The Life and Times of Mickey Rooney

by Richard A. Lertzman

  According to Augustine, Jan was kept away from Mickey due to a written agreement that Augustine orchestrated, and she signed, following a series of incidents that led Augustine to believe she was being physically abusive toward her diminutive husband. Although Jan, in our conversations with her, strenuously disputed this. While living with her, Augustine asserted, “Mickey had a tooth knocked out, he had a black eye, he ostensibly fell down the stairs. So Mickey, I felt, was physically in peril. In July 2012, I moved Mickey away. All of a sudden, Mickey’s appearance and everything about Mickey improved. He started working again and he was doing much better.”

  Litigation ensued, and ultimately, court documents show, Jan agreed to live elsewhere in return for three thousand dollars a month in support from Rooney. In February 2011, after a complaint was filed by Rooney’s attorneys on his behalf, a Superior Court judge granted LA-based lawyer Augustine temporary conservatorship over the actor and his estate and ordered Chris Aber and his wife, Christina, to stay at least one hundred yards from his client, according to the pleadings from Holland and Knight and our conversation with Michael Augustine. Rooney’s attorneys alleged that Chris Aber “threatens, intimidates, bullies and harasses Mickey,” and they refused to reveal Rooney’s finances to him, “other than to tell him that [Mickey] is broke.” He and his wife were also alleged to have withheld medications and food from Rooney, leaving him “extremely fearful that Chris will become physically threatening against Mickey and may even attempt to kidnap Mickey from his home.” The paperwork and subsequent filings suggested that Aber gained access to Rooney’s finances through his work as a “producer” at Densmore Productions Inc., a company Rooney formed in 1998—whereupon Aber issued himself majority stock, named himself treasurer, and began withdrawing substantial amounts of money.

  Jan argued that “Mickey could not get any credit due to the bankruptcy. Chris mortgaged his house and used his credit to get loans for us. We owed Chris money that he risked to get for us.”5 Chris told us that because he had put his own credit on the line in order to secure credit for Mickey, to cover his travel costs, “I ended up without funds as I could not afford to pay the legal costs.” And after he agreed to settle the controversy over Mickey’s estate with Mickey’s conservator attorneys for $2.6 million, on October 13, 2013, Chris and his wife declared bankruptcy, to avoid the debts he’d incurred from the legal and other costs from the Mickey Rooney dispute. The couple claim they do not have the money to pay the $2.8 million judgment.

  Chris’s résumé read in part:

  For the past years I have managed an Academy Award winning actor and was a partner of the production company Densmore Productions. In this position I functioned in numerous roles, including, traveling Tour Manager for a major show, which toured both nationally and internationally. Responsibilities included coordination of all travel arrangements, public appearances, publicity, bookings and press releases as well as forecasting and overseeing budgetary matters. I also facilitated and developed multiple incoming leads for new business partnerships and future performances. Other responsibilities included assisting in all aspects of the actor’s personal life, living arrangements, as well as supervising estate employees and managing three rental properties. As required, I accompanied this actor and his wife in their extensive travels as well as numerous social events.6

  Aber said that the personal costs he incurred to keep Mickey on the road resulted in the draining of his own finances, which Jan confirmed to us.

  Chris told us, “We worked for several months a year. Otherwise, my job, day after day, right up until he stopped cold turkey around 2000, I went day after day to the races with him. All over the world. Wherever we were.”

  It was Mark, with his wife, Charlene, who took guardianship of Mickey in his last two and a half years, after Mickey’s conservator moved him from Jan and Chris’s house and filed the separation agreement.

  BEFORE SHE WAS ORDERED to stay away from him, Jan continued to appear with Mickey in their road show Let’s Put on a Show! Even after Mick’s ninetieth birthday, they continued to perform, taking the show to Chicago and other, smaller venues. They had to keep it going because, after Mickey’s bankruptcy, with his inability to get credit in his or Jan’s name and his ongoing expenses and tax liens, the money was drying up and they had very little savings left.

