Mickey Rourke - The Dark Side of Fame with Piers Morgan (2008) The Wrestler

until 1994. I watched Mickey's last two fights and I just wanted to die for him, I think at that time he was like 40 years old and he was boxing and I saw him get his I got my ass kicked and I'm wondering why he's doing this and then I I realized that Mickey is the kind of person who comes out of nowhere, so everything is an achievement. I think he could have saved a lot of wear and tear on the old face because they beat it up. but look how many guys, how many guys have done that and he's done it, it gave you a bigger thrill than you've gotten in the movies, yeah buddy, that's the reality, yeah, yeah, it's something I've always enjoyed sports. much more than making movies, so while everyone else thought you had gone crazy abandoning your Hollywood career to return to the ring, it seemed obvious to do it right, it was like I wanted to do it or do it one more time before becoming Como a nursing home, you know, I wanted to compete one more time at a high level and I went as far as I could until I started to lose some memory and failed. neurological twice and um, they said you should stop right now and they had just offered me a They said if you win three more big fights you could move up to cruiserweight and fight for a WBO title fight so that's all I thought about and then I told the doctor and they told him how much they're going to cost you. pay, I told him well, I mentioned the figure, he says you won't even be able to count, that if you have three more fights, really, yes, winning a WBO title would have meant more. for you than winning an Oscar yes, you see in that answer, I understand what it is about.

I don't think you were mad, it was your passion, yes, it turns out you were a guy who loved his boxing and who happened to be very good at acting. yeah, when you try to go back to the movies, yeah, I mean, the game had moved on for you, it was gone, yeah, I mean, apart from anything else, your face had been pretty messed up, well, you know, I had surgery five times my nose, they broke my cheekbone. two concussions broke my hand, my hands will probably never be the same again, but what happened in the boxing years was taking a famous, beautiful face and turning you into some kind of train wreck, right, I remember this one photo landed on the showbiz desk and we were like have you gone crazy why it was beautiful?

He already had the brightest, most wonderful face with character. What would someone want to do? It's quite a mystery to me. The late 90s saw the emergence of the weekly gossip magazine that marked the new era. of intrusion and celebrity attacks on a normal page filler that came out of this was the feature when plastic surgery goes wrong and its poster boy well, it was

mickey

rourke

plastic surgery is a way out it's it's almost it's embarrassing it's almost it's embarrassing and so bad if you're going to do it, do a good job. The press thought the surgery seemed more than just reconstructive.

I realized he was trying to change himself. Hadn't it become something new? You know, like a butterfly, but it failed. I saw it in something in London, not long after it had been done in the first fight and, um, it was really scary, you know, it scared the kids, I've noticed since I've worked in Hollywood, that there's this ridiculous obsession. with how you see yourself with all things. aesthetic, do you mind being dissected regularly now as a feature of plastic surgery here's

mickey

rawkins no, I mean if I had known, disproportionate things about the operations I've had for injuries, you don't know, I don't read?

I don't care what anyone has to say. Some already know, that city was built on envy, so they'll say what they want to say and believe what they want to believe, but when you try to get movie roles again. Presumably it mattered then, I think my reputation at the time was so devastatingly bad that my film career was pretty much over before I left to go back to boxing when you finished the boxing you had. I have read a rather heartbreaking story of yours. of your life, the kind of life in the desert, yeah, for 10 years where you had no money, you had no real friends to cut down, you didn't have much to get up for other than your dogs, um and probably the saddest moment for me when I read your story about how you were trying to get tables and restaurants and yeah there was a time when you couldn't pay before you couldn't pay for a drink yeah and I remember getting mad at a guy once when I couldn't.

I got a table at the place and said, what's up? I don't have a movie this week. You know, I would say it's worse to be a husband than to have never been anything before because when someone says what. I pass you? You know, people say I'd be standing in a 7-11 buying a pack of cigarettes and the guy would say, Hey, didn't you used to be at the movies? There are like six people in line. Go. Yeah, a lot of time we're going to come and then someone, oh Mickey Rook, would go for Jesus Christ, I think, and you know, it was like you know going through that kind of thing he had all this behavior that restaurants wouldn't give you tables.

