Tommy Kirk | |
|---|---|
 Kirk on the set ofSon of Flubber | |
| Born | Thomas Lee Kirk (1941-12-10)December 10, 1941 Louisville, Kentucky, U.S. |
| Died | September 28, 2021(2021-09-28) (aged 79) (date body found) Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1953−1975, 1987−2001 |
| Known for | The Shaggy Dog Swiss Family Robinson The Absent-Minded Professor Old Yeller |
| Parent(s) | Louis and Lucy Kirk |
Thomas Lee Kirk (December 10, 1941 − September 28, 2021)[1] was an American actor, best known for his performances in films made byWalt Disney Studios such asOld Yeller,The Shaggy Dog,Swiss Family Robinson,The Absent-Minded Professor, andThe Misadventures of Merlin Jones, as well as thebeach party films of the mid-1960s. He frequently appeared as a love interest forAnnette Funicello or as part of a family withKevin Corcoran as his younger brother andFred MacMurray as his father.
Kirk's career with Disney ended when news of his homosexuality threatened to become public. He struggled with drug addiction and depression for several years, appearing in a series of low-budget films before leaving the acting business in the mid-1970s. Kirk opened a carpet cleaning business and lived a mostly ordinary life, occasionally appearing at fan conventions. He died at his home in Las Vegas, Nevada, in September 2021, aged 79.
Kirk was born inLouisville, Kentucky, one of four sons. His father, Louis, was a mechanic who worked for the highway department; his mother, Lucy, was a legal secretary.[2] Looking for better job opportunities, they moved toDowney, California when Kirk was 15 months old.[3][4]
In 1954, Kirk accompanied his elder brother Joe to an audition for a production ofEugene O'Neill'sAh, Wilderness! at thePasadena Playhouse inPasadena, California. "Joe was star struck," said Kirk.[4] Joe was not cast, losing out toDrisoll, but Tommy was, and he made his stage debut oppositeWill Rogers Jr.[5] "It was five lines, it didn't pay anything, and nobody else showed up, so I got the part," recalled Kirk.[4]
The performance was seen by an agent from the Gertz agency, who signed Kirk and succeeded in casting him in an episode ofTV Reader's Digest, "The Last of the Old Time Shooting Sheriffs", directed byWilliam Beaudine. Kirk's brother went on to become a dentist.[4] Kirk was in demand almost immediately.[6]
In April 1956, 14-year-old Kirk was cast asJoe Hardy forThe Mickey Mouse Club serialThe Hardy Boys, alongsideTim Considine asFrank Hardy. The first of the serials,The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure, was filmed in June and early July 1956, and aired in October at the start of the show's second season.[7] In the following year, the second serialThe Mystery of Ghost Farm aired in 1957. The show and Kirk's performance were extremely well received and led to a long association between the actor and the Disney studio. A year prior to being cast inThe Hardy Boys, Kirk first auditioned for another serialSpin and Marty, but was unsuccessful. The open audition took the form of a baseball game.[8]
In August 1956, Disney hired him and the former Mouseketeer Judy Harriet to attend both theRepublican andDemocratic presidential nominating conventions, for newsreel specials that later appeared on the show.[9] Kirk also hosted short travelogues for the serial segment of the show's second season, sometimes withAnnette Funicello. He did the voice-over narration for "The Eagle Hunters" and dubbing work for the Danish-made filmVesterhavsdrenge, shown on theMickey Mouse Club as the serial "Boys of the Western Sea". Around this time, it was announced that Kirk would appear as YoungDavy Crockett, but this did not happen.[10]
Kirk's career received its biggest break yet when, in January 1957, Disney cast him as Travis Coates inOld Yeller (1957), an adventure story about a boy and his heroic dog.[11] Kirk had the lead role in the film, a success at the box-office, and he became Disney's first choice whenever they needed someone to play an all-American teenager.Kevin Corcoran played his younger brother and the two of them were often cast as brothers.[6] Later that year, Kirk and Corcoran were announced for the cast ofThe Rainbow Road to Oz, a feature film based on the stories ofL. Frank Baum, but this film was never produced.[12]
