and Mickey's mate for forty years. We showed film of the two of them at Judy Garland's fifteenth birthday party in 1937.

We brought back memories of the film he made with Spencer Tracy fifty years before: Boy's Town, based on a true story of a priest who started the 'town' in Nebraska. We filmed there to show its work now.

Vic Damone, George Peppard and Anthony Quinn all added their tributes to the much-married Mickey, who said his marriage certificate should be made out 'To Whom It May Concern'.

But what was it that made this story compete with any flight of Hollywood fancy?

Virtually 'born in a trunk' youngster finds Hollywood stardom. His name is known the world over. His career goes into decline. By the late Sixties he is down to his last hundred dollars. Then an old Hollywood actor pal, who has become a producer and theatre owner in Miami, gets a play he wants to put on and immediately thinks of his mate Mickey Rooney. He finds him, now nearly down to his last buck.

The play is about alimony. 'I know all about that,' says Mickey.

The old pal is Eddie Bracken. The play is a triumph for Mickey.

A New York producer is in the first night audience. In his briefcase is the script for Sugar Babies. It runs on Broadway for seven years. With Mickey Rooney.

You couldn't write it.

Series 29 subjects