Maureen O'Hara
O'Hara in c.1940
Born	Maureen FitzSimons (1920-08-17) 17 August 1920 (age 91) Ranelagh, Dublin, Ireland
Occupation	Actress/Singer
Years active	1938–1973 1991–2000
Spouse	George H. Brown (m.1939-1941; annulled) Will Price (m.1941-1953; divorced) Charles F. Blair, Jr. (m.1968-1978; his death)

Maureen O'Hara (born 17 August 1920) is an Irish film actress and singer. The famously red-headed O'Hara has been noted for playing fiercely passionate heroines with a highly sensible attitude. She often worked with director John Ford and longtime friend John Wayne. Her autobiography, 'Tis Herself, was published in 2004 and was a New York Times Bestseller.

Early life and career[link]

O'Hara was born as Maureen FitzSimons on Beechwood Avenue in the Dublin suburb of Ranelagh.^[1] She was the second oldest of the six children of Charles Stewart Parnell FitzSimons and Marguerita Lilburn FitzSimons. Her father was in the clothing business and also bought into Shamrock Rovers Football Club,^[2] a team O'Hara has supported since childhood.^[3] Her mother, a former operatic contralto, was a successful women's clothier. O'Hara was raised as, and still is, a Roman Catholic.^[4] Her siblings were Peggy, the oldest, and younger Charles, Florrie, Margot and Jimmy. Peggy dedicated her life to a religious order, the Sisters of Charity, and the younger children all went on to receive training at the Abbey Theatre and the Ena Mary Burke School of Drama and Elocution in Dublin. O'Hara's dream at this time was to be a stage actress. She was first educated at the John Street West Girls' School near Thomas Street in Dublin's Liberties Area. From the age of 6–17 she trained in drama, music and dance, and at the age of 10 joined the Rathmines Theatre Company and worked in amateur theatre in the evenings, after her lessons.^[5]

O'Hara's father was a very practical man and did not entirely support her theatrical aspirations. He insisted she learn a skill so that she would have something to fall back on to earn a living in case her experience in the performing arts was not successful. She enrolled in a business school and became a proficient bookkeeper and typist. Those skills proved helpful many years later when she was able to take and transcribe production notes dictated by John Ford for the screen adaptation of Maurice Walsh's short story The Quiet Man.

She did well in her Abbey training and was given an opportunity for a screen test in London. The studio adorned her in a "gold lamé dress with flapping sleeves like wings"^[6] and heavy make-up with an ornate hair style. Reportedly, her thoughts concerning the incident were, "If this is the movies, I want nothing to do with them!"^[7] The screen test was deemed to be far from satisfactory; however, actor Charles Laughton later saw the test and, despite the overdone makeup and costume, was intrigued, paying particular notice to her large and expressive eyes.

Laughton subsequently asked his business partner Erich Pommer to see the film clip. Pommer agreed with Laughton and O'Hara was offered an initial seven-year contract with their new company, Mayflower Pictures. Her first major film was Jamaica Inn (1939) directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Laughton was so pleased with O'Hara's performance that he cast her in the role of Esmeralda opposite him in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), which was to be filmed at RKO Studios in Hollywood that same year. After the successful completion of Hunchback, World War II began, and Laughton, realizing their studio could no longer film in London, sold O'Hara's contract to RKO. That studio cast her in low-budget films until she was rescued by director John Ford, who cast her as Angharad in How Green Was My Valley, which won the 1941 Academy Award for Best Picture. Six years later, in 1947, she made what is perhaps her best-remembered film, starring as Doris Walker and the mother of a young Natalie Wood in 20th Century Fox's Miracle on 34th Street, which, despite being released in May, has become a perennial Christmas classic, with a traditional network television airing every Thanksgiving Day on NBC. The film also helped to further establish O'Hara's career after the film garnered several awards, including an Academy Award Nomination for Best Picture.

In 1946, she became a naturalized citizen of the United States and now holds dual citizenship with the U.S. and her native Ireland.

