Hayley Mills won the very last juvenile Oscar Hollywood ever handed out
A director hunting for a boy cast 12-year-old Hayley Mills instead, and a Disney producer who saw the result made her Pollyanna. That role earned her the final Academy Juvenile Award ever given. Within a few years she was Britain's biggest star, yet she later felt the studio contract had boxed her in.
Mills was born in Marylebone, London, on 18 April 1946, the daughter of actor John Mills and writer and actress Mary Hayley Bell. J. Lee Thompson had wanted a boy for the lead in Tiger Bay (1959), but chose her and put her opposite her own father; the part won her a BAFTA as most promising newcomer. Bill Anderson, a Disney producer, watched it and pushed for her to play the orphaned glad girl in Pollyanna (1960). She could not attend the ceremony, so Annette Funicello collected her juvenile Oscar.
The Parent Trap (1961) cast her as twins scheming to reunite their divorced parents, and her duet with herself, Let's Get Together, reached No. 8 in the United States and No. 1 in Mexico. Back home, Whistle Down the Wind, adapted from her mother's novel about children who take an escaped convict for Jesus, made her the most popular star in Britain for 1961. Over six years she made six Disney films, ending with That Darn Cat! Critics were amused that America's favourite child star was so thoroughly English.
Her 2021 memoir, Forever Young, describes the other side: low self-esteem, an eating disorder and roles refused, Lolita among them, because they clashed with her wholesome image. At 20 she turned down a fresh Disney deal as the parts felt repetitive, and at 21 she lost most of her earnings to a 90 percent tax rate, failing on appeal. She said she feared ending up a studio asset like Judy Garland.
Adult roles followed, including The Family Way (1966), scored by Paul McCartney and directed by Roy Boulting, whom she married in 1971. Television revived her career with The Flame Trees of Thika in 1981. Her Disney series Good Morning, Miss Bliss was cancelled after 13 episodes and reworked by NBC into Saved by the Bell without her. In 2024 M. Night Shyamalan cast her as an FBI profiler in Trap, her first big American film part in almost 60 years.
Source: Hayley Mills
