Here are some famous child stars and how they have turned out years later.
Jonathan Taylor Thomas
Jonathan Taylor Thomas, also known as JTT, became famous in 1991 for playing Randy Taylor, the smart and lovable middle child on Home Improvement. In the 1990s, he voiced young Simba in The Lion King (but didn’t sing) and starred in movies like Tom and Huck (1995) with Brad Renfro and Wild America (1997) with Devon Sawa.
He left Home Improvement in 1998 (his character, Randy, moved to Costa Rica) to focus on school but still acted in his free time.
In 2004, he had a recurring role on 8 Simple Rules. In 2013, he reunited with his TV dad, Tim Allen, to direct and appear in several episodes of Last Man Standing.
JTT stepped away from the spotlight to focus on his life, including graduating from Columbia in 2010. But even without being on screen, he still grabs attention—whenever paparazzi spot him, the photos quickly go viral.
Jonathan Lipnicki
Jonathan Lipnicki made a big first impression in movies at just 6 years old, starring alongside Tom Cruise in Jerry Maguire and delivering many memorable lines.
He later appeared in the Stuart Little movies, voiced Baby Tiger in Doctor Dolittle, and acted in The Little Vampire and Little Mike. He also guest-starred on Dawson’s Creek but took a break from acting to enjoy a normal high school life.
As an adult, Jonathan Lipnicki is still acting and starred in the 2023 Lifetime movie Secrets at the Museum.
He is also a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. In May 2021, he helped provide extra security outside a synagogue in Los Angeles after a rise in anti-Semitic vandalism and harassment.
In 2017, he shared on Instagram that he was bullied in middle school, hoping his story could help others going through the same thing.
He was bullied constantly by some kids who later seemed to forget how they treated him and even tried to add him as a friend on Facebook.
“I was told I was a has-been and would never book a job again,” he remembered. He began having panic attacks every night, dreading the next day’s bullying.
But he made it through and shared, “I am grateful for the amazing life I have and I hope I can pass on that it DOES get better.”
Mara Wilson
Mara Wilson became a star at 6 in Mrs. Doubtfire and at 9 in Matilda before stepping away from acting.
She later became a writer and activist, releasing her memoir Where Am I Now?: True Stories of Girlhood and Accidental Fame in 2016. She also appeared on Broad City and voiced characters in the animated shows BoJack Horseman, Big Hero 6: The Series, and Helluva Boss.
Mara Wilson shared in a February 2021 New York Times op-ed about the challenges of being a famous child actress.
“Once, someone I’d considered a friend asked, with a big smile, ‘How does it feel to know you’ve peaked?'” she remembered. “I didn’t know how to answer, but now I would say that’s the wrong question. I haven’t peaked, because for me, The Narrative isn’t a story someone else is writing anymore. I can write it myself.”
Joseph Gordon-Levitt
By the time Joseph Gordon-Levitt played Tommy Solomon on 3rd Rock From the Sun, he was already an experienced actor.
On the show, which started in 1996 when he was 14, he played an alien pretending to be part of a regular human family. That same year, he also played Demi Moore’s son in the thriller The Jury.
He played the sweet guy with a crush in 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), a street-smart hustler in Mysterious Skin (2004), and a determined teen detective searching for his missing ex-girlfriend in the mystery film Brick (2005).
Joseph Gordon-Levitt looked young enough to play a teen well into his twenties. But when he started taking adult roles, he starred in movies like 500 Days of Summer, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Inception, 50/50, The Dark Knight Rises, Looper, Lincoln, and Snowden. He also wrote and directed Don Jon.
In 2020, he played a prosecutor in The Trial of the Chicago 7, a film based on real events. He later starred as Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick in the series Super Pumped.
In his personal life, he quietly married Tasha McCauley in 2014, and they have two children.
Natalie Portman
Natalie Portman showed incredible talent at just 12 years old in The Professional (1994), earning a serious reputation as an actress—and she still lives up to it today.
