Mickey Doyle

Mieczyslaw "Mickey Doyle" Kuzik[1] is a fictional character in the HBO TV series Boardwalk Empire. He is played by Paul Sparks. Mickey Doyle is based on Polish American mobster Mickey Duffy.

Mickey Doyle
Boardwalk Empire character
First appearance"Boardwalk Empire"
Last appearance"Friendless Child"
Created byTerence Winter
Portrayed byPaul Sparks
In-universe information
Full nameMieczyslaw "Mickey Doyle" Kuzik
NicknamePollack
Bohunk
SpeciesHuman
GenderMale
OccupationGangster
bootlegger
racketeer
NationalityAmerican

Mickey is a gangster in Prohibition-era Atlantic City. For the first two seasons, he is the main rival of harlem liquor kingpin Chalky White. He is known for his distinctive, nasal laugh, and serves as the series' comic relief. Out of all the characters who worked with/for Nucky Thompson surprisingly Mickey is the last man standing.

Appearances

Season one

In the first episode of season one, Mickey is introduced as a Polish-American gangster trying to establish himself as a power in the illegal alcohol trade following the passage of the Volstead Act, which outlaws the sale of alcohol. It is revealed that his real name is Mieczyslaw Kusik, and he changed it to "Mickey Doyle" to pass himself off as Irish-American. He meets with Atlantic County Treasurer and political boss Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) to show him his bootlegging operation. Mickey tells Nucky that he expects to produce 2000 crates a week. He gets into a scuffle with Nucky's driver, Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt), until Nucky breaks it up. Jimmy later gets revenge on Mickey by informing Prohibition Agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) about Mickey's operation. Van Alden raids Mickey's operation and arrests him. Nucky gives Mickey's operations to Chalky White (Michael K. Williams), an African-American gangster.[1]

Mickey convinces Chalky's rivals, the D'Alessio brothers, to murder Chalky and gives them a description of his car, a Packard. They track the car but mistakenly kill Chalky's driver instead of Chalky himself.[2] Mickey persuades the D'Alessio brothers to rob the ward boss in broad daylight on the boardwalk.[3] He then joins them in going into business with Arnold Rothstein (Michael Stuhlbarg).[4]

Season two

In Season 2, Mickey joins Jimmy Darmody's crew, along with Al Capone (Stephen Graham), Charlie Luciano (Vincent Piazza) and Meyer Lansky (Anatol Yusef), and with them conspires to kill Nucky.[5] Mickey brings Philadelphia gangster Manny Horvitz (William Forsythe) to a meeting with Jimmy, and helps to convince Horvitz to lend them money.[6] Mickey promises that he can be operational within a week or two provided he gets alcohol to reconstitute. When Jimmy notices that Mickey has brought Horvitz along, he throws Mickey off the balcony, sending him crashing into a table.[7]

Mickey meets with the rest of Jimmy's crew at their new warehouse in Atlantic City to view the medicinal alcohol they have bought from George Remus (Glenn Fleshler). Doyle oversees his men diluting the alcohol in a vat as the others arrive. Doyle adds that Horvitz, whom Jimmy had tried to have killed, is still a problem and Jimmy instructs Doyle to pay him off with liquor. Later that day, Mickey has a tense meeting with Horvitz in which he blames the assassination attempt on Waxey Gordon (Nick Sandow); Hovitz doesn't believe him, however, and beats him up.[8]

When Jimmy suddenly disappears following the murder of his wife Angela (Aleksa Palladino), Mickey sells his entire share of the liquor in Philadelphia. Lansky keeps track of figures in his notebook. Capone instructs Mickey to sell Jimmy's portion of the stock, and pay Jimmy out of his own share. When Mickey protests, Luciano reminds him that Rothstein holds a life insurance policy on him; if Mickey does not do as instructed, Luciano will kill him and split the insurance money with Capone. Cowed, Mickey accepts the deal. However, he then goes to Van Alden and sells out his partners, giving him the location of their next meeting. In return for that information, Mickey demands half of the money the police would seize. Mickey's hopes for a huge profit fall through, however, when Van Alden is forced to flee the state to escape a murder charge. Desperate for work and protection against his former partners, Mickey begins working for Nucky.[9]

Season three

By season 3, Mickey is working for Nucky as the crew boss in one of Nucky's liquor warehouses. He is first seen with Nucky as he interrogates a thief who had stolen some of his liquor; Nucky explains to the thief that Mickey is truly at fault for the theft, as he had left the liquor unattended while he went to an outhouse.[10] Nucky's brother, Eli (Shea Whigham), works directly under Mickey, much to Eli's annoyance. Mickey throws his weight around the warehouse, at one point intimidating one of his movers by claiming to have killed Horvitz. The word spreads that Mickey killed Horvitz, angering Richard Harrow (Jack Huston), the man who actually committed the crime. Harrow kidnaps Mickey and brings him before Nucky, and forces him at gunpoint to admit that he lied.[11]