  Jan’s friend Ellen Easton told us, “Jan would cry to me, as they could not even afford to fix their air-conditioning. I gave them the idea for the Let’s Put on a Show!, and for a long while it worked well. However, he was now in his nineties, and it became tougher for both of them to travel.” As stated by Jan, in fact, toward the end of the show’s run, Mickey had become so feeble that he could not effectively perform the numbers, and the show suffered to the point where some reviewers panned it and referred to Mickey as a “curiosity.”

  Mickey was still earning from the movies he was making and from some residuals, and he would get lots of cash when he appeared at autograph shows, according to Nelson Deedle, who worked to set up autograph sessions for Mickey during the latter part of his life. Mickey also appeared in television commercials. In 2005, Rooney filmed a commercial for a cold remedy, in which Rooney’s towel slips off in a sauna, exposing his eighty-four-year-old buttocks for about two seconds. The ad, scheduled to premiere during the Super Bowl, was rejected by network censors. Rooney angrily described the commercial as “a fun spot,” and said, “[T]he public deserves to see it.”7

  Mickey’s anger issues started becoming more pronounced as he advanced into his nineties. His temper flared up at inappropriate moments in public, and he had less and less tolerance for any perceived setback. As he became more and more physically challenged, the athletic Mickey Rooney became angrier at himself, at his limitations. And as he confronted the final Ericksonian crises, reconciling himself with old age and the limitations thereof, he fought against them desperately, lashing out in frustration at the world around him. Cashing in on his fame, which propelled him for the last forty years of his life, had become an ongoing business, and when the reality television craze began to dominate cable, Mickey was there. In an attempt to cash in on the reality market, Chris Aber set up a deal to shoot a “sizzle” reel for a proposed reality series tentatively called The Rooneys, which is available on YouTube.8 In it, you can see Mickey warts and all, his outbursts of anger and his tantrums on full display.

  Another cogent example of the dynamics among the Rooneys was witnessed by the Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Feinberg, who said, “I’d met Mickey on many occasions at events and interviewed him when many of his friends passed away. However, I wanted to talk with him about his career at MGM. It was, by far, one of the strangest and most difficult interviews I’ve attempted. I have done literally hundreds of interviews with older actors, but it never approached the strangeness of this one.”

  Feinberg said that the interview was punctuated by Mickey’s emotional outbursts, more like a toddler’s tantrums. “Although there were [instigating] incidents, such as Jan kicking Mickey so hard under the table [that] Mickey let out a blood-curdling scream . . . Mickey had outbursts of rage and tantrum-like episodes in which we had to stop the camera. Mickey retold some of the fables he created from his career, along with some interesting stories.”9

  Feinberg also said—as did Jan and her sister Ronna—that Mickey had very little concept of the past. He could tell stories from his youth, but as he got older, the past seemed less and less relevant to him, and he seemed to disregard it. He would actually concoct stories, which could be contradicted by facts (for example, bragging about giving Marilyn Monroe her name, when this was patently untrue). He told different stories at different times about his final conversations with Judy Garland.

  DESPITE THE ONGOING PERSONAL drama, Mickey forged ahead in his work as he had throughout all the other times of crisis in his life, now working with young filmmakers.

  It may seem contradictory (after looking at Mickey’s interview with Scott Feinberg)
to state that Mickey could be difficult to deal with off-camera, beyond irascible and downright mean, but completely charming on a movie set. It is not really a paradox. There was only one reality to Mickey’s existence, and that was performing. Whether onstage or on-camera, performing was the reality he lived in and longed for. Everything else was just a distraction. Worse, it was almost hateful. Nothing illustrates this better than the way he dealt with young Brooklyn filmmaker Keith Black in 2007.