Since her big debut, she has starred in major blockbuster movies like Star Wars: Episodes I-III, the Thor films, and Avengers: Endgame. She has also been in indie favorites like Beautiful Girls and Garden State, and comedies like Mars Attacks! and Your Highness, deep dramas like Closer and Brothers, and thrilling sci-fi films like V for Vendetta and Annihilation.
Natalie Portman won the Best Actress Oscar for playing a ballerina struggling with her mind in Black Swan (2010). She was also nominated for an Oscar for her role as the newly widowed Jacqueline Kennedy in Jackie.
In 2015, she directed her first movie, A Tale of Love and Darkness, based on Amos Oz’s autobiographical novel.
She married Black Swan choreographer Benjamin Millepied in 2012, and they have two children, a son named Aleph and a daughter named Amalia.
Angus T. Jones
Angus T. Jones became famous for playing the son of Jon Cryer’s unlucky divorcé and the nephew of Charlie Sheen’s fun-loving songwriter on the 2000s sitcom Two and a Half Men.
In 2012, a video surfaced online where Jones criticized the show, calling it “filth.” The clip was part of a 15-minute religious testimonial for Forerunner Chronicles, a Seventh-day Adventist ministry in Alabama.
Jones later apologized for “showing indifference to and disrespect of my colleagues and a lack of appreciation of the extraordinary opportunity of which I have been blessed.”
He left the show soon after but came back for the finale in 2015.
Jones, who reportedly made $350,000 per episode in his last full season on the CBS sitcom, told Houston TV station KHOU that the show “was making light of topics in our world that are really problems for a lot of people, and I was a paid hypocrite because I wasn’t okay with it, but I was still doing it.”
Before a small uncredited role in the 2023 Max series Bookie, Angus T. Jones’ last acting job was in Louis C.K.’s 2016 limited series Horace & Pete.
He went to the University of Colorado at Boulder and lived what he called a “normal existence,” he told People in 2016. “I got pretty doomsday with my thinking for a long time, but now I’m having fun and enjoying where I’m at,” he said. “I no longer feel like every step I take is on a land mine.”
Daniel Radcliffe
Daniel Radcliffe could have been known only for playing Harry Potter, but he has worked hard to take on very different roles.
He has acted in serious stage plays like Equus and The Cripple of Inishmaan and even starred in the classic musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.
In movies, he played Beat poet Allen Ginsberg in Kill Your Darlings and a farting corpse in Swiss Army Man. On TV, he starred as a doctor struggling with drug addiction in A Young Doctor’s Notebook.
Recently, Daniel Radcliffe finished four seasons of Miracle Workers, played the lead role in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, and returned to Broadway in Merrily We Roll Along.
On a personal note, Radcliffe is a dad to a son with his longtime partner, Erin Darke.
Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster started acting around age 6 in the Andy Griffith Show spinoff Mayberry R.F.D.
At 14, she earned her first Oscar nomination for playing a young girl forced into prostitution by a dangerous pimp in Taxi Driver. Her character’s situation pushes Robert De Niro’s Travis Bickle to take violent action.
That same year, in 1976, she also starred in the original Freaky Friday, a lighthearted comedy that was the complete opposite of Taxi Driver and made her a more mainstream child star.
Jodie Foster took a break from acting to study at Yale.
After college, she made a big comeback and won her first Oscar for Best Actress in The Accused (1988). She plays a woman who is attacked and takes her attackers to court, only to find herself judged differently.
In 1991, she directed her first movie, Little Man Tate. The next year, she won another Oscar for Best Actress for playing a brave FBI trainee in The Silence of the Lambs (1992).
Jodie Foster received the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement at the 2013 Golden Globes.
In recent years, she has focused more on directing TV shows, working on episodes of House of Cards, Black Mirror, and Orange Is the New Black.
Some of her big movie roles in the 21st century include Panic Room, Inside Man, Elysium, Hotel Artemis, and The Mauritanian, which won her a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress in 2021.
In her personal life, she has two sons with her ex-partner Cydney Bernard and married photographer and director Alexandra Hedison in 2014.
Kristen Stewart
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Kristen Stewart got early support from Jodie Foster when they played mother and daughter in David Fincher’s 2002 thriller Panic Room.
