How Did Hayley Mills Lose Her Fortune?
Hayley Mills became famous in the 1960s, starring in wholesome juvenile comedies like The Parent Trap (1961) and That Darn Cat! (1965). However, in a new memoir, Mills reveals that she earned a fortune on Disney movies—and then lost it virtually overnight.
Hayley Mills was just a teen when she starred in perhaps her biggest role—a dual part in which she played rival identical twins Susan and Sharon in the 1961 classic The Parent Trap.
Mills worked so hard as a child that by the time she was 21, she’d starred in over a dozen films, including Tiger Bay (1959), Whistle Down the Wind (1961), In Search of the Castaways (1962), Summer Magic (1963), The Trouble With Angels (1966) and The Moon-Spinners (1964).
However, in her new book, Forever Young, Mills reveals that a trust was set up for her to access at age 21—and what happened to leave her destitute. She discovered that when she went to claim her Disney fortune, it had been taxed by the British government at a rate of 91%.
Her lawyer Stanley Passmore delivered the unwelcome news: “Well, my dear, basically, the Revenue have attacked your trust company. They’re going to tax you at the full rate: 91 percent of the entire trust.”
Mills recalls the shock: “I felt the blood drain from my face.” Passmore suggested she should have repudiated the trust before turning 21 and said it was too late to act. Rather than sue, she filed repeated tax appeals.
In 1972, she briefly won a ruling stating that she’d already paid taxes on her money. Lord Denning of the Master of the Rolls determined that the money belonged to her, pointing out that she shouldn’t have to pay a surtax on already-taxed earnings.
However, she wasn’t able to keep her $17 million in earnings. The House of Lords appealed the ruling two years later. Mills described the outcome bitterly: “The state had plundered my trust like a horde of pirates. The Disney money was all gone.”
She continued acting after Disney, appearing in The Family Way (1966), Pretty Polly (1967) and others, including several Parent Trap sequels in the 1980s.
In a September 2021 interview with the Los Angeles Times, she compared the loss of her Disney fortune to a dream. “I never saw it,” she explained. “I knew it was there, and one day I would have it, but it was just sort of a dream, and then one day the dream was gone.”
Mills would have benefited from an attorney experienced in asset protection. If you want to make sure your assets are properly protected, contact our office to schedule a consultation.
