In another universe, intolerant everyman Archie Bunker could’ve been played by Mickey Rooney instead of Carroll O’Connor. “All in the Family” creator Norman Lear had O’Connor in mind for the role after seeing him in 1966’s “What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?” but he considered other actors before officially casting him. One particular person of interest was Rooney, whom Lear spoke to over the phone.
According to Lear, Rooney’s manager Red Doff confirmed the actor’s interest in doing a TV series and immediately put him in contact. “I told [Rooney] this is about a bigot,” Lear explained to the Television Academy Foundation. “He hears this, and he says, ‘They’re going to kill you in the streets.'”
Nevertheless, Rooney remained open to working with Lear. That interest extended to Rooney pitching him in the same phone conversation.
Mickey Rooney pitched a TV series to Norman Lear
Norman Lear recounted the pitch Mickey Rooney gave him: “Ex-Vietnam vet. Blind. Private eye. Large dog.” With limited details and no confirmation from Rooney, it’s difficult to say whether Rooney imagined the series as a procedural, a noir thriller, or a ’70s sitcom. “That’s all he said, but that’s the show he wanted to do,” said Lear.
Rooney never did a show created by Norman Lear. Just like Rooney’s TV pitch never came to fruition with Lear — or any other producer. Aside from his previous work in “The Mickey Rooney Show” and “Mickey,” Rooney only starred in one other sitcom after turning down Archie Bunker: “One of the Boys.”
The NBC series was released in 1982 and ended that same year. Rooney’s “One of the Boys” co-star Dana Carvey shared his experience working with Rooney on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” in 2022. “Mickey was the craziest person I’ve ever met,” he said. “‘You’d be coming down the hallway — and [Rooney] said this every day about his former glory — ‘I was the number one star in the world.'”
This story originally appeared on TVLine