Like her mentor, Stewart has had a complicated relationship with fame. But her experience was on a much bigger scale, especially online, after she landed the huge role of Bella Swan in the Twilight series at around 16.
“I remember her thinking there wasn’t a chance I’d continue being an actor,” Stewart said about Foster in a 2019 interview with Stellar magazine. That wasn’t about her talent, but more about her quiet personality. Stewart added, “I really love my job, but I understand why she would have thought that about me as a kid. I love her.”
Kristen Stewart, who is also a muse for Chanel, has kept busy with acting since finishing the five Twilight movies.
Aside from the 2019 Charlie’s Angels reboot, she has mostly chosen smaller, more personal films. These include The Clouds of Sils Maria, which made her the first American actress to win a César Award (France’s version of the Oscars), the mystery drama Personal Shopper, and the not-quite-biographical films Seberg and Spencer.
After her highly publicized breakup with Robert Pattinson, Stewart has mostly dated women. She has been engaged to Dylan Meyer since 2021.
Josh Brolin
Long before he played Thanos and made half of Earth’s population disappear, Josh Brolin, the son of actor James Brolin, started his career in The Goonies (1985).
He played Brandon Walsh, a cool but frustrated older brother who was also protective and caring.
Josh Brolin has acted in many movies over the years. Some of his biggest roles include Flirting With Disaster, Mimic, and No Country for Old Men, which won the Best Picture Oscar and gave his career a big boost.
He also starred in American Gangster, W. (where he played President George W. Bush), and Milk, where he played Dan White, the San Francisco councilman who killed city official and gay rights activist Harvey Milk. His performance in Milk earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
Other major films include Jonah Hex, True Grit, Sicario, Deadpool 2, and his famous role as the CGI-covered villain Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame. He also stars in the sci-fi epic Dune (both the first movie and the upcoming sequel).
Josh Brolin has two children from his first marriage to Alice Adair.
He was later married to Diane Lane from 2004 to 2013.
In 2016, he married Kathryn Boyd. They have two daughters together—Westlyn Reign Brolin, born in 2018, and Chapel Grace Brolin, born in December 2020.
Christina Ricci
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Christina Ricci was just 10 years old when she starred in her first movie, Mermaids (1990), alongside Cher and Winona Ryder.
The following year, she played the funny but gloomy Wednesday Addams in The Addams Family (1991).
In the 1990s, Christina Ricci had more memorable roles in Casper and Now and Then.
She later took on more complex characters in movies like The Opposite of Sex, Buffalo ’66, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Sleepy Hollow, Prozac Nation, Pumpkin, and Monster, where she played the girlfriend of serial killer Aileen Wuornos (Charlize Theron, who won an Oscar for the role).
For the past 30 years, Christina Ricci has taken on bold and interesting roles.
She played a stylish 1960s flight attendant in the short-lived show Pan Am, was chained to a radiator in Black Snake Moan, and portrayed real-life women like ax murderer Lizzie Borden in The Lizzie Borden Chronicles and author Zelda Fitzgerald in Z: The Beginning of Everything.
Ricci has a son, Freddie, with her ex-husband James Heerdegen.
In December 2021, she welcomed her daughter, Cleopatra, with hairdresser Mark Hampton, whom she married in October of that year. She also stars in Yellowjackets.
Macaulay Culkin
Macaulay Culkin became a star at just 10 years old with his famous scream in Home Alone.
Before that, he had already been acting since he was about 5, appearing in TV movies, Uncle Buck, Jacob’s Ladder, and more.
After Ri¢hie Ri¢h in 1994, he took a long break from acting—almost 10 years.
Now, as a musician and painter, he chooses acting roles when he wants to, mostly in smaller but memorable movies like Party Monster and Saved.
Macaulay Culkin voiced characters on Adult Swim’s Robot Chicken and played a barista version of himself on The Jim Gaffigan Show.
In 2021, he joined season 10 of American Horror Story, once filming was able to move forward after pandemic delays.
Culkin is engaged to Brenda Song, and they have two sons. Their first, Dakota Song Culkin, was named after Culkin’s older sister, who passed away in a car accident in 2008. Their second son was born in 2023, but his name hasn’t been shared yet. He made his first public appearance at Culkin’s Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony on December 1, 2023.
