Former Child Star / Real Life

• Lindsay Lohan... Oh dear. It was a mix of her personality (even as a child), her equally self-destructive parents, a self-admitted drug problem (which really hasn't done favors for her looks), numerous run-ins with the law, and poor choices of roles that eventually demolished anything she had left resembling a professional career.

• The famous child acting duo Corey Feldman and Corey Haim both had meltdowns in their adult lives. Eventually, it claimed Haim's life in 2010. Feldman has survived without crashing and burning, but as his 2016 appearance on The Today Show has shown, the man is in that unfortunate position of having enough money to basically do whatever he wants without having friends who can talk him out of some of his ill-reasoned whims and help preserve his dignity.
• Dustin Diamond played the role of Screech on Saved by the Bell for over a decade. Once the series ended in 2000, Diamond filed for bankruptcy and accused his parents of stealing his money. He struggled to pay his mortgages and later admitted that his sex tape was a scam. He appeared on reality shows with other washed-up celebrities until his death from lung cancer in 2021.
  • For this and many other reasons, the Washed Up Celebrities blog called him the most washed-up celebrity of his generation.
• Brian Bonsall, who played baby brother Andy Keaton on Family Ties, Preston Waters from Blank Check and Worf's son Alexander on Star Trek: The Next Generation has been arrested several times for assault and drug possession.
• There's also the so-called "John Connor Curse." Edward Furlong, Nick Stahl, Thomas Dekker, and Christian Bale all seemed to have personal and career problems after playing the role, and all were former child stars. More specifically, Furlong had trouble with drug abuse; Stahl was missing for several days and dropped off the acting radar due to his drug use; Dekker was arrested for DUI after running over a cyclist; Bale went ballistic and his rant on the set of Terminator Salvation became a Memetic Mutation, as well as his domestic assault charge around the same time (he bounced back, though, with his later films).
• For some time, Jake Lloyd seemed to be very bitter and cynical about his role as Anakin Skywalker in The Phantom Menace, but since he went through high school and college with his classmates teasing him about it and other people constantly accusing him of ruining Star Wars, it's impossible to blame him for feeling so disillusioned. Despite this, a later interview between him and a Star Wars fansite (as well as a photo on his own Facebook page◊) showed that — contrary to popular belief — he does not hate the franchise after all the harassment. However, his personal life had troubles in the years afterward; after a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia at age 19, Lloyd has been in and out of mental hospitals his entire adult life.
• Michael Jackson was ultimately a bigger star as an adult solo act, but he didn't completely subvert this trope. The abuse he suffered under his dad's thumb as a child star affected him so very much that once he was able to stand on his own, he became obsessed with experiencing the childhood he never had growing up. Thus, most of his adult pursuits and interests were juvenile in nature and a way for him to "live as a kid" (i.e., building an amusement park on his property and holding slumber parties), and were reasons he became saddled with accusations of child molestation that hounded him for the rest of his life until he died from overdosing on anesthetics he used as sleeping pills.
• Able to carry songs with sincerity and maturity far beyond his years, Frankie Lymon was one of the earliest child stars of the rock era and an acknowledged template for the stage presence of a young Michael Jackson. His career fell victim to heroin addiction - he was introduced to the drug at age 15 - his voice changing, and a scandal when he briefly danced with a white girl on a TV dance show. He died of a heroin overdose at age 25, leaving his estate in such disarray that lawsuits continued for three decades after his death, by which time he had been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was very much like Michael. His parents, particularly his father Leopold, made him and his sister Maria Anna child prodigies, but most of his popular works date from his later years. Much like MJ, Mozart had serious difficulty living on his own, even while determined to be free of his father's influence. While creatively, his work was unparalleled, personally, he was a mess. He struggled not only to find paying work but also to keep the jobs he did get, all the while spending money quicker than it came in. He died at the age of 35, sadly just as his financial situation had started to turn around for the better and he had begun to compose music again after a period of slowed productivity. A persistent legend claims he was buried in a pauper's grave, but this is false.^note This misconception likely stems from misunderstanding reports that he was buried in a "common grave"; this was an individual grave outside the section of the cemetery reserved for aristocrats, not a pauper's grave or a communal grave as depicted in the movie Amadeus.