  That year, Mickey became intrigued with a communication from a Brooklyn inner-city teacher, Black, who for the previous twenty years had been spending his summer breaks, and his own money, financing his own low-budget movies. Black decided in 2007 to take a long shot and approach Mickey with an offer to appear in his debut feature film, a romantic comedy called Driving Me Crazy. Impressed by Black’s charming script and relentless chutzpah, Rooney not only agreed, but said he would work for just a nominal hundred dollars. Mickey and Jan flew to New York and shot numerous scenes with Black, all the while entertaining his cast and crew with amazing tales of old Hollywood. Black recalled:

  Mr. Rooney loved the script and said it reminded him of the heartwarming romantic comedies Hollywood was famed for, stories that cared more about character and story than special effects. I didn’t feel like I could be in the same room with him. He made me feel like an equal. He made me feel without saying it that I deserved to be sharing a set with him. We were instantly best friends. He listened to everything I said with such intense focus. He enjoyed talking to me and helping me. I felt like I was the new Judy Garland; he gave me the same consideration and respect he gave to her. There is no substitute for Rooney’s close to eighty years of acting experience. His kind words will last me a lifetime. I learned so much. It was like a crash course from a Hollywood legend.10

  Black told us that working with Rooney was inspirational and propelled his career:

  Mickey’s total vote of confidence meant the world to me. I’ve won festival awards, received glowing reviews from critics, been on Showtime, but this meant nothing compared to him listening to me with respect. This man had worked side by side with some of the greatest stars. He came to the set early, stayed late. This was a guy in his late eighties working like a dog. A couple times I got worried because he got out of breath and requested a chair to rest in. On the set, he was like a mentor. It was remarkable. Besides having to know his own lines, he memorized mine and [those of] other actors, including Oscar winner Celeste Holm and Dick Cavett. Mickey didn’t just drop by the set; he had clearly spent many hours with the script before he even got on the plane from LA. Even though mine was a small indie feature, he treated it like a big Hollywood blockbuster. Mickey was so humble and kind. The only time he sounded like a Hollywood leading man was when he requested ice cream and strawberries. What struck me about Mickey was that he was so focused on simply helping me make the best movie possible.11

  Film producer and director Shawn Levy, who directed and produced the three Night of the Museum movies starring Ben Stiller, echoed Black’s sentiments. Levy said:

  Mickey certainly left us with a remarkable work and legacy. Mickey came in and auditioned for the first Night at the Museum in 2005. Both Ben and I were amazed . . . and despite being a legend with hundreds of films to his credit, this is a guy that so loved to work. He was willing and eager to work. This is an industry that now has performers with just a couple of performances in a TV show and they won’t audition. It’s called “offer only”—and Mickey, with four hundred films, coming in and laying it on the line to get the job. He auditioned on the backlot at Fox with myself [sic], the casting director, and Stiller. We created the role of Gus as a pugnacious little firecracker, and we so wanted Mickey to be the guy, and when he came in and auditioned, it was immediately clear that he was the guy. Comedy has evolved throughout the decades, and it has changed, and we live in a very improv type of comedy climate. He was prepared, knew his lines, did his lines, and he was prepared to ad-lib. So if Stiller or I threw him an idea in the middle of shooting a scene, he was great. So some of the insulting nicknames he said to Stiller in the course of the film were scripted, but many were created during filming. He was very light and fluid, and flexible enough to handle the changes even during the course of the shooting day. I suspect that his stage training was the case that allowed him to be that flexible.

  Levy continued:

  There were a couple things that were really impressive and central to his amazing talent. I saw clearly that the audition showed me that here was a guy that still burned with creative hunger, but he also had such respect and esteem for his fellow actors. He was thrilled to be working with Dick [Van Dyke], Bill [Cobbs], and Ben Stiller. Mickey just adored Ben Stiller. He had a big part in the first movie, and although he had a nice role in the second film, we ended up cutting much of the older guards’ scenes. Coming into the third film, we knew it was going to be the last, the finish of the series, but I wanted it to mark the return of my senior citizen night guards. I’m told by his family that he went over the moon when he got the call for the film. So at ninety-three, he got on a plane, flew to Vancouver, and although he couldn’t really stand up for long periods of time and his memory wasn’t what it used to be, he came to work with a real fervor and gratitude. Real gratitude.12

  Of Mickey’s acting at such an advanced age, Levy said, “He was one hundred percent lucid. He was honest; he said he had a tough time standing up for long and ‘I’m not great remembering the lines; could you feed them to me?’ I said, ‘No problem.’ So I sat behind the camera, next to Ben Stiller, and I would feed him his dialogue. Not only was he completely lucid, but I would go as far as to say that he was vital.”

