Mickey Rourke
From Dickipedia - A Wiki of Dicks
Rourke’s dickishness is broad, far-reaching, and impossible to classify. Rather than choosing a dick specialty like Kobe Bryant (rapist) or Karl Rove (evil), Rourke does it all. He is dick of all trades.
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Early Life
Mickey Rourke was born in Schenectady, New York on September 16, 1956. His father, Philip Andre Rourke, Sr. was an amateur body builder and a classic dick in his own right. Rourke Sr. left the family when young Mickey was six years old but made up for it by fitting a lifetime worth of beatings into the small amount of time they shared together. Would Mickey put an end to this cycle of abuse when he grew up? No.
After his parents divorced, Rourke’s mother moved the family to southern Florida, where he channeled his anger into a socially acceptable form of hurting people: boxing. At 12, fighting under the name Andre Rourke, young Mickey won his first match at the same gym where Muhammad Ali began his career. After posting an amateur record of 20-7 and suffering numerous concussions, doctors advised Rourke to find a career that didn’t involve being constantly punched in the face.
Career
Acting
After taking a role in a friend’s play at the University of Miami, Rourke borrowed $400 from his sister and moved to New York, becoming one of the final students taught by the legendary Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio. It is probably for the best that Strasberg didn’t live to see Rourke eventually use his training to make an action movie with a rapper who put out an album titled "Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z...".
Rourke quickly made an impression playing an arsonist in the movie Body Heat, and went on to star in the cult classic Diner, along with Paul Reiser, Steve Guttenberg, Tim Daly and Kevin Bacon. In her review, Pauline Kael singled out Rourke, saying she liked his “edge” compared to his clean-cut, boy-next-door co-stars, also writing "He has a sweet, pure smile that surprises you. He seems to be acting to you, and to no one else."
Rourke continued building this persona, playing an enigmatic older brother in Rumble Fish and an enigmatic older brother in The Pope of Greenwich Village. Since there were no older brother roles in 9 ½ Weeks, Rourke had to settle for playing an enigmatic stranger who seduces a married Kim Basinger and eats food off her naked body. Asked about her experience on the film, Basinger famously dubbed Rourke “the human ashtray." While filming, Rourke hung a brass plaque on his trailer that read, "All studio executives and producers stay the fuck away.”
Throwing It Away
With continued praise for his roles in movies such as Barfly and Angel Heart, Rourke became a star. Audiences couldn’t get enough of his Rumpled Dirty Rebel persona, and young dick actors like Sean Penn and Nicolas Cage would visit his movie sets to watch him work. 9 ½ Weeks director Adrian Lyne said, "If Mickey had died after Angel Heart, he would have been remembered as James Dean or Marlon Brando." But instead of dying, he lived and pissed everybody off by fighting with producers, showing up late to sets, not learning his lines, and burning every bridge in sight.
Rourke also decided he was to good to take the following high-profile acting jobs: Kevin Costner’s role in The Untouchables, Eddie Murphy’s role in Beverly Hills Cop, Tom Cruise's role in Rain Man, Nick Nolte's role in 48 Hrs., and Bruce Willis’s role in Pulp Fiction. When Rourke actually did make films, his dickishness often overshadowed them, like Wild Orchid, in which he and real-life girlfriend Carré Otis allegedly filmed an unsimulated sex scene. Rourke was later arrested for spousal abuse after marrying her.
Boxing
In 1991, Rourke decided that the most logical thing to do for an actor known for his rugged good looks was to quit show business and return to a sport where even the winner’s face is pummeled into a bloody pile of meat. His injuries as a professional boxer included a broken nose, toe, ribs, a split tongue, and a compressed cheekbone. In 1995, when doctors warned him that he was incurring irreversible brain damage, Rourke reluctantly retired from boxing.
Return To Acting
Rourke was now officially an actor again, however, after all the face-punching and resulting plastic surgery, he now looked worse for the wear. Rourke’s career now consisted of making a less-than-well-received sequel to 9½ Weeks, getting third billing in a Jean-Claude Van Damme / Dennis Rodman movie, and making several direct-to-video movies so obscure they have no names.
Unlike his good looks, Rourke had not lost his off-camera attitude. He walked off the set of straight-to-video movie Luck of the Draw because the producers wouldn't let his pet Chihuahua appear with him in a scene.
2008 Comeback
Rourke managed to become a movie star again after starring as washed-up professional wrestler Randy "The Ram" Robinson in 2008’s indie film darling The Wrestler, receiving a Golden Globe for Best Actor. Apparently the last 20 years of becoming washed-up in real life was just one long intensely committed Method acting exercise.
Rourke now expertly plays the “I’m so sorry” card, publicly apologizing for his dickish past so frequently that many people have been tricked into thinking he is actually no longer a dick. Rourke has stated that "…all that I have been through…made me a better, more interesting actor…my best work is still ahead of me.” We like to think that his best dick work is ahead of him too.