• Judy Garland had some success into her twenties, still usually playing teenage roles, but she could never really transition into serious adult roles, and once her teenage stardom days were over, it was the beginning of the end for the "little girl with a great big voice." She developed a drug addiction, which stemmed from being given barbiturates by MGM to keep her active and working longer during her childhood years. Her increasing difficulty to work with and nervous breakdowns certainly didn't help, as well as her greedy and jealous Stage Mom. Two failed comeback attempts, five marriages, a few suicide attempts, and many health problems (including heavy smoking and drinking) later, she passed away from a barbiturate overdose at the very untimely age of 47 in 1969 (although because of her health problems, she arguably looked at least ten years older).
• Brad Renfro was 12 when he made his film debut in the critically-acclaimed film The Client, co-starring with Susan Sarandon and Tommy Lee Jones. He won The Hollywood Reporter's Young Star Award in 1995 and went on to appear in the films Apt Pupil and Ghost World. Sadly, he spiraled into drug and alcohol abuse and died from a heroin overdose in January 2008 at the age of 25.
• The three lead kid actors on Diff'rent Strokes — Gary Coleman, Todd Bridges, and Dana Plato — became infamous for brushes with the law as adults. Plato ultimately died at 34 of a drug overdose which was ruled a suicide. Gary Coleman, meanwhile, struggled to recover before tragically dying at 42 from head trauma. Bridges, meanwhile, is a regular on TruTV's World's Dumbest..., along with former Partridge Family cast member Danny Bonaduce, another example of a former child star who fell into serious problems as an adult (both Bridges and Bonaduce appear to be getting their lives on track at this point). Danny Cooksey, who played Sam in the final season, seems to have escaped the woes of his older cast mates, probably from a mix of good parenting, a successful voice acting career (and a failed music career), and a fairly normal adult life and marriage.
• Bobby Driscoll, who was Disney's golden boy during the 1940s, is a very sad case. He was in several Disney movies, and was particularly famous for his roles in Song of the South and Peter Pan (in which he played the title role), but was abruptly let go in the middle of the 1950s (allegedly at least partly because he developed terrible acne as he entered puberty, requiring heavy makeup to hide it). He was ridiculed in school for being a child star, acting roles dried up, and he became addicted to drugs. In 1968, he was found dead in an abandoned Manhattan building and the body wasn't identified until a year later. He was 31 years old.
• Anissa Jones, notable for playing Buffy in Family Affair, was another sad case. When the show ended its run in 1971, she tried to find work in films, but no roles were coming. Brian Keith, who played her uncle on Family Affair, wanted to give her a part in his new TV project, but she no longer wanted to work in TV. Jones later fell into drug addiction and died in 1976 of an overdose at age 18. One contributing factor to her problems may have been that the producers and writers literally didn't let her grow up — even though she had hit puberty by the time the series ended, she was still forced to act and appear as a preteen.
• Other than the Olsen Twins, just about all of the child/teenage actors who starred in Full House have fallen out of the limelight.
  • Jodie Sweetin, in particular, stands out as an example of this trope played straight. Facing an inability to find further work and a traumatic social life due to being typecast as Stephanie Tanner, she became an alcoholic and a habitual user of marijuana, cocaine, LSD, and most famously, meth. However, she seems to have gotten her life back on track, has published a memoir about her drug addiction, and is now seeking a comeback.
• Leif Garrett is an example of this, a child pop star who got embroiled in drugs and scandals. For about 5 years, he was a commentator on TruTV's World's Dumbest... alongside fellow former child stars Danny Bonaduce and Todd Bridges.
