Here's Baby Clyde to conclude our brief Mickey Rooney Centennial celebration
Many years ago, as a Golden Age Hollywood obsessed tween, I dragged my poor brother up to London with me so we could stand outside the stage door of the Savoy Theatre. The West End debut of the smash hit Broadway revue Sugar Babies was playing and it starred the legendary Mickey Rooney and Ann Miller ...from actual HOLLYWOOD!!!
As a little kid from a decidedly un-glamourous council estate, who spent all his spare time poring over books about old movies stars, this was too good an opportunity to miss. It didn’t turn out quite as I’d planned. We arrived at the stage door with plenty of time before the show began to find a handful of like minded saddos also waiting. They informed us that Miss Miller was already inside which was of course unfortunate, but Mickey was still to arrive. A little while later he did...
Smiling but not stopping, he walked straight past the crowd not signing any autographs or posing for any photos.
I don’t remember being that disappointed, after all that tiny, tubby, bald man who had just been close enough to touch was an honest to goodness Movie Legend. He’d been signed to MGM, made films with Judy and Spencer and Lana, been a bigger box office draw than Clark Gable and married Ava Gardner. It felt surreal that I was anywhere in his vicinity.
National Velvet (1944)
It’s hard to imagine now just how famous Rooney was in the late 30’s/early 40’s when he and numerous other hugely popular child stars ruled the box office. Shirley Temple was voted the #1 money maker for 4 years running in the 1930’s and the likes of Deanna Durbin, Freddie Bartholomew, Jane Withers, Jackie Cooper and of course Garland had crowds flocking to see them to brighten up the Depression. Whilst some came a cropper in later life, others retired young shunning the limelight. That was never going to be an option for Mickey Rooney, a man with show business in his veins.
Having been the biggest draw in the world pre WWII (Which he’d spent the last part of away from the screen, entertaining troops) the post war environment was less welcoming to his brand of brash showmanship. Now too old to convincingly play kids and at 5’2' way too short to be a conventional leading man no one really knew what to do with him. His last proper hit before his star began to wane was the timeless horse racing drama National Velvet (1944). But it wasn't Rooney who walked away with the imagination of moviegoers. The movie proved to be Elizabeth Taylor’s child star break out at the age of 12.
While Rooney never reached National Velvet era heights again, he was too talented a performer (with too big a thirst for attention) to simply leave the business. He was literally born to perform. Brought up in Vaudeville, he’d been on stage since before his 2nd birthday. He could sing, dance, tell jokes, do magic trick, play the drums or just about anything else that was called for. He was the kind of old school pro we don’t really see anymore. Consistently employed in film (Although not necessarily in starring roles) he took work wherever it was offered, radio, theatre and especially the newly rising medium of television. Most surprisingly he turned out to be an extremely adept serious actor garnering a first Best Supporting Actor nomination for 1956’s The Bold and The Brave (An award he should have won).
It can be no coincidence, given National Velvet's end-of-an-era place in his career, that 30+ years later in the film I’m nominally supposed to be talking about here today, Mickey made a comeback starring as a former jockey lured out of retirement to train a mystery horse to a triumphant win.
Kelly Reno and Mickey Rooney in "The Black Stallion"
The Black Stallion is superior children’s fare. A critically acclaimed smash hit based on the classic children’s novel by Walter Farley and produced by Francis Ford Coppola. It tells the story of Alec (Kelly Reno) a young boy who survives a shipwreck off the African coast and washes up on a desert island along with a wild Arabian stallion. Befriending the horse, once rescued and back in small town America Alec teams up with Mickey’s character Henry Dailey and the rest is exactly what you would expect. To be precise the rest is National Velvet and every other sporting films you’ve ever seen, only this one somehow manages to overcome its inherent cliches and be both gorgeous to look at and surprisingly moving. The first half, which has long stretches of no dialogue, is mostly made up of boy and horse slowly making friends on a deserted beach and it’s ravishing.
The film made $40 million at the box office in 1979 (a big sum back then). Universally praised for its Editing, Cinematography, Score it earned a Best Supporting Oscar nomination for Mickey Rooney now deep in the middle of his late career character actor phase.
His Broadway debut in Sugar Babies and The Black Stallion arrived in the same year and he capped this sensation comeback with a Tony nomination and his final Oscar nomination. It’s a pity that AMPAS couldn’t have gone all the way. He’s extremely effective as the grizzled trainer and a win wouldn’t have been undeserved at all. Unfortunately, Oscar voters had other ideas and gave the 1979 award to another 1930s movie legend, Melvyn Douglas for Being There. Considering Douglas had already won (Hud, 1963) and the Academy’s penchant for rewarding long overlooked and often undeserving old timers in this category (Looking at you Mr Ameche) it seems a shame that Mickey became a four-time loser. It may have been more fitting if he’d been beaten by 8 year old Justin Henry in Kramer vs Kramer who surely would have received the same Juvenile Award that Rooney had been given in 1938 if that prize hadn’t been discontinued. (And why did they discontinue those?)
Thankfully, in the Black Stallion era proper, deserving, movie legends were being recognised so three years later the Academy made good when they awarded Rooney an Honorary Award
In recognition of his 60 years of versatility in a variety of memorable film performances."
Epilogue: A few years ago, I was at JFK airport travelling back to London with, of course, my brother. We were waiting for an elevator. When the doors opened, we were confronted by airline workers and security people surrounding a very old man in a wheelchair. He had a hat on and a blanket over his knees but there was no denying it was genuine Old School Hollywood Legend, Mickey Rooney. Remembering all those years ago and how I hadn’t managed to speak to him I blurted out ‘Hello Mr Rooney’. He turned and looked at me obviously surprised. His face lit up, he waved and said ‘Hello, son’. All I could think was THAT MAN USED TO BE MARRIED TO AVA GARDNER!!!
