Hugo Keesing collection on Annette Funicello and Hayley Mills

[See finding aid for the Hugo Keesing collection on popular music and culture for information on Hugo Keesing]

Annette Funicello (1942-2013), born in Utica, New York, was recruited at age twelve by Walt Disney after he saw her perform in a dance recital production of Swan Lake in Burbank, California. In 1955, Disney cast Funicello as one of the Mouseketeers for the original run of The Mickey Mouse Club. Funicello performed “How Will I Know My Love” on the show in 1958 which was released as a single, launching Funicello’s singing career. In the 1950s and early sixties Funicello, now often credited simply as “Annette,” released a number of singles for Disney such as “Tall Paul” (1959) and “Pineapple Princess” (1960) and co-starred in films such as Babes in Toyland (1961) and The Misadventures of Merlin Jones (1964). With 1963’s Beach Party, Funicello began her long string of films in the genre of the same name often co-starring with Frankie Avalon. Funicello continued to work in film and television in the 1970s and eighties starring in commercials for Skippy peanut butter and in the beach-party-revival film, Back to the Beach (1987). In 1992, Funicello received the Disney Legends Award. Throughout the 1990s, Funicello worked as a writer and philanthropist establishing a fund to treat neurological disorders such as multiple sclerosis, from which she suffered.

Hayley Mills (1946-), born in London, England, was the daughter of English actor, John Mills. She began her acting career at age twelve acting alongside her father in the 1959 film, Tiger Bay. Upon seeing the film, Lillian Disney encouraged her husband, Walt, to cast her as the lead in his upcoming film, Pollyanna. Mills’ performance in Pollyanna won her the Academy Juvenile Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1960, the last instance of this award. This propelled Mills into a long string of roles acting and singing in Disney productions in the 1960s including The Parent Trap (1961), Summer Magic (1963), and That Darn Cat (1965). In 1966 Mills’ contract with Disney ended and she continued making films and in 1970 she made her West-End debut in Glen Byam Shaw’s production of The Wild Duck. In the 1980s Mills resumed work with Disney starring in a number of TV specials and received the Disney Legends award in 1988. To the present, Mills has been most active in theatre starring most recently in Isabel Mahon’s Party Face Off-Broadway in 2018.