• There is an interesting contrast between the two stars of Guest from the Future. Natalia Guseva acted in a few more movies but decided to become a scientist instead. Now, she not only works as a biochemist, but also is still involved with the fan community, and is raising a daughter. Meanwhile, Alexei Fomkin had a few more roles but got into drug problems, which caused him to lose roles and spiral further downward. He quit acting and moved to a village, which seemed to be straightening him out. Sadly, he died in 1996 when his apartment burned.
• Fellow Soviet child starlet, Katya Lycheva, a contemporary of Guseva's, was not only loved for her work in children's films at home: she was also a goodwill ambassador who toured the United States at age 11 in 1986 and was part of the opening ceremonies of the Goodwill Games. Soon afterward, she withdrew into a reclusive lifestyle and stated in one rare interview that she prefers not to talk about her past fame.
• Robert Blake starred in Our Gang comedies (originally under his given name Mickey Gubitosi), then later starred in In Cold Blood and had the title role on the TV series Baretta, and years later was acquitted of his wife's murder, but lost a civil wrongful death lawsuit filed by his children.
• For a while, it looked as though Amanda Bynes was shaping up to be an aversion; she had stated that she didn't like drinking or going to clubs and instead preferred to hang out at home with family and friends. That changed in 2012, however, when she was involved in several hit-and-run and reckless driving incidents, and continued into a series of increasingly erratic Twitter posts, including asking Drake to "murder her vagina". She was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia, which explains the behavior and was on involuntary psychiatric hold for several months in 2013.
• Former Idol Singer Ai Kago joined Morning Musume, one of the most popular Girl Groups in Japan, at age 12, and her popularity flourished when she was selected to join other units under the Hello! Project name. However, as she grew older, she became dissatisfied with her image and started smoking to feel "older", though she was underage at that time. As a result of that (and entering a relationship with a man 10 years her senior), she was kicked out of Hello Project. While she did try to make a comeback, her career has continued to spiral downward with numerous scandals including having an affair with a married man and dating a man rumored to have ties with the yakuza.
• Much of the cast of The Little Rascals (the original short films, also known as Our Gang), gave rise to the so-called "Our Gang Curse," as the majority of the cast members died young and/or violently.
  • Norman Chaney (Chubby) suffered from a glandular ailment that caused him to weigh over 300 pounds (hence the nickname). He was given surgery to treat his condition but died of complications from said surgery. Depending on the report, he was either 18 or 22.
  • Donald Haines and Bobby Hutchins (Wheezer) were WWII-related fatalities. Haines was killed in action at the age of 23 at the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia, while Hutchins (a member of the Army Air Corps) was killed just a few days shy of his 20th birthday when his plane crashed on landing during a training exercise.
  • William Laughlin (Froggy) died in a scooter accident at the age of 16.
  • Clifton Young (Bonedust) fell asleep while smoking and died in his hotel room from smoke inhalation at the age of 33.
  • Carl Switzer (Alfalfa) was murdered over a gambling debt at the age of 31. Years later, his 42-year-old brother Harold Switzer (Slim/Deadpan) killed his girlfriend in a Murder-Suicide.
  • Scotty Beckett died of an overdose at the age of 38.
  • Richard Daniels (Mickey) died alone in a hotel room of cirrhosis of the liver at the age of 55.
  • Kendall McCormas (Breezy Brisbane) committed suicide at age 64.
  • Matthew Beard (Stymie) led a life of crime and drugs. Although he successfully cleaned up in the 1960s, he ultimately succumbed to a stroke at the age of 56.
  • Darwood Kaye (Waldo) was killed by a hit-and-run driver at the age of 72.
  • Jay R. Smith (Jay) was stabbed to death in Las Vegas at age 87 by a homeless man whom he had befriended.
  • Dorothy Dandridge was the only former Rascal to have a successful acting career as an adult and became the first black woman to be nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress. But her financial advisors lost all her money and she died penniless at 42.