In July 1958, Kirk was cast inThe Shaggy Dog (1959), a comedy about a boy inventor, who under the influence of a magic ring, is repeatedly transformed into anOld English Sheepdog.[13] This teamed him with Corcoran and Considine, and two other Disney stars with whom he regularly worked,Fred MacMurray andAnnette Funicello. According toDiabolique, "Much of the credit went to MacMurray; a lot of the credit should have gone to Kirk, whose easy-going boy next door charm made him the ideal American teen."[6] Kirk said that when filming finished, Disney told him they did not have any projects for him and his contract would not be renewed. "I was thin and gangly and looked a mess ... I thought the whole world had fallen to pieces," he said.[14] (At the same time,Film Daily called Kirk one of its five "male juveniles" of the year, the others beingTim Considine,Ricky Nelson,Eddie Hodges, andJames MacArthur.)[15]
With his Disney contract completed, Kirk went toUniversal Pictures, where he played the male lead in the English dub of a Soviet animated feature,The Snow Queen, oppositeSandra Dee.[16]
Shaggy Dog turned out to be a hit, gaining significantly larger rentals thanOld Yeller, and Disney soon contacted Kirk, offering him another long-term contract and a role as middle son Ernst Robinson in another adventure film,Swiss Family Robinson (1960), starringJohn Mills,Janet Munro, and once againDorothy McGuire as his onscreen mother and Corcoran. It remained Kirk's favorite movie.[17] When he returned from filming in theWest Indies, the studio signed him to two more movies.[18]
Kirk followed up with a secondary role in a fantasy comedy starring Fred MacMurray,The Absent-Minded Professor (1961), another huge hit.[19] Disney sent Kirk to England forThe Horsemasters (1961), a youth-oriented horse riding film, which was made for U.S. television, but screened theatrically in some markets. He appeared once more with Munro and Funicello. That same year, Kirk played the support role of Grumio in thefairy tale fantasyBabes in Toyland, supporting Funicello,Ray Bolger,Ed Wynn andTommy Sands. Kirk later described this film as "sort of a clunker ... but it has a few cute moments, it's an oddity", and enjoyed working with Ed Wynn.[20] It was a box-office disappointment; so too wasMoon Pilot (1962), a satirical comedy where Kirk played the younger brother ofTom Tryon.[21][6]
Kirk acted in a family comedy with MacMurray,Bon Voyage (1962), with other family members played byJane Wyman,Deborah Walley, and Corcoran. On set, Kirk did not get along with his onscreen parents. He later admitted that his own neediness made him view MacMurray as a surrogate father, a role MacMurray had no wish to fulfill.[22] Kirk also had trouble with Jane Wyman, saying: "She was very mean to me. She went out of her way to be shitty ... but she was a total bitch and I think she washomophobic."'[23] Kirk maintained better relationships with his onscreen brothers Kevin Corcoran and Tim Considine, who called Kirk "a monster talent".[24]
Kirk starred with Funicello in another overseas-shot story which screened in the United States on TV, but was released in some countries theatrically:Escapade in Florence (1962). Newspaper columns occasionally linked Kirk and Funicello's names romantically,[25] though in fact, they were never anything more than friendly coworkers.[22]
In July 1962, Disney announced they would makeThe Happiest American with Kirk, but it was not made.[26] Instead, he did a sequel toAbsent Minded Professor,Son of Flubber (1963), his last film with MacMurray.
In 1963, Kirk reprised his role as Travis Coates in Disney'sSavage Sam (1963), a sequel toOld Yeller, which reunited him with Corcoran and co-starredBrian Keith; it was not as well received asOld Yeller.
