Bonni Lou Kern (Jan 2, 1941)
|
The Dancer
Bonni, a talented amateur, was the oldest Mouseketeer and one of the best female dancers on the show for the first season. A good acrobat as well, she never made the Red Team or Roll Call, yet was used extensively in difficult dance numbers. She had little interest in show business, only in dancing, and did not pursue other TV or film work.
|
Background
Bonni Lou Kern was born in Los Angeles, California. As a fourteen year old student at Burch Mann's Alhambra studio, she was brought by Burch to the auditions, along with Darlene Gillespie, Mary Espinosa, and some others. She had no prior show business experience, nor did she come from an entertainment background. Burch thought a lot of Bonni's dancing skills, so to please her teacher, Bonni went along with the whole Mouseketeer experience. For the audition, Bonni and the other girls from Burch's studio did a character dance in "milkmaid" costumes. After they were hired, Bonni and Darlene wore these same costumes for several early skits on the show. Bonni and Mary were both called back for a second audition a short time after the first, where they were both asked to sing. Both girls made the cut the second time out.
Performance
An acrobat as well as a dancer, Bonni made her TV debut with a front flip over Bobby and Sharon's arms on opening day in Disneyland. She was a strong fast dancer, and could handle folk, character, tap, jazz, and ballet, though like Sharon, she was never called upon for the latter style. Bonni was of average height, but being older than the other Mouseketeers meant she towered over most of the boys. Like Mary Sartori, her relative height was probably one cause for her being stuck on the Blue Team.
Being the oldest, it would have been natural for Bonni to do introductions, but she was given little chance at this. Her singing was limited to groups, or rarely, a very short solo. Because of her height and dancing skills, she was usually paired with Bobby Burgess. They got along fine, and even seemed like a couple, until one day Bobby did something to annoy her. (Neither of them have ever revealed what it was). She made her displeasure known during their next dance number. When he lifted her overhead, she looked down and spat on him.
Aftermath
Bonni had never intended to enter show business, and when most of the first season Mouseketeers were dropped in January 1956, she went back to high school without regrets. Her dance teacher, Burch Mann, also left the show about this time, another reason for Bonni not to miss television. After high school graduation, she went into business management. She married delivery driver Harold Carr, with whom she had two daughters, and continued to reside in Alhambra, California. Bonni took part in the 1975 Disneyland Mouseketeer Reunion, and also appeared on the televised 25th Anniversary Show in 1980. Sometime after her first husband's death in 1981, Bonni remarried and moved to Ohio.
