Mickey Rooney (actor and all-round entertainer) 1920 to 2014
Mickey Rooney was one of the last living Hollywood legends. He rubbed shoulders with the likes of Spencer Tracy, Clarke Gable, Cary Grant, Errol Flynn, James Cagney...the list is endless and he outlived them all.

Rooney's first acting role was at the tender age of 6-years, in the Micky McGuire series of short films. In fact he made 78 mini movies from 1927 to 1932. He followed this by what is acknowledged as the break that got him noticed as Puck in A Midsummer's Night Dream (1935). This led to his success in the Andy Hardy series (1937) showing him as the cheeky boy-next door. It was also in that same year that Rooney made the first of his 10 movies with another big child star of the time and very close friend, Judy Garland.

Surrey Comet:

Despite his stature of only five feet and two inches, he was a bit of a ladies man and married eight times. He must of had something special though, because he married legendary actress and pin-up girl Ava Gardner in 1942 when they met as MGM studio actors but they were soon divorced in 1943. To be honest I think she was well out of his league and Gardner later went on to marry Frank Sinatra.

Surrey Comet:

Rooney continued to make a success of his career in the 40's and with his popularity high he enlisted in the army during World War II where he entertained the troops in Europe and America. After the war he came out of the army and went back to making movies and also had his own TV series in the 50's The Mickey Rooney Show but his career began to dry up during the 1960's when he was also declared bankrupt.

He had a resurgence in his career in the 1970's by this time he was in his fifties and he found a new younger audience with popular children's films such as Pete's Dragon (1977), The Magic of Lassie (1978) and The Black Stallion (1979). You might remember his voice for the animated fox, Todd in Disney's The Fox and the Hound (1981). He continued to act even into his late eighties and early nineties in as one of the three night watchmen in Night at the Museum (2006) and a cameo in The Muppets (2011).

Surrey Comet:

My personal favourite was a little known political crime thriller with Gene Hackman called The Domino Principle (1977). I haven't seen it since I was a teenager, I imagine it's probably quite dated now?

There's no denying that Rooney left his mark as Mr Hollywood and at one point in his life he could claim to be the world's biggest box office stars. Apparently director Shawn Levy tweeted yesterday that last month Mickey Rooney had shot his last scene in Night at the Museum 3 (source BBC news) at the age of 93! What a trooper.

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