Dakota Fanning
Dakota Fanning has been acting since she was very young. She played a 5-year-old version of Ally McBeal and Sean Penn’s 6-year-old daughter in I Am Sam.
It may seem like she quickly jumped to playing a trailblazing detective in The Alienist, but her journey took time.
Dakota Fanning has been acting for over 20 years, giving standout performances in Uptown Girls, Man on Fire, Hide and Seek, War of the Worlds, Charlotte’s Web, The Secret Life of Bees, three Twilight movies, American Pastoral, and Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, where she played real-life Charles Manson follower Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme.
She will star in The Nightingale alongside her younger sister, Elle Fanning, and is also set to lead an adaptation of The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath’s famous novel about a young woman struggling with mental illness in the 1950s.
Ella Fanning
Elle Fanning first appeared on screen as the younger version of her sister Dakota’s character in I Am Sam, but she has built her own successful acting career and unique sense of style.
Elle started out playing the daughter of adult characters in movies like Daddy Day Care, The Door in the Floor, Babel, and Reservation Road. She also guest-starred on shows like CSI, Criminal Minds, House, and Law & Order: SVU—even though she was probably too young to watch them at the time. As she grew up, her movie choices covered all kinds of genres, from family films like We Bought a Zoo and Maleficent to teen-focused movies like Super 8 and Twixt, as well as serious dramas like Trumbo and 20th Century Women and darker, artistic films like The Neon Demon and The Beguiled.
Elle played Mary Shelley in a movie about the famous author and starred as Catherine the Great in the Hulu comedy The Great. Up next, she and her sister Dakota will play sisters in the upcoming movie adaptation of Kristin Hannah’s World War II novel The Nightingale.
Hillary Duff
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Hilary Duff has grown up since her days as the star of Disney Channel’s Lizzie McGuire. She smoothly moved into family-friendly movies like Agent Cody Banks, Cheaper by the Dozen, and A Cinderella Story.
After some time without big roles, Duff found success again in Younger, playing a smart and complex coworker of Sutton Foster’s character, who is pretending to be younger than she is. The popular TV Land series was set to return for a seventh season. Fans were excited about a possible spin-off about Duff’s Younger character, Kelsey, but even more eager to see her play Lizzie again in a planned Lizzie McGuire reboot for Disney+. Sadly, the revival was canceled.
She has since starred in two seasons of How I Met Your Father.
Duff and hockey player Mike Comrie, the father of her son Luca, separated in 2014 after about four years of marriage and later got divorced. She and songwriter Matthew Koma had their daughter Banks Violet Bair in 2018 and got married in 2019. In 2021, they welcomed another daughter, Mae James Bair.
Candace Cameron
Candace Cameron, the younger sister of Growing Pains star Kirk Cameron, became a style inspiration for 12-year-olds everywhere with her crimped hair while playing the responsible oldest sister, D.J. Tanner, on Full House. The show aired from 1987 to 1995.
She has starred in many TV movies, some with important messages. One example is No One Would Tell (1996), based on a true story about a high school girl who was murdered by her 16-year-old boyfriend after months of silent abuse. (Yes, it’s still chilling to think about.)
More recently, after spending two seasons as a co-host on The View and reuniting with most of the Full House cast for five seasons of Fuller House on Netflix, Candace has become the star of Hallmark Channel Christmas movies. She also plays the lead in the Aurora Teagarden mystery series, based on books by Charlaine Harris.
In 2021, she celebrated 25 years of marriage to former NHL player Valeri Bure, and they have three children together.
Jodie Sweetin
After playing middle sister Stephanie Tanner on Full House for eight seasons, Sweetin faced struggles with drug and alcohol addiction, which she openly shared in her 2009 memoir, unSweetined.
She was married three times between 2002 and 2016, and her short engagement to Justin Hodak also made headlines. Hodak had several legal troubles, including violating a restraining order Sweetin had against him. In 2019, he was sentenced to more than six years in prison for possessing a deadly weapon and falsifying evidence.