Facing a blockade from Nucky's rival Gyp Rosetti (Bobby Cannavale), Mickey decides to route a convoy of trucks carrying Nucky's liquor through the small town of Tabor Heights. He dismisses Eli's warnings that it is a trap. Sure enough, Rosetti's gang ambushes the convoy, killing several of Nucky's men; Mickey and Eli are able to escape, however.[12]

Season four

In season 4, Mickey runs Nucky's main warehouse. When Nucky's nephew, Willie (Ben Rosenfield), tries to charm his way into getting a crate of whiskey for a party, Mickey chastises him and throws him out. Moments later, however, he takes pity on the boy and gives him a crate. In so doing, he unwittingly sets a chain of events in motion that end with Willie facing murder charges.[13]

Mickey accompanies Nucky to Tampa, Florida, where Nucky intends to invest in land. There, they both meet speakeasy owner Sally Wheet (Patricia Arquette), and Mickey immediately has designs on her. Sally prefers Nucky, but flirts openly with Mickey in order to make Nucky jealous. When it appears that she is about to sleep with Mickey, however, Nucky hits him in the forehead with his former valet Eddie Kessler's (Anthony Laciura) cane that Mickey took, impressing Sally and scaring Mickey into backing down.[14]

Season five

While Nucky is in Havana, Cuba, Lansky unsuccessfully makes an attempt on his life. When Nucky returns to Atlantic City, Mickey is running his bootlegging operations and Chalky White's former restaurant, now a strip club.

Mickey and Nucky are fighting Luciano in a bloody gang war with the aid of New York Mafia "Boss of all bosses" Salvatore Maranzano (Giampiero Judica). Mickey informs Nucky and Maranzano that Luciano has fire bombed four of their trucks, costing them over $100,000. Nucky has Mickey go to New York to kidnap Luciano's associate Benjamin Siegel (Michael Zegen) in order to force a meeting and end the feud. Before the meeting starts, Nucky gives Mickey the title and full ownership of his strip club, as well as five percent of every profit made there. When Luciano says that he wants everything Nucky has, including the strip club, Mickey tries to reason with Luciano, but to no avail; Luciano shoots him in the throat, killing him.[15]

Origins

Mickey Doyle is loosely based on Polish American Philadelphia-based mobster and bootlegger Mickey Duffy, who was also killed in Atlantic City in 1931.[16]

Reception

Paul Sparks was nominated for three "Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series" Screen Actors Guild Awards in 2014, 2015, and 2013, and won the award twice in 2011 and 2012 for his role along with the rest of the cast in the series.[17]

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References
  1. "Boardwalk Empire". Boardwalk Empire. Season 1. Episode 1. September 19, 2010. HBO.
  2. "The Ivory Tower". Boardwalk Empire. Season 1. Episode 2. September 26, 2010. HBO.
  3. "Family Limitation". Boardwalk Empire. Season 1. Episode 6. October 24, 2010. HBO.
  4. "Belle Femme". Boardwalk Empire. Season 1. Episode 9. November 14, 2010. HBO.
  5. "Peg of Old". Boardwalk Empire. Season 2. Episode 7. November 6, 2011. HBO.
  6. "Two Boats and a Lifeguard". Boardwalk Empire. Season 2. Episode 8. November 13, 2011. HBO.
  7. "Battle of the Century". Boardwalk Empire. Season 2. Episode 9. November 11, 2011. HBO.
  8. "Georgia Peaches". Boardwalk Empire. Season 2. Episode 10. November 27, 2011. HBO.
  9. "Under God's Power, She Flourishes". Boardwalk Empire. Season 2. Episode 11. December 4, 2011. HBO.
  10. "Resolution". Boardwalk Empire. Season 3. Episode 1. September 16, 2012. HBO.
  11. "Bone for Tuna". Boardwalk Empire. Season 3. Episode 3. September 30, 2012. HBO.
  12. "Blue Bell Boy". Boardwalk Empire. Season 3. Episode 4. October 7, 2011. HBO.
  13. "Acres of Diamonds". Boardwalk Empire. Season 4. Episode 3. September 22, 2013. HBO.
  14. "The North Star". Boardwalk Empire. Season 4. Episode 6. October 13, 2013. HBO.
  15. "Friendless Child". Boardwalk Empire. Season 5. Episode 7. October 19, 2014. HBO.
  16. Napier, Jim. "Fact From Fiction: The Real History Of ‘Boardwalk Empire’" Archived 2015-07-11 at the Wayback Machine Screen Junkies. September 26, 2010.
  17. Paul Sparks: Awards at imdb.com.
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