Mickey Rourke has officially been evicted from his L.A. home due to a California court order.
The Wrestler and Iron Man 2 actor has been in a legal battle to remain in the Drexel Ave. property after his landlord filed an unlawful detainer case claiming Rourke owed $59,100 in back rent. Earlier this week, a judgment was entered in favor of the landlord after the 73-year-old actor did not respond to the complaint, according to People, which first reported the news, and the landlord repossessed the property. Rourke had already departed the property, however, and was last reported as living in a West Hollywood hotel while he waited for a new residence in Koreatown to become available.
The news follows a curious turn of events in January regarding the former Oscar nominee, in which his manager of nine years, Kimberly Hines, launched an emergency GoFundMe to save Rourke from homelessness.
The fund had almost hit $100,000 when Rourke responded to the effort with an Instagram video where the actor claimed he had no knowledge of the “humiliating” public fundraiser to try and help him and said he would return any money donated back to his fans. “If I needed money, I wouldn’t ask for no fucking charity,” Rourke said at the time. “I’d rather stick a gun up my ass and pull the trigger … My life is very simple, I wouldn’t go to outside sources like that.”
In an exclusive interview with The Hollywood Reporter in January, his manager Hines helped clarify the situation.
“The GoFundMe was done for Mickey,” Hines explained. “That money’s going to Mickey. It’s not going to me. And if Mickey doesn’t want this money now and decides, ‘I don’t want help, it’s like it’s charity,’ the money will be returned … We said, ‘Mickey, there’s some people that want to help you out.’ He’s like, ‘OK, great.’ I don’t think he understood, and now it’s taken on this media frenzy, and he flipped out … He’s calling me for money. He’s calling friends for money. A GoFund is set up for him, and now he’s rejecting it?”
Hines noted that Rourke doesn’t manage his money very well. That the actor doesn’t have a bank account, “doesn’t carry money,” tends to live paycheck to paycheck and is extremely generous to his friends.
“And he hasn’t really made that much money in the last couple of years, because he just doesn’t want to compromise [on his choice of roles],” she added. “It’s great that so many people care because, honestly, the guy spends Christmas alone. He spends his birthdays alone. Besides his assistant and his manager, he’s got nobody in his life. He should probably take this help, because unless he goes back to work, I can only finance him for so long.”
In an interview with TMZ, Hines revealed the actor refuses to work for anything less than $200,000 a day.
In one optimistic note, Hines added that since the news of his housing situation went viral, the actor has had multiple offers for new roles.
Seth Abramovitch contributed to this report