  • Several cast members died prematurely of cancer either in their late 50s or early 60s. These include:
    • Mary Kornman at age 57.
    • Allen Hoskins (Farina) at age 59.
    • Jackie Condon at age 59.
    • Janet Burston at age 63.
    • Sherwood Bailey (Spud) at age 64.
  • There were even some cast members who, despite leading normal lives, died relatively young nonetheless. They include:
    • George McFarland (Spanky) aged 64 from a heart attack or an aneurysm.
    • John Collum (Uh-huh) at the age of 36 from a heart attack.
    • Elmo Billings at the age of 51 from a stroke.
    • Darla Hood (Darla) at the age of 47 of acute hepatitis from a blood transfusion given during an appendectomy.
    • William Thomas (Buckwheat) at age 49 of a heart attack.
    • Alvin Buckelew (aged 40); Carlena Beard^note sister of Matthew "Stymie" Beard(aged 42); George "Chuck" Nokes (aged 49); Tommy McFarland (aged 51); Shirley "Muggsy" Coates (aged 51); and Gary "Junior" Jasgur (aged 58) — all of unspecified causes.
  • Those who did not die either tragically and/or prematurely mainly worked in menial or low-key jobs, making this a straight version of the trope.
  • Hal Roach, the creator of the Little Rascals, stated that he never believed in this curse. (As an aside, he lived to 100!)
• Sawyer Sweeten, between the ages of sixteen months and ten years old, played Geoffrey Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond alongside his twin brother and older sister, who played his siblings. Sadly, he killed himself at the age of 19, for reasons that are not quite clear.
• Tatum O'Neal, the youngest person to ever win a competitive Oscar, never came close to recapturing the success she had with Paper Moon. She continued to stay in the spotlight for the rest of the decade but never achieved much success in adulthood.
  • Averted with her Little Darlings co-star Kristy McNichol, who transitioned from child and teenage roles to adult comedies, particularly her role as Barbara Weston in Empty Nest. She retired from acting after her last role in 1998 and has lived a quiet life.
• Butch Patrick, best known for playing Eddie Munster on The Munsters had a few more roles after the show was canceled, but then disappeared from the limelight. Since then, he mostly went on having a normal life, and making appearances at conventions, though he did seek rehab treatment for drug addiction in 2010.
• Peter Robbins, famous for being Charlie Brown's first official voice actor, didn't grow up to have a stable life, getting arrested for threatening his girlfriend and stalking her plastic surgeon. The judge even sentenced him for mental examination after he went on a foul-mouthed tirade against the judge in court, in which Robbins was later diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. In 2015, he was sentenced to 4 years and 8 months for criminal threats, and eventually took his own life in late January 2022.
• Carl Steven, who played young Spock in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and voiced Fred Jones in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo retired from acting in the mid-90s and seemed to be an aversion to this trope until around 2009 when he became addicted to heroin after being given it following a tonsillectomy. He later began stealing to support his addiction and was charged in 2010 with armed robbing several pharmacies. He was sentenced to 13 years in prison where he died in July 2011 of a heroin overdose.
• Jason Davis, best known for voicing Mikey Blumberg on Recess was arrested in 2011 for possession of a controlled substance. Sadly, in spite of seeking out help from Dr. Drew prior to his arrest and other attempts at rehab, he died of an overdose in February 2020.
• Who's the Boss?: While Alyssa Milano has done all right in her transition from child to adult roles, Danny Pintauro disappeared from the limelight for a long time. He has since revealed a history of meth addiction and is now HIV-positive.
• Filipino actor Jiro Manio was a child prodigy whose career peaked at the age of 10-11 when he appeared in the film Magnifico. Unfortunately, he got hooked on drugs as he hit his teens, and as the acting roles dried up, he was largely considered a has-been before he reached the age of 20. He had recently made headlines after being found in a disheveled state, wandering around in Manila's airport after running away from home about four days prior. He went to rehab and exited in June 2017, but was arrested in January 2020 after allegedly stabbing another man three times.