In addition to her acting skills, O'Hara had a soprano voice and described singing as her first love. The studio heads never capitalized on her musical talent, as she was already big box office in other genres of film. However, she was able to channel her love of singing through television. In the late '50s and early '60s, she was a guest on musical variety shows with Perry Como, Andy Williams, Betty Grable and Tennessee Ernie Ford. In 1960, she starred on Broadway in the musical Christine which ran for 12 performances. That year she released two successful recordings, Love Letters from Maureen O'Hara and Maureen O'Hara Sings her Favorite Irish Songs. Love Letters from Maureen O'Hara has been released on CD in Japan and is now out of print; Maureen O'Hara Sings Her Favorite Irish Songs has yet to be released on CD.

With Tyrone Power in the trailer for The Black Swan (1942)

An icon of Hollywood's Golden Age, at the height of her career, O'Hara was considered one of the world's most beautiful women. She is often remembered for her on-screen chemistry with John Wayne. They made five films together between 1948 and 1972: Rio Grande, The Quiet Man, The Wings of Eagles, McLintock! and Big Jake. A clip of O'Hara's radiant face as she waves from a gate in John Ford's Academy Award-winning How Green Was My Valley, remains one of the most classic images preserved on film, and is often featured as a clip in montages and promotions.

Marriage, retirement and comeback[link]

In 1939, at the age of 19, O'Hara secretly married Englishman George H. Brown,^[8] a film producer, production assistant and occasional scriptwriter whose best known work is the first of Margaret Rutherford's 1960s Miss Marple mysteries, Murder She Said. The marriage was annulled in 1941. Later that year, O'Hara married American film director William Houston Price (dialog director in The Hunchback of Notre Dame), but the union ended in 1953, reportedly as a result of his alcohol abuse. They had one child in 1944, a daughter named Bronwyn FitzSimons Price. Bronwyn has one son, Conor Beau FitzSimons, who was born on September 8, 1970. From 1953 until 1967 O'Hara had a relationship with Enrique Parra, a Mexican politician and banker. She wrote in her autobiography; "Enrique saved me from the darkness of an abusive marriage and brought me back into the warm light of life again. Leaving him was one of the most painful things I have ever had to do."^[9]

She married her third husband, Charles F. Blair, Jr., on March 12, 1968. Blair was a pioneer of transatlantic aviation, a former Brigadier General of the U.S. Air Force, and a former Chief Pilot at Pan Am. A few years after her marriage to Blair, O'Hara for the most part retired from acting. Blair died in 1978 when an engine of a Grumman Goose he was flying from St. Croix to St. Thomas exploded. She was elected CEO and President of Antilles Airboats with the added distinction of being the first woman president of a scheduled airline in the U.S. Later she sold the airline with the permission of the shareholders.

O'Hara remained retired from acting until 1991, when she starred in the film Only the Lonely, playing Rose Muldoon, the domineering mother of a Chicago cop played by John Candy. In the following years, she continued to work, starring in several made-for-TV movies, including The Christmas Box, Cab for Canada and The Last Dance, the latter her last film to date, released in 2000.

Now retired, she has homes in Arizona and the Virgin Islands but lives mainly in Glengarriff, County Cork. In June 2011 she participated at the Maureen O'Hara Film Festival in Glengarriff.^[10]

O'Hara is scheduled to make a public appearence in Kells Co. Meath on the 26th of May 2012 to commemerate her father, who was born in the town.

In May 2012, O'Hara's family contacted social workers regarding claims that O'Hara was a victim of elder abuse^[11].

Achievements[link]

O'Hara was named Irish America magazine's "Irish American of the Year" in 2005, with festivities held at the Plaza Hotel in New York.

She was given the Heritage Award by the Ireland-American Fund in 1991.

For her contributions to the motion picture industry, O'Hara has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7004 Hollywood Blvd. In 1993, she was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. She was also awarded the Golden Boot Award.

She wrote the foreword for the cookbook At Home in Ireland. In March 1999, O'Hara was selected to be Grand Marshal of New York City's St. Patrick's Day Parade. In 2007, she wrote the foreword for the biography of her dear friend, actress Anna Lee.

In 2004, O'Hara released her autobiography 'Tis Herself, co-authored with Johnny Nicoletti and published by Simon & Schuster. In the same year, she was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Irish Film and Television Academy in her native Dublin.

