"Racist" Mickey Rooney

Must not laugh at Asians

"Mickey Rooney got heartburn when he learned why his 1961 film "Breakfast at Tiffany's" had been pulled for "Ratatouille" at East Sacramento's free Screen on the Green movie series Saturday night. "Ratatouille? Never heard of it!" Rooney, 87, said in his classic Brooklyn accent in a spirited phone interview from his southern California home this weekend.

One of the most beloved and enduring movie actors in American history, Rooney was shocked to hear his comic role as Mr. Yunioshi, Audrey Hepburn's cantankerous upstairs neighbor, had been branded racist by several Asian American activists in Sacramento....

CAPITAL (Council of Asian Pacific Islanders Together for Advocacy and Leadership), an umbrella group for more than 90 local organizations, told the Sacramento City Council that Rooney's buck-toothed Japanese character with thick glasses and exaggerated Asian accent perpetuated "offensive, derogatory and hateful racial stereotypes detrimental and destructive to our society."

Source

It was comedy at the time but laughter is dangerous these days

Posted by John Ray.