• Another Filipino child star, CJ Ramos, reportedly developed a drug problem after he left show business in his late teens. At 32, he was arrested in July 2018 for drug possession, but that somehow led to a Career Resurrection as a cast member on Ang Probinsyano.
• Much has been said about Skylar Deleon being a "former Power Rangers star convicted of double-murder," but the truth is she had only appeared as an extra in one episode. Nonetheless, she did act a bit as a child and teenager, before getting involved in crime as an adult.
• As far as child actresses go, Margaret O'Brien ruled the 1940s and early 1950s, boasting an impressive resume by the time she turned 12. As an adult, her film roles were few and far between, and she was only marginally more successful after transitioning to television.
• Jonathan Brandis was another sad case. He played young Bill in the original 1990 miniseries for Stephen King's It, and later Lucas in SeaQuest DSV. However, his career fell on progressively hard times after that, something his friends say contributed to his heavy drinking and depression. He passed away on November 12, 2003, at the age of 27, after hanging himself.
• Blake Heron, best known as Marty in Shiloh, didn't go on much else, and tragically passed away on September 7, 2017, at the age of 35. He had struggled with drug addiction since the age of 12 and had recently completed rehab for heroin addiction.
• Tuesday Weld, a popular child/teen actress of the 1950s and early 1960s struggled with this hard, largely due to her Stage Mom putting pressure on her as the breadwinner of her family. She had a nervous breakdown at age 9, struggled with alcoholism by age 12, and attempted suicide at least once. She emancipated herself at 16, and kept acting through her 20s, but eventually started turning down high-profile roles, and was completely out of the spotlight by the '70s, largely by choice. She's now a Reclusive Artist.
• Glee actors:
  • While he wasn't exactly a star, Mark Salling was 14 when he acted in Children of the Corn IV: The Gathering. After his appearance as Puck, Salling faced legal troubles after being accused of sexual battery by an ex-girlfriend and later charged with possession of child pornography. He committed suicide on January 30, 2017, invoking the trope.
  • Naya Rivera (Santana) had been a screen actress since she was a child, including a guest spot on Family Matters and a major role on Redd Foxx's last sitcom, The Royal Family. After a rocky marriage that included domestic violence charges against her, Rivera died at 33 in a boating accident.
• Tommy Kirk was best known for playing Travis Coates in Old Yeller, Joe Hardy in The Hardy Boys television serial, and Wilby in The Shaggy Dog, among other appearances for Disney (including the original version of The Mickey Mouse Club) in the late 50s/early 60s, but was fired by Walt Disney himself in 1963, after he was caught in a relationship with a 15-year-old boy (Kirk was 22 at the time) and the boy's parents threatened to sue. As his career spiraled down, he turned to marijuana, alcohol, and prescription drug abuse, almost dying of an overdose at one point. He claims to be so high on a regular basis, that he remembers very little about his later films. He lost out on a role in the John Wayne film The Sons of Katie Elder after being arrested for marijuana possession, and he eventually went broke after spending his money on drugs. His career continued to dry up so badly, he took a couple of non-union jobs in the early 70s, almost losing his SAG card. He then finally gave up acting and sobered up, while officially coming out as gay. He was later inducted as a "Disney Legend" in 2006 (along with other original Mouseketeers), continued to make occasional appearances at fan conventions, and largely took the blame for his own career downfall. He died at his Las Vegas, Nevada home on September 28, 2021, at the age of 79.
• Soviet child actor Sergey Shevkunenko's once-promising career degenerated into a string of assaults, home burglaries, drugs, and weapons violations resulting in several prison sentences. In 1995, he and his mother were murdered in their apartment. Their murders remain unsolved.
• Manuel Benitez (AKA Mark Everett) had roles in films such as Pee-wee's Big Adventure and Stand and Deliver in his youth. After acting, he would go on to deal drugs, murder his girlfriend, and kidnap their son. He was later gunned down by police after holding his son hostage in a restaurant.
