Mara wilson main

PHOTO: COLOMBIA TRISTAR PICTURES

11 Child Actors Who Left Hollywood to Lead (Relatively) Normal Lives
New ff pic
Mar 30, 2017

When you think about the career trajectory of child actors, odds are you're thinking of the horror stories.

The stories of too much too soon. The stories of drugs and alcohol abuse, and parents stealing money.

While those stories are real, there are some child actors that get out relatively unscathed.

1. Mara Wilson: Matilda, Mrs. Doubtfire, Miracle on 34th Street

Image via Colombia TriStar Pictures

Mara Wilson was one of the most popular child actors of the '90s but by the year 2000 she says the work was gone.

Now a successful writer, Wilson details what it was like to be a star and age out in her 2016 book, .

2. Josh Saviano: The Wonder Years

After playing Kevin's (Fred Savage's) best friend and neighbor Paul on The Wonder Years, Josh Saviano left Hollywood.

Though there was the odd rumor that he grew up to be Marilyn Manson, Saviano is now a lawyer specializing in celebrity brand consultancy.

3. Ariana Richards: Jurassic Park

Image via Universal Pictures

After hiding in the kitchen from velociraptors in Jurassic Park,  Ariana Richards took a step back from Hollywood.

With the exception of a cameo in Jurassic Park: The Lost World and an episode of Boy Meets World, Richards has spent most of her time focusing on her painting.

4. Danny Lloyd: The Shining

Image via Warner Bros

When Danny Lloyd was just six years old, he played Danny Torrence in Stanly Kubrick's The Shining. It makes sense he wouldn't do much acting after that.

Lloyd left the industry after one more role in the TV movie Will: G. Gordon Lidd and became a pig farmer. He now teaches biology at a Kentucky community college.

5. Carrie Henn: Aliens 

Image via 20th Century Fox

Like Danny Lloyd, Carrie Henn's terrifying first big movie seems to have put her off acting. After playing Newt in Aliens, Henn left the business.

She is now a fourth-grade teacher.

6. Jeff Cohen: The Goonies

Image via Warner Bros.

A few years after delighting audiences with his "Truffle Shuffle" as Chunk in The Goonies, Jeff Cohen said goodbye to Hollywood. He now works as a lawyer and a writer.

7. Barret Oliver: The Neverending Story

After The Neverending Story, Barret Oliver was in the films D.A.R.Y.L. (Note: I loved this movie as a kid), Cocoon, Cocoon: The Return. But by 1989 he was done acting.

Since then Oliver has worked as a photographer and printer.

8. Charlie Korsmo: Dick Tracy, What About Bob, Hook, Can't Hardly Wait 

As a kid, Charlie Korsmo played Kid in Dick Tracy, Siggy in What About Bob and Jack in Hook. He then took a seven-year break, coming back to the screen to play William in Can't Hardly Wait. 

Korsmo then left Hollywood and got a physics degree from MIT, a law degree from Yale, became a practicing lawyer and now teaches law at Case Western University.

Wow.

9. Omri Katz: Hocus Pocus

Omri Katz was a teen dream with his '90s floppy hair in Hocus Pocus and the TV show Eerie, Indiana. But since retiring from acting, Katz now works on the hair of others. Specifically, as a hairdresser in Los Angeles. 

10. Jason Zimbler: Clarissa Explains It All

For three seasons, Jason Zimbler played Clarissa's annoying brother Ferguson on Nickelodeon's Clarissa Explains It All. After the show ended Zimbler went to college and worked in theater; and he now works as a software engineer for HBO.

11. Leanna Creel: Saved by the Bell

Image via Peter Engel Productions

As Tori Scott on Saved by the Bell, Leanna Creel made leather jackets a dream item for every kid in the U.S.

After the show, she got her MFA in film production from UCLA and now runs a video and photography business with her wife.

on

MORE STORIES YOU’LL LOVE
Blake ryan kids feat
Hmfeat 684x534
Katemiddletonfeat 684x534
Celebwrapfeat 684x534