Sober since 2008, Sweetin is a mom to two daughters, Zoie and Beatrix. She reunited with the Tanner family for five seasons of Fuller House on Netflix and has starred in several Hallmark Channel movies, including the 2019 Christmas movie Merry and Bright and the romantic comedy Just Swipe.
Mary-Kate And Ashley Olsen
Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen both played Michelle Tanner, the cute and clever youngest sister on the classic ABC sitcom Full House. After the show, the twins built a huge business, starring in movies, creating a production company, and launching kids’ clothing lines, books, and other products—turning their success into a full Olsen empire.
Mary-Kate kept acting after New York Minute (2004), appearing in Weeds for a season and starring in movies like The Wackness and Beastly. Ashley mostly stopped acting, and now both focus on fashion. They co-founded the award-winning brands The Row and Elizabeth & James.
Ashley had her first child with her partner, Louis Eisner, in 2023. Mary-Kate married Olivier Sarkozy in 2015 but filed for divorce in 2020.
Leonardo DiCaprio
Before becoming a big movie star, starting a production company, fighting for the environment, winning an Oscar for The Revenant, dating models, and living on yachts, Leonardo DiCaprio played a homeless teen named Luke on Growing Pains in 1991.
Even though he was 16 on Growing Pains, his youthful looks made him seem younger. He had already been acting for years when he got his first Oscar nomination for What’s Eating Gilbert Grape. In the early years of his career, he played troubled characters in movies like A Boy’s Life, The Basketball Diaries, Marvin’s Room, and Romeo + Juliet—where his character’s trouble was love.
He still looked a bit like a kid in Titanic, but by 22, he had become a full-on heartthrob.
In the past decade, DiCaprio has starred in movies like Inception, The Wolf of Wall Street, Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood, The Revenant (which won him his first Best Actor Oscar), and Killers of the Flower Moon.
Emma Watson
Growing up!
After playing Hermione Granger in eight Harry Potter movies, the English actress moved on to young adult films like The Perks of Being a Wallflower and The Bling Ring. She also starred with Tom Hanks in The Circle and uses her voice as a UN Goodwill Ambassador to support women’s rights and gender equality worldwide.
Neil Patrick Harris
Born in New Mexico, he found success right away. At 15, he got a Golden Globe nomination for his first role as a moody kid who connects with his family’s housekeeper in the 1988 TV movie Clara’s Heart. He became famous as the teen doctor in Doogie Howser, M.D., but instead of letting that define him, he later had fun making fun of himself in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle.
After taking a break from acting as he adjusted to life after childhood fame, he kept busy with theater, including three Broadway shows. Eventually, he found the perfect TV role as the charming playboy Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother, which earned him four Emmy nominations. In 2010, he was nominated for three Emmys in one year and won two—one for co-producing the 2009 Tony Awards and another for a guest role on Glee.
Neil Patrick Harris is a multi-talented entertainer—he acts, sings, dances, and even does magic! He has hosted the Tony Awards four times, winning an Emmy each time as a producer. He also hosted the Emmys twice and the Oscars once, in 2015. In 2014, he won a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for his role in Hedwig and the Angry Inch.
Harris and his longtime partner, David Burtka, became parents to twins Gideon and Harper through surrogacy in 2010. They got married in 2014.
Raven-Symoné
Raven-Symoné was just 4 years old when she stole the show as the adorable Olivia on The Cosby Show. After that, she acted in movies like The Little Rascals, Doctor Dolittle, and Doctor Dolittle 2. In 2003, she got her own popular Disney Channel show, That’s So Raven, where she played a fun-loving teen with psychic abilities and a unique fashion sense. While starring in that series, she also appeared in other Disney Channel projects, including The Cheetah Girls, The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, Kim Possible, and Sonny With a Chance.
After That’s So Raven ended in 2007, Raven-Symoné continued acting on TV. She appeared in shows like American Dad, Nashville, State of Georgia, The Jim Gaffigan Show, Master of None, and Drunk History. Since 2015, she has had a recurring role on Black-ish. She also co-hosted The View for three seasons. In June 2020, she married Miranda Maday.