• Neil Hope, who played Wheels on Degrassi Junior High and Degrassi High, is not only one of the saddest examples but one in which art and life both imitated each other. Hope had a troubled upbringing, and also had alcoholic parents. According to Degrassi co-creator Linda Schuyler's 2022 memoir, Hope would find his father dead from complications of alcoholism around the time he was starring on the show. Not long after this, the script called for Wheels' parents to be fatally injured by a drunk driver, a plot that Neil said he wanted to do because he thought it would help him cope. He did not act after the original Degrassi ended in 1992, and because it was a non-union show, neither he nor any of the cast were paid residuals, despite the show continuing to be re-run and syndicated in over 50 countries. As a result, he drifted through several odd jobs, and became an alcoholic himself, in a way much like his character Wheels, whose life was ruined by alcohol. His alcoholism was also aggravated by his depression and type 1 diabetes, which he allegedly neglected. He had become so isolated by the time of his death at the age of 35 alone in a rooming house in 2007 that not even his family was aware until five years later.
• Martin Stephens was a very in-demand child actor in the 50s and 60s, getting to act alongside stars such as Lana Turner, Stewart Granger, Deborah Kerr, and Maureen O'Hara. At first with small parts, he really became famous for his starring roles as David in Village of the Damned (1960) and Miles in The Innocents. Although he kept acting into his teens, his final film was a small role in The Witches (1966) and he retired for good. He later confessed he'd been pushed into it by a Stage Mom, and did experiment with drugs a bit in his twenties, but ended up living a quiet life as an architect.
• His The Innocents co-star Pamela Franklin made her debut in that very film and, although she achieved a lot of fame with The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie when she was nineteen (including a BAFTA nomination), those are still by far her most remembered roles. The Legend of Hell House typecast her as a scream queen and she retired from acting for good in the 70s after getting married. She now owns a first-edition bookstore in West Hollywood.
• Maia Campbell is a heartbreaking case. Having been the daughter of famed author Bebe Moore Campbell, she found success by starring in In The House and appearing in popular works such as Poetic Justice and Beverly Hills, 90210 and had got married and had a daughter. During the height of her success, she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which she would habitually refuse to seek help for and instead self-medicate with drugs. A subsequent divorce, losing custody of her daughter, and the 2006 death of her mother devastated her even as the two women were estranged at the time. In the years since then, she has unsuccessfully sought help from life coach Iyanla Vanzant, been arrested for disturbing the peace, had several videos surface of her displaying erratic and harrowing behavior while intoxicated in public, and denied help from others concerned for her well-being.
• Former Canadian child star Joey Cramer of Flight of the Navigator fame, in which he starred as the titular navigator didn't have quite the charmed life in the 21st century following his retirement in the late 90's. In 2008, he was prosecuted for careless storage of a gun, receiving a sentence of three months probation; later in the year, he was convicted for possession of narcotics with the intention of trafficking, receiving an imprisonment sentence of six months. In 2010 he was fined for consuming alcohol in a public place. In 2011, he was convicted of threatening behavior with a weapon and jailed for 30 days and received another conviction that year for cashing forged bank checks. In 2016, he would be charged for his involvement in a bank robbery. Come 2018, production began on the documentary "Life After the Navigator" on his troubled post-film life.
• Orlando Brown found success in childhood by appearing in the hit sitcom Family Matters as well as several movies before scoring his breakout role in That's So Raven. However, in the years since its cancelation, he has faced some difficult times surrounding alcoholism, mental instability, and numerous arrests. He also tries to remain in the news by badmouthing his former co-star Raven-Symoné whenever he can, had a video surfaced of him being recorded by (and thrown out of the house of) his "manager" while in a state of distress and at one point claimed that his biological father was Michael Jackson.
