The first half of the 20th century is often referred to as the Golden Age of Hollywood. But this distinction overlooks the abusive conditions forced upon actors of all ages. Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney were given large amounts of drugs to keep up with their intense shooting schedule when they were still children. Both actors had historic careers in the industry, but they were also damaged by these experiences in heartbreaking ways.
Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney were MGM’s premier child stars
Rooney appeared in his first film role at 6 in the short film Not to be Trusted. He soon rose to prominence. Rooney’s early big roles include the titular character in the comedy series Mickey McGuire and the 1935 adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Garland (born name Frances Ethel Gumm) was prepared for stardom from the age of two. She performed with her two sisters on the Vaudeville circuit. (Her mother Ethel, a former performer herself, would often play the piano for them.)
The two both signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer as preteens and starred in a number of musicals together. Garland and Rooney first appeared on screen as a pair in 1937’s Thoroughbreds Don’t Cry. They would go on to star in seven more movies together. Three of these are the Hardy Family movies, with Rooney as Andy Hardy and Garland as his friend Betsy Booth.
The critical height of their pairing was in Babes in Arms in 1939, where both actors received Academy Award nominations. Rooney (19) is the second-youngest Best Actor winner ever, and Garland was nominated for the defunct Juvenile Oscar for her dual performances in this and The Wizard of Oz. They collaborated for the final time on Words and Music, a 1948 musical.
Judy Garland detailed how the studio forced her and Mickey Rooney to take pills
Plenty of movies from the early days of Hollywood are worth watching to this day. But as this History article explains, many stars from that period worked unreasonable hours due to a carefully structured system that included the use of drugs.
Kids were not exempt from this process. And some parents were far too desperate to see their progeny on the big screen. At the behest of her mother and MGM, Garland took “pep pills” (aka amphetamines) to maintain an energetic performance during production and sleeping pills when the studio deemed it acceptable to rest.
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“They’d give us pills to keep us on our feet long after we were exhausted. Then they’d take us to the studio hospital and knock us out with sleeping pills – Mickey sprawled out on one bed and me on another,” Garland said. “Then after four hours they’d wake us up and give us the pep pills again so we could work 72 hours in a row. Half of the time we were hanging from the ceiling but it was a way of life for us.”
As Garland became a bigger star, MGM doctors also prescribed diet pills to control weight. The studio also convinced her to get an abortion when she was 19 so they could continue to use her prepubescent “girl next door” image.
Egregious use of pills was common in Hollywood, the military, and as a dieting tool up until 1970 when the Controlled Substances Act was passed and the studio system began to lose its power over the labor force.
Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney led storied careers marred by drug problems
Rooney and Garland weren’t just co-workers. They were kindred spirits. Both delighted audiences despite MGM’s cruelty. And, given their circumstances, both dealt with drug and alcohol addiction early in life.
Rooney was fortunate to survive these demons, overcoming addiction in his 70s. He continued to act into his 90s. Rooney died of natural causes in 2014.
Garland was much less fortunate. She turned to substances to help deal with the deep-seated pain in her personal life, her career as an adult veering from brief highs and despairing lows. Garland died in 1969 after an accidental overdose of barbiturates.
Rooney shared how this impacted him. “She was like my sister,” he told Vanity Fair. “She was my friend. It hurts too terribly to talk about it.” There was a time in their lives when the actor believed Garland had a crush on him. Rooney always regretted that he never gave her a chance. Maybe things could’ve been different if they were by each other’s side through it all.
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