There was only one of those kinds of things, but did it confirm to you that Hollywood is an insincere and shallow place? Because at the time I was talking to a guy who was helping me put the pieces together. Therapist, you said yes and I realized they weren't any producers or anyone in Hollywood. I'm, you know, I was the one who brought down the curtain. You know, I jumped off the mountain at the beginning. I mean, it was one of the great self-implosions in Hollywood history. Listening to you, it seems obvious to me that that destructive childhood almost certainly cost you your career, your marriage, your fortune, that is, everything good that came your way. end was chewed up by the the damage that was there I don't like using it as a crutch I'm what I'm using as a crutch is the damage that came out of it damaged me in a way that I couldn't function without self-destructing and Um, ruining what I was trying to achieve and the hardest thing for me is, uh, it's like when my ex-wife told me, you know you have to change, you know, and then I realized, man, I kind of change or my muscles just blow my brains out.

Have you ever thought about blowing your brains out? I'm sure you really have moments when you thought I was going to commit suicide. Well, let's say you know what's on your mind. How would you have done it? I have no idea, but you see, because my my little brother was sick with cancer his whole life trying to live, there was a big part of me. I wouldn't do it because it was just mainly for him, you know, because he would fight so hard to beat his illness and he wanted to be. I live and I'm going to sit there and blow my brains out no I wouldn't there's no way I would mainly because he was joey the only person you were closest to in your life yeah and it was his death that The hardest thing you've ever had to deal with, yeah, yeah, when it's your brother and you die, you know he's in your arms and you see the light go out, you know that was it, that was it, you know people might say oh, death is a The beautiful thing that is now is something lonely, ugly, scary, horrible, there is nothing that I don't find, there is no beauty in it.

Do you think he would have been proud of the way you recovered? Well, you know, Joe. He died about two and a half years ago, three years ago, and I remember him saying, Hey brother, he said you changed, man, I never thought you did. I'm sitting there looking at him and he's dying and he's so happy to see the change. At the turn of the century it seemed increasingly unlikely that filmmakers would once again con

side

r that Hollywood has been for anything, but movies have changed and the people who make them have changed, too. Filmmakers like Mr.

Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino grew up admiring Mickey's work. Those people are not dancing. with someone else's tune and neither does Mickey, so they can make, I'm sure they can make music together. In 2005, film director Robert Rodriguez transferred the graphic novel Sin City to the big screen and cast Mickey as serial killer antihero Marv, the film was a hit. and introduced a whole new generation to Rorke's on-screen talent, albeit with prosthetic issues, Sin City was easily his best role in years and a long time. I'm very happy because thank God he had a good role for a change.

I was fascinated by him in sensitivity seeing how strange he looked quite special, I think in a strange way, but did it feel good to be back? You know, people tell me that and it's like when you've been out of work for 13 years. I never feel like you're back, what does it feel like? I don't know, I think in the beginning, I think when you're very young and you start and you hit and things are going well, you know you're there. and it's never going to go away and then when it goes away, you know, maybe it goes away for six months or a year, but after a decade, you know you start to go away, maybe they're right, maybe it's over, do you feel lucky? ? making movies again after what I did to everyone, yes, and can you enjoy it more this time?

Yes, I really feel less anger, less resentment, I don't feel anything now, you're actually enjoying doing because I realized that I was the monster, not everyone else, these people, I was screaming in the

dark

for them to come out and move on. with plans set for Sin City 2. Mickey's Marv could well be back and his latest role as the

wrestler

is con

side

red the best work of his career. He closed his future with his plastic surgery because he became weird and then his plastic surgery relaxed and he looks like Mickey Rourke again, so I think his future is wide open and I think it will blow us away.

He probably has the redeeming role in him, like Brandon did when he played The Godfather. He's on his way back and you know why he's on his way back, because he was always cool and seems kind. weird but it doesn't matter in a weird way it doesn't matter because inside he's a phenomenal actor and he always was and I think if he's doing well now that's why he's a really really good actor, I mean . Would you like to have a movie big enough now to stop the endless procession of people coming up to you and talking about nine and a half weeks?

Do you know what nine and a half doesn't really mean? It almost doesn't make me angry or it's almost embarrassing. because it's like I don't understand, you know, I mean, do you feel a lot of pressure when you're with a woman now to produce fruit and stuff? Are they trying to exert that pressure? Know? No, no, for old times' sake, no. Not at all, no, some of the women I'm with these days don't even remember that movie. It's great to have you back. Thank you. It's great to be back for another cup of coffee.