• Aaron Carter was a preteen superstar with popular songs such as "Crush on You" and "Aaron's Party (Come and Get It)." He was the younger brother of Nick Carter from the Backstreet Boys and was romantically linked to fellow child stars Hilary Duff and Lindsay Lohan. Unfortunately, his fourth album was a complete flop as his young fans had become teenagers and outgrown his music, which led to him getting dropped by his label. By the mid-2000s, he became embroiled in family turmoil with his parents taking all of his earnings, and he appeared on the short-lived reality show with his siblings, House of Carters, which showcased his and Nick's very troubled relationship. In 2014 he began releasing new music in hopes of being taken seriously as an adult artist, but his music became Overshadowed by Controversy stemming from his chaotic personal life: multiple stints in rehab for drug abuse (which had ravaged his physical appearance), accusations of domestic violence from ex-girlfriends, conflict with his family to the point of his siblings taking out restraining orders against him, and losing custody of his son. Ultimately Aaron died in 2022 of a drug overdose just a few weeks shy of his 35th birthday.
• Averted and played straight with the two child leads of The Parent Trap II. Carrie Kei Heim, who played Nikki, retired from acting at a young age and grew up to become a writer and a lawyer. Bridgette Andersen, who played Mary, was a child prodigy who also stopped acting in her early teens, but not through a lack of effort. She sadly died in 1997 at the age of 21 from an accidental drug and alcohol overdose.
• As a child, Jon Paul Steuer starred in the 1990s sitcom Grace Under Fire as Quentin Kelly, son of single mother Grace Kelly, portrayed by comedian Brett Butler. Butler had been fighting substance abuse throughout the series' run, and it eventually caused her to act erratically on the set, in one case, she flashed herself at the then-12-year-old Steuer. His parents pulled him out of the show and producers bought out Steuer's contract to avoid an embarrassing lawsuit.^note Butler had gotten breast implants and showed them off to everyone on set, but she didn't think to draw the line at her underage costars. Butler also relapsed between the fourth and fifth seasons, which led to the show's cancellation in early 1998. Steuer would audition for other roles in TV and film, but constant questions about his time working with Butler forced him to quit acting altogether. He would later form a glam punk band and eventually land work as a bartender and server. Sadly, on New Year's Day 2018, he committed suicide by a gunshot wound at the age of 33.
• From The Mighty Ducks, almost everyone involved ended up as an aversion. Almost all of them went on to have stable adult acting careers or retired from acting after a time. The lone exception, however, was Shaun Weiss, who played Greg Goldberg. He had a stable acting career through the 90s and 00s, but Weiss developed a case of drug problems in the 2010s and got into several spots of trouble with the law before ultimately being arrested for attempted breaking and entering while being high on meth in early 2020. However, in the months since, he finally entered rehab and seems to be finally getting the help he needed. He looks far healthier and even has a new set of teeth, after the ravaging on his original teeth that meth did.
• Jennette McCurdy rose to fame for her role as Sam Puckett on iCarly and Sam & Cat. Jennette opened up about her experiences, saying that she was pushed into acting by her Stage Mom in order to financially support her family. Her mother also pushed her into developing eating disorders in order to stay thin. Jennette hated playing Sam, feeling that the character was a bad role model for children, and found it difficult to play a character much different from her real self. On Sam & Cat, Jennette often butted heads with her costar Ariana Grande as well as network executives, her mother died during filming and she was caught up in a scandal when sensual photos of her were leaked (despite her being 22 years old at the time). Worse, she discovered that, due to her mother improperly filling out the paperwork required to set up her trust required by the Coogan Act, none of her earnings were ever put aside for her and she was left with none of the money she earned. After Sam & Cat was canceled in 2014, Jennette's acting career took a nosedive. However, she eventually retired from acting of her own volition in 2017, instead pursuing writing and directing, and 2022, she wrote her memoir I'm Glad My Mom Died, a title that basically sums up how she felt about her mother. The book was a critical success and helped re-establish her in the public eye on her own terms, and while she declined to join the iCarly reunion/revival series, she has publicly wished Miranda Cosgrove in particular well and described her as one of the only true friends she had as a child actor.