In 2006, O'Hara attended the Grand Reopening and Expansion of the Flying Boats Museum in Foynes, Limerick, Ireland, as a patron of the museum. A significant portion of the museum is dedicated to her late husband Charles.

O'Hara donated her late husband's seaplane (a Sikorsky VS-44A) "The Queen of the Skies" to the New England Air Museum. The restoration of the plane took 8 years and time was donated by former pilots and mechanics in honour of Charles Blair. It is the only surviving example of this type of plane.

In 2011, Maureen O'Hara was formally inducted into the Irish America Hall of Fame at an event in New Ross, County Wexford, receiving letters from Mary McAleese and Bill Clinton.^[12] O'Hara was also named president of UFFO, The Universal Film & Festival Organization which promotes a code of conduct for film festivals and the film industry.^[13]

Maureen O'Hara is credited with helping to win WWII. She starred with John Payne and Randolph Scott in the 1942 hit To the Shores of Tripoli. The attack on Pearl Harbor happened while the film was in post-production, so they changed the ending to include everybody going off to war. The U.S. Marine Corps says this film was the number one recruiting device for Marines in 1942.^{[citation needed]} In 1940 there were only 19,400 Marines. By the end of WWII there were 485,052 U.S. Marines. Hence the pun "The Maureen Corps".

Filmography[link]

Footnotes[link]

References[link]

• The Hoops by Paul Doolan and Robert Goggins (ISBN 0-7171-2121-6)

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Maureen O'Hara

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Maureen O'Hara

• Maureen O'Hara at the Internet Movie Database
• Maureen O'Hara at the TCM Movie Database
• Photo gallery
• Maureen O'Hara Magazine
• Maureen biography and facts
• Doctor Macro's photo gallery

O'Hara is an Anglicized form of the Irish name Ó hEaghra. The death of the eponyum is mentioned in the Annals of the Four Masters - 926. Eaghra Poprigh mac Saorghus, lord of Luighne, in Connaught ... died.

O'Hara as a surname[link]

• O'Hara (surname)

Fictional characters[link]

• Chief O'Hara (Disney Comics), Disney comic book character
• Chief Miles O'Hara, character from the Batman TV show
• Jack "Butcher" O'Hara, the Green Beret in the game series Commandos
• Juliet O'Hara, a main character in the American comedy-drama television series Psych
• Miguel O'Hara is an alternative futuristic version of the comic book superhero Spider-Man
• Neely O'Hara, character in Valley of the Dolls
• Scarlett O'Hara, literary protagonist in Margaret Mitchell's novel Gone with the Wind
• Spike O'Hara, the main character in the NES game Ghoul School
• Dana O'Hara, protagonist of the song Letter to Dana by Finnish power metal group Sonata Arctica, from their album Ecliptica.

Place names[link]

• Cardinal O'Hara High School, a Catholic high school near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
• Lake O'Hara, a lake in Yoho National Park, British Columbia, Canada
• O'Hara Glacier, a glacier in Antarctica
• O'Hara Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania a US town.
• O'Hara Township, Pennsylvania, a township within Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, USA

Other uses[link]

• O'Hara, U.S. Treasury, a 1970s crime television series
• O'Hara, the title of a novel by William Hamilton Maxwell
• The People Against O'Hara, a 1951 film starring Spencer Tracy
• The book of O'Hara is a collection of poetry from the royal O'Hara family which was edited by Lambert McKenna in 1951 from the original manuscripts

See also[link]

• Ohara (disambiguation)
• O'Hare (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

This page or section lists people with the surname O'Hara. If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding the person's given name(s) to the link.

Hayley Mills (born 18 April 1946) is an English actress. The daughter of John Mills and Mary Hayley Bell, and sister of actress Juliet Mills, Mills began her acting career as a child and was hailed as a promising newcomer, winning the BAFTA Award for Most Promising Newcomer for Tiger Bay (1959), the Academy Juvenile Award for Pollyanna (1960) and Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actress in 1961. During her early career, she appeared in several films for Walt Disney, and is perhaps best known for her dual role as twins Susan and Sharon in the Disney film The Parent Trap.

During the late 1960s she began performing in theatrical plays, and played in more mature roles. The age of contracts with studios soon passed. Although she has not maintained the box office success or the Hollywood A-list she experienced as a child actress, she has continued to make movies and TV appearances, having two movies in post-production in 2010.