Disney then cast Kirk as student inventor Merlin Jones inThe Misadventures of Merlin Jones (1964), again opposite Funicello. The film was directed byRobert Stevenson, who was frequently assigned Disney comedies. It became an unexpected box-office sensation, earning $4 million in rentals in North America, and Disney invited Funicello and him back to make a sequel,The Monkey's Uncle (1965).The Monkey's Uncle came out in July 1965 and was almost as successful asMerlin Jones.[27]
Kirk began to work steadily in television throughout 1956 and 1957 in episodes ofLux Video Theatre ("Green Promise"),Frontier ("The Devil and Doctor O'Hara"),Big Town ("Adult Delinquents"),Crossroads ("The Rabbi Davis Story"),Gunsmoke ("Cow Doctor"),Letter to Loretta ("But for God's Grace", "Little League") andMatinee Theatre ("The Outing", "The Others" – a version ofTurn of the Screw).[28]
Kirk supportedAngie Dickinson in a short feature calledDown Liberty Road, a.k.a.Freedom Highway (1956),[29] a short commercial travelogue produced byGreyhound Lines to promote theirScenicruiser buses.
Concurrent with his film career at Disney, Kirk continued to guest star on television series, such asThe O. Henry Playhouse ("Christmas by Injunction"),The Californians (as Billy Kilgore in "Little Lost Man"),Matinee Theatre ("Look Out for John Tucker"),Playhouse 90 ("A Corner of the Garden"),The Millionaire ('Millionaire Charles Bradwell") (1959)Bachelor Father ("A Key for Kelly"),Mr. Novak, "Love in the Wrong Season" (1963),Angel ("Goodbye Young Lovers"), andThe Alfred Hitchcock Hour ("Ten Minutes from Now") (1964).
The news of Kirk's termination from Disney Studios was not made public, but Kirk was soon working forAmerican International Pictures (AIP), which needed a leading man to co-star with Funicello in a musical they were preparing,The Maid and the Martian. Kirk was cast as a Martian who arrives on Earth and falls in with a bunch of partying teenagers. The movie was later retitledPajama Party (1964) and was a box-office success.[30]
AIP then cast him inThe Ghost in the Invisible Bikini (1966) withDeborah Walley.[6] Soon after, he and Walley were put inIt's a Bikini World, filmed in late 1965 under the direction ofStephanie Rothman. It was not released until 1967.[31] Also for AIP, he appeared in a TV special,The Wild Weird World of Dr. Goldfoot (1965), made to promoteDr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, which aired in November 1965. In December, he announced he would make three more films for Exclusive, starting withTeacher, Teacher, alongsideBob Denver andDawn Wells but the film would not be made.[32]
Following his work for AIP, Kirk spent the remainder of the 1960s making various low-budget films, includingVillage of the Giants (1965) forBert I. Gordon;The Unkissed Bride (1966) forJack H. Harris;Track of Thunder[33] andCatalina Caper in 1967[34]; and two films for Texan directorLarry Buchanan:Mars Needs Women (1968) andIt's Alive! (1969). Kirk got along well with Buchanan and the two would often spend time together off-set.[20]
Kirk said he reached bottom in 1970 when he did two movies that were notScreen Actors Guild,Ride the Hot Wind andBlood of Ghastly Horror, causing him to almost lose his SAG card. "Finally, I said, to hell with the whole thing, to hell with show business, I'm gonna make a new life for myself, and I got off drugs, completely kicked all that stuff."[17] In the 1970s, he was in a 1973 episode ofThe Streets of San Francisco and then starred in low-budget westernMy Name Is Legend (1975). While filmingMy Name is Legend, Kirk was thrown from a horse and injured.[35]
In the succession of films with Annette Funicello, Kirk recorded a few songs to accompany the films. ForPajama Party (1964), they recorded and filmed "There Has to Be a Reason" in a lip-synced performance as a duet. However, the original recording track was heavily altered by the studio engineers, mostly withecho effect. Kirk described his own singing voice as "wispy and adolescent".[36] ForMerlin Jones, Kirk featured on the song "The Scrambled Egghead" with Funicello.[37]