• R&B musician Tevin Campbell was a musical prodigy at a young age, and his talents earned him a record deal with Warner (Bros.) Records, quickly becoming a protégé of both Quincy Jones and Prince. He was a multi-Platinum selling artist in his early teens, and was featured in films and TV, most notably Prince's Graffiti Bridge and A Goofy Movie. However, by 1996, right when he fully reached adulthood, Tevin's career took an immediate nosedive, and his next two albums bricked. After getting arrested in a sting operation involving soliciting sex from an undercover cop, Tevin mostly stayed out of the public eye, outside of the odd performance and guest appearance on a song. By his own admission, the main reason his career stalled was because people still saw him as the little kid who was under Quincy's wing — a perception he's still having trouble shaking off to this day.
• Ke Huy Quan got his first acting role at the age of 12 with Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and then followed it up with the box office hit The Goonies the next year. Despite having these two big films on his resume, Quan struggled to find acting work as an Asian-American in Hollywood, and by his early 20s, the roles he was being offered were non-existent. Quan eventually quit acting and pursued a career behind the camera as an assistant stunt coordinator. He ended up subverting this trope later in life when he returned to acting at 50 years old. His first role back in the sci-fi comedy Everything Everywhere All at Once received wide acclaim and numerous awards and accolades, including an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.
• Quan's Goonies co-star Jeff Cohen also walked away from acting and ended up becoming an entertainment lawyer. Unlike Quan however, Cohen is quite content with his change of career and has no dreams of making an acting comeback.
• Jackie Earle Haley is another former child star who managed to make a comeback in Hollywood. Haley co-starred in The Bad News Bears in The '70s, and by 1993, his career was effectively over. He did some menial work (such as being a limo driver) and directed a few commercials from his Texas studio. In 2006, Sean Penn called him out of retirement and he landed a role in All the King's Men. Haley was later nominated for an Oscar in Little Children and has found success in Watchmen and other supporting roles.
• While the members of New Edition were bigger stars as adults than as children Bobby Brown couldn't quite escape this trope. Drug problems and a growing ego led to his initial exit from the group in late 1985, and was written off as a has-been after a lackluster solo debut the next year, before reinventing himself with his sophomore album Don't Be Cruel. Unfortunately, Brown's success would only fuel his ego and drug habits, and a very troubled marriage to Whitney Houston only made things worse. After a string of constant arrests and other violent incidents throughout The '90s, one of which effectively imploded a New Edition reunion tour in 1997, Brown's career and reputation took a nosedive, and completely hit ground zero by the turn of the millennium, reduced to making appearances on reality shows, and eventually getting divorced from Houston in 2007. On a happier note, Brown eventually got clean and has been recording and touring with New Edition once again.
• Brooke Shields, celebrated for her roles in the late 1970s and early 1980s as a young actress and fashion model, faced challenges early in her career. The pressure exerted by her Stage Mom became a significant hurdle for Shields, prompting her to seek a break from the limelight. Despite her decision to continue acting, Shields later opted for a more "normal" life by enrolling at Princeton University. Though she continued to pursue acting, Shields gradually turned down high-profile roles and eventually faded from the public eye by the Turn of the Millennium. A documentary, Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields was released in 2023.
• Averted with Mary Poppins star Karen Dotrice, who largely retired from acting and has made sporadic appearances since shying away from the spotlight in the 80s, her most recent cameo appearance being as an old lady in Mary Poppins Returns. When asked about why she retired she cites being coaxed into appearing topless as a teenager, further stating that she wouldn't have appeared in Poppins had she do it all over again.
  • Things weren't so lucky for her co-star Matthew Garber (who portrayed Dotrice's on-screen brother Michael Banks in the film), as he passed away in 1977 after contracting hepatitis whilst in India.

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