In 2007 Mills became a main character in the ITV Series Wild at Heart.

Early life and career[link]

Mills was born Hayley Catherine Rose Vivien Mills in London, England, the younger daughter of actor Sir John Mills and playwright Mary Hayley Bell. She is also the younger sister of actress Juliet Mills and the first cousin once removed of Susie Blake.

Mills was 12 when she was discovered by J. Lee Thompson, who was initially looking for a boy to play the lead role in Tiger Bay. Walt Disney's wife, Lillian Disney, saw her performance and suggested that Mills be given the lead role in Pollyanna. The role of the orphaned "glad girl" who moves in with her aunt catapulted Mills to super-stardom in the United States and earned her a special Academy Award.^[1][2]

Disney subsequently cast Mills as twins Sharon and Susan who reunite their divorced parents in The Parent Trap. In the film, Mills sings the hit song "Let's Get Together." She made four additional films for Disney in a four-year span, including In Search of the Castaways and Summer Magic. Her final two Disney films, The Moon-Spinners and That Darn Cat!, did very well at the box office.^[3]

During her six-year run at Disney, Mills was arguably the most popular child actress of the era. In 1961, British exhibitors voted her the most popular star in the country for that year.^[4] Critics noted that America's favourite child star was, in fact, quite British and very lady-like. The success of "Let's Get Together" (which hit No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart and No. 17 in Britain ( Decca F 21396) also led to the release of a record album on Disney's Buena Vista label, Let's Get Together with Hayley Mills, which also included her only other hit song, "Johnny Jingo" (Billboard No. 21, 1962).

In addition to her Disney movies, Mills starred in several other films, notably Whistle Down the Wind 1961, (based on the book of the same title written by her mother, Mary Hayley Bell), with Alan Bates. The Truth About Spring (with her real father, John Mills, cast as her father and James MacArthur as the love interest), and The Chalk Garden, 1964 from the play by Enid Bagnold

Mills was considered for the role of Lolita Haze in Stanley Kubrick's 1962 film version of Lolita. However, Walt Disney discouraged the casting, feeling the role was not up to Disney's wholesome standard, and the part eventually went to Sue Lyon.

In 1962 Disney announced plans to film I Capture the Castle, from the novel by Dodie Smith, with Hayley Mills in the role of Cassandra. However, Disney never produced the film.

Post-Disney film career[link]

After her contract with Disney expired in 1965, Mills starred in the enduring comedy The Trouble with Angels, opposite screen veteran Rosalind Russell. Looking to break from her girl-next-door image, Mills returned to England to appear as a mentally challenged teenager in the film Sky West and Crooked, which was directed by her father and written by her mother. Shortly thereafter, Mills was persuaded by her father and director Roy Boulting to star in The Family Way, a comedy about a couple having difficulty consummating their marriage, featuring a score by Paul McCartney and arrangements by Beatles producer George Martin. She then starred as the protagonist of Pretty Polly, opposite famous Indian film actor Shashi Kapoor in Singapore. In 1972 she made Endless Night with Britt Ekland, Per Oscarsson, Hywel Bennett and George Sanders. It is based on the novel Endless Night by Agatha Christie. After her appearance in The Kingfisher Caper in 1975, Mills dropped out of the film industry for a few years.^[5]

Television resurgence and reception[link]

In 1981 Mills returned to acting with a starring role in the UK television mini-series The Flame Trees of Thika, based on Elspeth Huxley's memoir of her childhood in East Africa. The series was well received, prompting Mills to accept more acting roles. She then returned to America, and made two appearances on The Love Boat.

Always welcomed at Disney, Mills narrated an episode of The Wonderful World of Disney, sparking renewed interest in her Disney work. In 1986 she reprised her roles as twins Sharon and Susan for a trio of Parent Trap television movies: The Parent Trap II, The Parent Trap III, and The Parent Trap IV: Hawaiian Honeymoon. Mills also starred as the title character in the Disney Channel-produced television series Good Morning, Miss Bliss in 1987. The show was cancelled after 13 episodes, and the rights were acquired by NBC, which reformatted Good Morning, Miss Bliss into Saved by the Bell. In recognition for her work with The Walt Disney Company, Mills was awarded the prestigious Disney Legends award in 1998.^[6]

Mills recalled her childhood in the 2000 documentary film Sir John Mills' Moving Memories which was written by her brother Jonathan. In 2007 she began appearing (alongside her sister Juliet) as Caroline in the ITV1 African vet drama, Wild at Heart.