Later in his career, Kirk returned to his home state of Kentucky and performed in musical theatre, includingGuys and Dolls,Hello, Dolly! (as Horace Vandergelder),Anything Goes (as Moonface Martin),A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (as Marcus Lycus), andLittle Mary Sunshine (as General Fairfax).[36][38]
Kirk later recalled being gay and working at Disney as "terrible". He said the studio:
Were growing aware. They weren’t stupid; they could add two and two, and I think they were beginning to suspect. I noticed people in certain quarters were getting less and less friendly. You know, you can tell. To complicate the thing, I was messing around with drugs and drinking. I wasn’t disciplined; I was kind of a wild Irish person and nobody could tell me what to do. I lived my life exactly as I pleased; I tried to keep my private life private, but I was messing around and I was drinking a lot and going around to wild parties and carrying on, you know 一 and this is all contrary to the Disney image."[39]
While filmingThe Misadventures of Merlin Jones in 1963, 21-year-old Kirk began a relationship with a 15-year-old boy, and was caught having sex with him at a swimming pool inBurbank.[40][41] The boy's mother informed Disney, who elected not to renew Kirk's contract.[42] Walt Disney personally fired Kirk,[43] but whenMerlin Jones became an unexpected hit, Disney allowed him to return long enough to film a sequel,The Monkey's Uncle.[27]
Kirk publiclycame out as gay in a 1974 interview with John Marvin.[44] At the time he was studying acting at theLee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, while working as abusboy in a Los Angeles restaurant.
In 2017, while being interviewed for an online talk radio show, Kirk confessed that he regarded himself asbisexual. "I have had relations with women too. I am not just gay, I am—I happen to beboth, I would say. Like many people."[45]
Kirk had issues with alcohol and drugs, later saying:
I was drinking from the time I was 14. I always liked it. I started messing with drugs in the last couple of years at Disney—around '62. I'd get so tired, and somebody gave me some amphetamines, and they made me feel good and gave me energy, and I got addicted. There were a lot of people mixing them with alcohol. I very nearly died of an overdose a couple of times in 1966. I got off drugs absolutely by 1968, but I continued to drink. During that part of the 60s, I was pretty messed up and I wasn't employable; I wasn't fit for work. I wouldn't go for treatment and nobody could tell me what to do; I just wrecked everything in my life. Thank God I didn't do anything that I look back on with horror...I didn't kill anybody in a car accident or kill myself, though I very nearly did, drinking and driving.... I fell asleep at the wheel on the Ventura Freeway one night about 1967, and drove diagonally across the Freeway. Just missed getting creamed by a truck... It was mainly pills. Speed, uppers, diet pills—and I got thin as a rake, and I was high all the time. It was a terrible period in my life.[46]
On Christmas Eve 1964, Kirk was arrested for suspicion of possession of marijuana at a house inHollywood. The district attorney's office subsequently refused to file a complaint against him on the marijuana charge. The city attorney's office, however, filed an illegal drugs charge, because officers found a vial ofbarbiturates in his car. This charge was dismissed by a judge in early January when Kirk's attorney established that the barbiturates had been prescribed by a physician.[47] However, the damage to his career had been done. He was replaced onHow to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965) byDwayne Hickman (intended as AIP's follow-up toPajama Party), onThe Sons of Katie Elder byMichael Anderson, Jr. and onBeach Ball byEdd Byrnes. His initial casting in these films was announced in late 1964.[48]
