Troubled Talent
Barfly (1987)
"It's cliché," Rourke has said about the labels people pinned on him during his wilder, partying days. "People go, 'Oh, he has a drug problem, a drinking problem.' It was never my issue."
The labels, however, have stuck, ("When we met, Mickey smoked but he didn't drink. As his fame grew he started to become the big star, drinking and doing coke,” first ex-wife Debra Feuer once told The Mirror) and few of his roles seem as close to the bone as Henry Chinaski in Barfly, the boozy poet of his generation.
Based on drunkard scribe Charles Bukowski, Chinaski is a Shakespeare of spirits, and the type of lyrical troublemaker that fit Rourke to a tee. Barbet Schroeder found the actor’s dark heart.
Though they worked together well on Barfly, Rourke’s slide into arrogance, anger and dismay about Hollywood poisoned their relationship.
''I remember I put a note on his front door saying that I would never speak to him again,'' says Schroeder, ''and I haven't.''
Soon, Mickey would ditch Hollywood altogether…
Next: Hangin’ Tough
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