In 2005 Mills appeared in the acclaimed short film, Stricken, written and directed by Jayce Bartok.

In 2010 Mills appeared in Mandie and the Cherokee Treasure, based on one of the popular Mandie novels of Lois Gladys Leppard

Stage career[link]

Mills made her stage debut in a 1966 West End revival of Peter Pan. In 2000 she made her Off Broadway debut in Sir Noël Coward's Suite in Two Keys, opposite American actress Judith Ivey, for which she won a Theatre World Award. In 1991 she appeared as Anna Leonowens in the Australian production of The King and I. In December, 2007, for their annual birthday celebration to "The Master", The Noël Coward Society invited Mills as the guest celebrity to lay flowers in front of Coward's statue at New York's Gershwin Theatre, thereby commemorating the 108th birthday of Sir Noel.

Mills is currently starring as Ursula Widdington in the Stage Production of Ladies in Lavender at the Royal & Derngate Theatre, Before embarking on a National UK Tour.

Personal life[link]

While filming The Family Way, the 20-year-old Mills met 53-year-old director Roy Boulting. The two married in 1971, and owned a flat in London's Kensington. They then went on to purchase Cobstone Windmill in Ibstone, Buckinghamshire. Their son, Crispian Mills, achieved recognition as the lead singer and guitarist for the psychedelic rock band Kula Shaker. The couple divorced in 1977. Mills currently lives in New York City.

Mills later had a second son, Jason Lawson, during a relationship with British actor Leigh Lawson. Mills' current (2012) partner is Firdous Bamji.^[7]

Mills has had involvement with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (the "Hare Krishna" movement).^[8] She wrote the preface to the book, The Hare Krishna Book of Vegetarian Cooking, published in 1984. Mills has been a pescetarian since the late 1990s.^[9]

In 1988 she co-edited, with Marcus Maclaine, the book My God, which consisted of brief letters from celebrities on their beliefs (or lack thereof) regarding God and the life to come.

On 18 April 2008, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had surgery and chemotherapy and told Good Housekeeping Magazine in January 2012 that she had recovered.^[7]

Filmography[link]

Box-office rankings[link]

Mills featured prominently in polls taken by exhibitors of the leading box office stars in the USA and Britain:

• 1961 – Most popular star in Britain^[11]
• 1962 – 20th biggest star in the USA, 5th in Britain^[12]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Hayley Mills at the Internet Movie Database
• Hayley Comes Back to Her Richmond Roots

Joanna Barnes
Barnes in 1959.
Born	(1934-11-15) 15 November 1934 (age 77) Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Occupation	Actress Writer
Years active	1956–2002
Spouse	Richard Edward Herndon (1955-?) (divorced) Lawrence Dobkin (1961-1967) (divorced) Jack Lionel Warner (1980-2012) (his death)

Joanna Barnes (born 15 November 1934) is an American actress and writer.

Barnes was born in Boston, Massachusetts, but moved to Los Angeles, California soon after finishing her education, and took up a contract with Columbia Pictures. She has since had roles in more than 20 films and made guest appearances on many television shows, including 77 Sunset Strip, Maverick, and Have Gun - Will Travel. Her performance in the 1958 film Auntie Mame as the snooty 'Gloria Upson' earned her a Golden Globe nomination for "New Star of the Year." She portrayed Lola in the 1959 NBC-TV detective series, 21 Beacon Street.

Barnes became the 13th actress to play Jane when she appeared in Tarzan, the Ape Man (1959), opposite Denny Miller as Tarzan.

Barnes worked for producer Martin Ransohoff in the 1960s, appearing in episodes of his The Beverly Hillbillies (Elly Goes to School and The Clampett Look) and was billed as special guest-star. Barnes played Peter Falk's ex-wife on the 1965–66 CBS series The Trials of O'Brien and was host of the ABC daytime talk show Dateline: Hollywood in 1967. During this period she appeared in The War Wagon, a lavish western movie starring John Wayne and Kirk Douglas, which she touted tirelessly on her show. She was also a frequent panelist in the early years of the syndicated version of What's My Line?