"I lost everything I had," Kirk recalled. "I lost my money, my property; I partied it all away. I was very irresponsible financially. I lived my own life; I guess I was just seeking love or pleasure or some kind of illusory or transitory happiness, and I was pretty wild. The first 10 years after leaving Disney were pretty awful."[49]
Kirk got over his drug addiction and gave up acting in the mid-1970s. He worked as a waiter and a chauffeur before going into the carpet-cleaning business in theSan Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles, an operation which he ran for 20 years.[50]
In 1990, Kirk said he was "poor", but had "No bitterness. No regrets." He wrote an unproduced script aboutAbraham Lincoln[4] and continued to act occasionally, including small roles inStreets of Death (1988) andAttack of the 60 Foot Centerfold (1995). He also enjoyed writing and occasionally appearing at retro film conventions.[22] He had maintained a lifelong friendship with his Old Yeller co-starBeverly Washburn, since re-meeting at a convention in 1994.[51][52] He lived a private life and did not believe in "exhibiting" himself, preferring to keep away from the public eye.[45]
In 1993 Kirk said "I’ve quit drugs. I don't use anything at all. I don’t smoke; I don’t drink; I don't use drugs. I eat a very healthy diet, and I feel pretty good. I enjoy my work and I am a Christian. I’ve found Christianity to be a huge and tremendous help in getting the poison out of my system, purging myself of resentments and bitterness."[53]Kirk was inducted as aDisney Legend on October 9, 2006, alongside his former co-stars Tim Considine and Kevin Corcoran. His other repeat co-stars, Annette Funicello and Fred MacMurray, had already been inducted in 1992 and 1987, respectively. Also in 2006, the first of Kirk'sHardy Boys serials was issued on DVD in the fifth "wave" of theWalt Disney Treasures series.[54] At that point, he was retired with "a nice pension"[50] and living inRedding, California.
Kirk was found dead at his Las Vegas apartment on September 28, 2021. He was 79 years old.[55][56]
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1956 | The Peacemaker | Tommy | Uncredited |
| 1956 | Down Liberty Road | Short | |
| 1957 | Old Yeller | Travis Coates | |
| 1957 | The Snow Queen | Kay | Voice; 1959 English dubbed version |
| 1959 | The Shaggy Dog | Wilbur "Wilby" Daniels | |
| 1960 | Swiss Family Robinson | Ernst Robinson | |
| 1961 | The Absent-Minded Professor | Biff Hawk | |
| 1961 | Babes in Toyland | Grumio | |
| 1961 | The Horsemasters | Danny Grant | TV Series |
| 1962 | Moon Pilot | Walter Talbot | |
| 1962 | Escapade in Florence | Tommy Carpenter | TV Series |
| 1962 | Bon Voyage! | Elliott Willard | |
| 1963 | Son of Flubber | Biff Hawk | |
| 1963 | Savage Sam | Travis Coates | |
| 1964 | The Misadventures of Merlin Jones | Merlin Jones | |
| 1964 | Pajama Party | Go Go The Martian | |
| 1965 | The Monkey's Uncle | Merlin Jones | Last Disney appearance |
| 1965 | Village of the Giants | Mike | |
| 1966 | The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini | Chuck Philips | |
| 1966 | The Unkissed Bride | Ted | |
| 1967 | It's a Bikini World | Mike Samson / Herbert Samson | |
| 1967 | Catalina Caper | Don Pringle | |
| 1967 | Track of Thunder | Bobby Goodwin | |
| 1968 | Mars Needs Women | Dop / Martian Fellow No. 1 / Mr. Fast / Seattle Sun Reporter | TV Movie |
| 1969 | It's Alive! | Wayne Thomas | TV Movie |
| 1971 | Blood of Ghastly Horror | Sergeant Cross | |
| 1973 | Ride the Hot Wind | Captain Gregory Shank | |
| 1975 | My Name Is Legend | ||
| 1988 | Streets of Death | Frank Philips | |
| 1995 | Attack of the 60 Foot Centerfold | Passenger | |
| 1998 | Little Miss Magic | Mr. Kenner | |
| 1998 | Billy Frankenstein | Blind Monk | |
| 2000 | Club Dead | Private Detective | |
| 2001 | The Education of a Vampire | Albert Kornfield |
Actor Tommy Kirk was among nine persons booked on suspicion of possessing marijuana after a raid on a party at a Hollywood model's home, police reported. Kirk ... was arrested Friday along with the others ...
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