  “When Mickey finished shooting, I gave a small speech about him,” Levy said. Because this was the last in the series of Night at the Museum pictures, it was a poignant moment and a chance to honor Mickey for his ninety-three years in show business. As the cast and crew stood up to applaud Mickey, no one realizing of course that this would be his final public appearance, Mickey gave one of the most heartfelt testimonials he ever had, about his years in the industry and how humbled he was to have been a part of it. It was an historic moment for everyone on the set. According to Levy:

  They were applauding him, and he quieted the crew [and] then gave an impassioned speech that we were all lucky to be able to do this wonderful work; he was really underlining this. I took pictures of this. . . . It was an honor to direct him. I feel privileged to have been a part of making his legacy.

  At the premiere and after party for the first movie, my grandmother-in-law, who is ninety-three, says it was the night that she was charmed by Mickey Rooney. I’m grateful for the memories I have of Mickey, to this day, it was a rare thrill for her to be charmed by Mickey Rooney. He has fans, and will have fans, for all time. You can see his soul.13

  MICKEY WAS ABOUT TO turn ninety years old on September 23, 2010, and there were no great honors or memorials planned for him. Other entertainers before him had been honored for their body of work, specifically by the American Film Institute. Yet there were to be no honors from the AFI for Mickey, who had seemingly been forgotten, despite his continued appearances in pictures. Author, publicist, film lover, and one of Mickey’s fans, Ellen Easton sought to remedy that.

  She told us:

  In the spring of 2010, when I learned that no one in the entertainment industry had made any formal plans to honor Mickey on his ninetieth birthday, I was appalled. I thought that a man of his talents, who had contributed nine consecutive decades of his life to his industry, deserved a celebration. I approached John Iachetti, the director of entertainment at the Feinstein’s Loews Regency’s, New York, to ask if he would host a birthday party for Mickey’s ninetieth. He agreed immediately. Not only would it be a party, John would hire Mickey and Jan to perform as well, in Let’s Put on a Show!. With Feinstein’s on board, we were off and running.

  My next step was to call Nathan Lane, a Broadway legend in his o
wn right. Not only did he agree to attend, but he immediately bought two tables [and] said he would buy the entire room if needed, to ensure that Mickey had a full house. Donald Trump was my next call. At first Donald was scheduled to be overseas, but because of his friendship to Mickey, he changed his plans so he and his wife, Melania, could attend. Donald graciously gave me permission to use his name to help promote the event. I then called Regis Philbin. Regis and his wife, Joy, were also a yes. Soon thereafter, with more calls by myself [sic] and the Feinstein’s team, many of the greatest luminaries in the industry followed, including Michael Feinstein, Tony Bennett, Rita Moreno, Matthew Broderick, Victor Garber, Jake “Raging Bull” LaMotta, Elaine Stritch, MGM’s Arlene Dahl, and many others.

  To make the evening extra special, I contacted President Barack Obama, New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg, and Brooklyn borough president Marty Markowitz to request birthday greeting letters in honor of Mickey’s ninetieth. They all agreed. Brooklyn, the place of Mickey’s birth, sent a beautiful proclamation. Richard Johnson of the New York Post’s Page Six wrote a generous lead piece that created a buzz, after which, the phones were ringing off the hook. The power of the press really came through for Mickey. Thus, due to the demand, what was to have been a one-night celebration turned into two.