Mickey Rooney was an American film and television actor. He starred in almost 300 pictures throughout a nine-decade career and was one of the last remaining silent-film stars.
From 1939 until 1941, he was the top box-office draw and one of the highest-paid actors of the day. In the 1930s and 1940s, at the peak of a career defined by falls and comebacks, Rooney played Andy Hardy in a series of 16 films that exemplified mainstream America’s self-image.
What was Mickey Rooney worth?
Rooney was worth 2.5 million at the peak of his career.
In 1996, he declared bankruptcy for the second time, and in 2005, he characterized himself as “broke.” He continued to play on stage and in films, but his personal property was only worth $18,000 when he died in 2014.
Between the ages of 15 and 25, he made 43 pictures and was one of MGM’s most consistently successful performers. He was a versatile performer who rose to prominence as a character actor later in his career. Laurence Olivier famously called Rooney “the finest there has ever been.”
Clarence Brown, who directed Rooney in two of his early dramatic performances, National Velvet and The Human Comedy, described him as “the closest thing to a genius” with whom he had ever worked.
He received a Golden Globe Award in 1982 and an Emmy Award the following year for his performance as the title character in the television film Bill, as well as an Academy Honorary Award in 1982.
