Mickey Rourke’s manager insisted the GoFundMe she set up for the beleaguered actor is not a “grift,” and pushed back on Rourke’s own disavowal of the fundraiser in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
Kimberly Hines, who’s been Rourke’s manager for over 10 years, and her assistant launched the GoFundMe over the weekend after the actor found himself facing eviction. Last month, Rourke was sued by his landlord, who accused The Wrestler star of owing nearly $60,000 in rent on the West Hollywood bungalow.
Despite raising over $100,000, on Monday, Jan. 5, Rourke shared a video on Instagram insisting he was not involved with the effort. “If I needed money, I wouldn’t ask for no fucking charity,” Rourke said. “I’d rather stick a gun up my ass and pull the trigger. So whoever did this, I don’t know if they did it — why they did it. I don’t understand it.”
In her new interview, Hines said Rourke knew who was behind the effort, but added, “I understand that he has to say that. We’re all here to help Mickey and get him back on his feet, get him back to work, get him back making movies and telling stories and creating characters and being the Mickey Rourke that we all have known and love. That’s my goal. If Mickey doesn’t want this help from people that want to support him and his fans, then that money will be returned.”
Hines did acknowledge that it was possible Rourke didn’t fully understand what a GoFundMe was when she presented the idea to him. “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.”
But with Rourke’s strong disavowal, Hines also wanted to assure fans that there was nothing shady about the GoFundMe. “Nobody’s trying to grift Mickey,” she said, adding that the only issue right now is figuring out how to get the money to Rourke because he “doesn’t have a bank account.”
And while Hines seemed somewhat exasperated by Rourke’s aversion to help, she also insisted that if Rourke didn’t want the money, donors would be reimbursed. “He’s calling me for money. He’s calling friends for money,” she said. “A GoFund is set up for him, and now he’s rejecting it? ‘OK, Mick, no problem.’ But nobody here has done anything wrong.”
Hines also shared some more details about Rourke’s housing situation. She said that Rourke had been living at his old house for years, but a year-and-a-half ago it was purchased by Eric Goldie, who allegedly raised the rent from $5,200 to $7,000. Goldie is the one who sued Rourke at the end of last year for unpaid rent. But Hines claimed that the house was “uninhabitable,” with “black mold,” “no running water,” “water damage,” and a non-functioning refrigerator. (A lawyer for Goldie did not immediately return a request for comment.)
Rourke’s finances have also been shaky for years, with Hines saying the actor has never managed his money well and “doesn’t really know the word moderation.” Ironically, she noted, some of the actor’s money troubles stem from the fact that he’s been “very generous” himself over the years: “He bought his ex-girlfriend, who had cancer, an apartment. Didn’t buy himself an apartment. He’s given a lot of his money away to people, to friends. He’s loaned people money.”
Currently, Rourke is staying at a hotel in West Hollywood, but Hines said he will soon be moving to a more permanent apartment in Koreatown. Hines said she’s been “fronting the money for Mickey to get him out of this emergency situation,” but noted she can “only finance him for so long.” She was hopeful that the actor would accept the money from the GoFundMe, or possibly start working again.
“The good thing about this is that he got four movie offers since yesterday,” Hines said. “People are emailing him movie offers now, which is great because nobody’s been calling him for a long time.”
