15 Facts About Michael Callan

Michael Callan appeared on the local show Horn and Hardardt's Children's Hour.

Two years later, Michael Callan moved to New York City and performed under the name of "Mickey Calin".

Michael Callan auditioned several times before getting the role over a period of a year, and he was almost taken out at the last minute because director Jerome Robbins felt he was "too good-looking" for the part.

Michael Callan's performance in West Side Story was a great personal triumph.

Michael Callan was seen by talent scout Joyce Selznick, who worked for Columbia Pictures.

Michael Callan had been using the name "Mickey Calin" but would use the name "Michael Callan".

Selznick said Michael Callan only wanted to sign a two-pictures-a-year contract, but she persuaded him that he would benefit from the extra exposure that studio would give him under a long-term deal.

Columbia Pictures' first role for Michael Callan was in a prestige production, They Came to Cordura, starring Gary Cooper.

Michael Callan was unable to reprise his West Side Story role of Riff in the film version due to his contract with Columbia, but he did dance in the film Gidget Goes Hawaiian, opposite Deborah Walley as Gidget and Darren as Moondoggie.

Michael Callan appeared in the fantasy adventure film, Mysterious Island.

Michael Callan had a supporting role in The Victors and a bigger one in The New Interns.

Michael Callan played Hal B Wallis in My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn, and Metallo in Superboy.

Michael Callan both produced and starred in his own film, Double Exposure.

Michael Callan appeared in the Off-Broadway musical Bar Mitzvah Boy in 1987.

Michael Callan was nominated for a Golden Globe New Star of the Year Award in 1960 for The Flying Fontaines; and won in the same category the following year, for Because They're Young.