On December 19, 1972 Barnes appeared on The Merv Griffin Show with Joan Fontaine, Zsa Zsa Gabor, and Dan Martino founder of the Dan Martino School for Men.

She is also a distinguished writer and columnist. Her column, Touching Home, was carried by The Chicago Tribune and the New York News Syndicate. She has also published several novels, including The Deceivers (1970), Pastora (1980), and Silverwood (1985).

On April 30, 1955 she married Richard Edward Herndon and they later divorced. On June 24, 1962, she married actor Lawrence Dobkin; and they divorced on January 16, 1967. On October 1, 1980 she married her current husband Jack Lionel Warner. She has no children. During her marriage to Lawrence Dobkin she was the stepmother of his daughter Deborah from his first wife Frances Walker.

In the original Parent Trap (1961), she played the gold-digger, Vicki Robinson, who temporarily comes between Maureen O'Hara and Brian Keith. In the latest remake, Barnes played Vicky Blake, the mother of the gold-digging girlfriend character.

Filmography[link]

External links[link]

• Joanna Barnes at the Internet Movie Database
• Speaking of Stories: Joanna Barnes bio
• Golden Globes: Auntie Mame

Kevin Anthony "Moochie" Corcoran (born June 10, 1949) is an American director, producer, and former child actor. He appeared in numerous Disney projects between 1957 and 1963, frequently as an irrepressible character with the nickname Moochie. One of eight children, most of whom did some acting in the late 1950s to early 1960s, Corcoran is the sibling whose work is best remembered. His father, William "Bill" Corcoran, Sr. (1905–1958), was a police officer and then director of maintenance at MGM Studios. Corcoran's mother, the former Kathleen McKenney (1917–1972), was like her husband a native of Quincy, Massachusetts.

Moochie[link]

Between 1956 and 1960, Corcoran played several different (but similar) characters, each bearing the nickname Moochie. Although he was never a Mouseketeer, Corcoran appeared in three Mickey Mouse Club serials, beginning with Adventure in Dairyland, where he played Moochie McCandless, a farmer's son.^[1] This was the first of Corcoran's many Disney credits. He soon returned, as Montgomery (Moochie) O'Hara, in two Spin and Marty serials, The Further Adventures of Spin and Marty and The New Adventures of Spin and Marty.^[1]

Corcoran appeared in a Mouseketeer outfit with the name Moochie across his chest - once. In Disneyland: The Fourth Anniversary Show (1957), an episode of the Disney anthology television series, "Mouseketeer" Moochie repeatedly badgers Walt Disney for information about Zorro.^[1]

Continuing his fictional Moochie roles, Corcoran played Montgomery "Moochie" Daniels in the 1959 Disney film The Shaggy Dog. He also starred as Moochie Morgan in Moochie of the Little League (1959) and Moochie of Pop Warner Football (1960), both for the Disney anthology series. Character actor Russ Conway played his father.^[1]

In each iteration, Moochie likes to hang out with the older "guys" (big brother Wilby in The Shaggy Dog, the title characters in Spin and Marty), and hates being treated like the little kid he is. His determination to emulate elder peers despite adult warnings (swimming, helping Wilby, even switch-hitting) frequently gets him in trouble, but Moochie's bravado always returns soon afterward. Film writer Donald Liebenson has called Corcoran's character "part All-American boy and part hellion."^[2]

Other childhood roles[link]

Corcoran appeared in numerous Disney projects (and a handful of non-Disney ones) without the Moochie name. He starred as Toby, an orphan who runs off to join the circus, in Toby Tyler, or Ten Weeks with a Circus (1960). This was the only theatrical film in which Corcoran had the lead role. Important co-starring roles include the following:

• Old Yeller (1957) - younger son Arliss Coates
• Goliath II (1960) - Goliath II
• Pollyanna (1960) - Pollyanna's friend, orphan Jimmy Bean
• Swiss Family Robinson (1960) - youngest son Francis Robinson
• Daniel Boone (1960 Disney miniseries) - son James Boone
• Babes in Toyland (1961) - nursery rhyme character Boy Blue
• Bon Voyage! (1962) - younger son Skipper Willard
• The Mooncussers (1962 Disney TV) - Jonathan Feather
• Johnny Shiloh (1963 Disney TV) - Union Army drummer Johnny Lincoln Clem
• Savage Sam (1963) - Arliss Coates again
• A Tiger Walks (1964) - Tom Hadley

Kevin Corcoran and Tommy Kirk played brothers in five films, beginning with 1957's Old Yeller. The other films in this category were The Shaggy Dog (1959), Swiss Family Robinson (1960), Bon Voyage! (1962) and Savage Sam (sequel to Old Yeller, 1963). Fred MacMurray played their father in The Shaggy Dog and Bon Voyage! Dorothy McGuire played their mother in Old Yeller and Swiss Family Robinson.

Corcoran largely retired from acting after A Tiger Walks, although he also appeared in the 1968 film Blue in a minor role. It was probably around the time of the latter film that he attended college. In an interview for the DVD release of The Shaggy Dog, he credits his studio teachers with having prepared him well for his college studies.

Adult career[link]

Corcoran graduated from California State University, Northridge with a degree in theatre arts. After this he returned to Disney, this time working behind the camera as an assistant director and producer. His credits from this era include Superdad (1973), The Island at the Top of the World (1974) and Pete's Dragon (1977). Appropriately, he also worked on The New Mickey Mouse Club (1977). He was an associate producer on The Treasure of Matecumbe (1976), on the sequel Return from Witch Mountain (1978) and on The North Avenue Irregulars (1979). He co-produced Herbie Goes Bananas (1980), and was the producer of the comedy television series Zorro and Son (1983). Corcoran's more recent contributions to Disney include commentaries and interviews on such Disney DVD releases as The Shaggy Dog and Pollyanna.

He has also served as first assistant director on several non-Disney television series, including Scarecrow and Mrs. King, Quantum Leap, Profiler and Karen Sisco; and produced a number of projects. Over the course of his tenure on the Angela Lansbury series Murder She Wrote, he was credited as first assistant director, assistant producer, and director.

Family[link]

Kevin Corcoran is the brother of Donna Corcoran, Noreen Corcoran, Hugh Corcoran, Brian Corcoran, Kerry Corcoran, and Kelly Corcoran (1958–2002). Elder siblings Donna, Noreen, and Hugh Corcoran have extensive film and television credits as child actors during the 1950s. Donna, Noreen, and Kevin all appeared in the 1955 film Violent Saturday.

Noreen Corcoran starred as Kelly Gregg on the television series Bachelor Father from 1957-1962. During its five-year run, Bachelor Father was seen on all three national networks. Brian Corcoran played Kevin's brother, and Kerry, his sister, in the 1960 Daniel Boone miniseries on Walt Disney Presents, then on ABC. Brian also was Willie Winkie to Kevin Corcoran's Boy Blue in the 1961 film Babes in Toyland.

Donna Corcoran played Moochie's sister Marian in Moochie of the Little League (1960). She also played Bridget White, ("...eight years old") as the little orphan who saw the "Angels in the Outfield" in the original 1951 version with Paul Douglas and Janet Leigh. Younger brother Kelly Corcoran (1958–2002) portrayed 8-year-old Kip Pride in the NBC western series The Road West (1966–1967), starring Barry Sullivan.

Kevin Corcoran and his wife have been married since 1972.

Disney Legend[link]

Kevin Corcoran was honored as a Disney Legend on October 9, 2006. Among the other recipients at the 2006 ceremony were the two lead actors in Corcoran's Spin and Marty serials, Tim Considine and David Stollery, and Corcoran's frequent co-star, Tommy Kirk, himself a veteran of Mickey Mouse Club serials about the Hardy Boys.^[3]

References[link]

The Wonderful World of Disney Television: A Complete History by Bill Cotter. Hyperion, 1997. ISBN 0-7868-6359-5

External links[link]

• Kevin Corcoran at the Internet Movie Database
• Allmovie bio
• Disney Legends profile
• Profile on The Original Mickey Mouse Club Show website