Kathy Garver - X Child Stars: Where Are They Now?

X Child Stars

Also by Kathy Garver

The Family Affair Cookbook

Surviving Cissy: My Family Affair of Life in Hollywood

X Child Stars

Where Are They Now?

Kathy Garver

and

Fred Ascher

TAYLOR TRADE PUBLISHING

Lanham Boulder New York London

Taylor Trade Publishing

An imprint of Rowman & Littlefield

Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK

Copyright 2016 Kathy Garver

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available

ISBN 978-1-63076-113-4 (hardback)

ISBN 978-1-63076-114-1 (e-book)

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

This book is lovingly dedicated to one of the most famous child stars of all time, the tiny but largely talented Shirley Temple.

Foreword

I have been tracking the child star syndrome for almost forty years, and my main takeaway is that it is not we who change so much as it is the audience that watched us grow up.

Its fair to say that no one has more former child star friends than I, nor has anyone followed them more closely over the decades. For example, Tony Dow ( Leave It to Beaver ) and I have been friends for more than fifty years. Jay North (he played Dennis in Dennis the Menace ) and I have been pals for nearly fifty-five years. The foundation my wife and I started back in 1990, A Minor Consideration, has more than eight hundred members, and Kathy Garver is a charter member.

Nearly all of us are like the proverbial bug trapped in amber made famous by Jurassic Park . Our lives have proceeded apace, but those who watched us as children on television or in movies cling to old images of us while they, understandably, have gone on with their lives. Theyve changed, but their apprehension of us... as people... has not. And therein lies the trouble.

I understand fads. I was one. In my own life I have a certain fondness for hula hoops, roller skates, and ancient infatuations with girls I loved and lost... but I respect those memories. The images we as a group created, however, fall into a different category because all too often we fall victim to your I grew past those old infatuations syndrome, as if the erstwhile fondness is no longer relevant, and thus becomes something to dismiss... with prejudice.

If you have a younger brother or sister, you know how easily they avoid caring about what their older sibling finds fascinating. Thats the way of the world.

Its one thing to have a complete stranger walk up to you and say, Hey, didnt you used to be somebody? and quite another to have someone say, Gee, I used to love you.

Its okay to continue to have affection and respect for the idols of your childhood. Growing up doesnt have to mean that you turn your back on the kids you found appealing. We are all connected to our childhood years. For better or worse, we are tied to each other.

Kid stars will always be a part of the entertainment industry. How they turn out depends on many factors, with good fortune being the larger part of adult success. You will read how some of these lives have turned out, and I hope you absorb these tales with a degree of loyalty and respect.

A Minor Consideration has become the home for many of these former kid stars who span the entire history of show business. Kathy worked hard on this compendium, and I hope you enjoy the read.

Paul Petersen

Founder, A Minor Consideration

Introduction

When my friend Kathy Garver and I first discussed my involvement in writing a book about exchild stars, what piqued her interest in me and what stood out from other pitches she had heard over the years was why I thought a book like this was needed. I dont see these former actors as washed-out has-beens who provide fodder for throwaway gossip magazines. And I dont look at the child stars listed in this book as curiosities from previous eras. On the contrary, to me they comprise one of our most precious national treasures.

Nearly everyone reading this page grew up in postWorld War II America, and at least one-third of us were latchkey kids who returned from school to empty houses because both our parents worked outside the home. When we came home from school, we werent really alone. We would flip on the TV and spend the afternoon with our most loyal friends: the child stars.

This book only scratches the surface of all the biographies we wanted to include. We believe youll love this edition so much youll want a sequel, and I know Kathy would be delighted to oblige! In this book youll discover the fates of many of your favorite childhood stars, from the truly tragic to the super successful and everything in between. Some of the exchild stars arent ex-stars at allthink of Ron Howard, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Christina Applegate, who all began as child stars on television.

Some of the exchild stars may no longer be stars as defined by Ron or Leo, but they have been quite successful in adulthood. My coauthor, Kathy Garver, along with Alison Arngrim, Melissa Gilbert, Joey Lawrence, and many others, figure in this group.

What saddens meand what inspired me to create this book with Kathyis the overblown interest the press and its audience take in reading about troubled exchild stars. I think that this pleasure may come from a place of envyseeing someone fall from grace whose fame we once coveted. Or maybe it is morbid curiosity. In any case, we have included the tragic stories, too, but we hope that we have respectfully told the stories of those who have had hardships. Kathy has proudly written about many exchild stars who seemed to be in a helpless downward spiral of drugs and abuse but were able to turn their lives around, and recover, and thrive.

And the really tragic endingslike the severe drug overdose that took the life of Kathys Family Affair costar Anissa Jones at the age of eighteenare written as cautionary tales with respect to those weve lost without passing judgment on the choices that often lead to an early grave.

The day I first met Kathy was at a celebrity signing event near LAX. I remember entering a room filled with many famous stars of yesteryear, including June Lockhart, Barbara Eden, and Pat Boone, among others. Sitting in the corner by the front door at a small wooden table were Brian Forster and Suzanne Crough from The Partridge Family . I was struck by how small their table was; it seemed almost disrespectful that those two exchild stars were denied the red carpet treatment they deserved for all those afternoons they were there for us in our otherwise empty house.

It is particularly poignant to me to think of Suzanne Croughs relatively early death in 2015. She was one of the people who inspired me to write this book and begin a movement to hold our exchild stars up to a new light. I only wish she had lived to see the fruits of her inspiration.

Fred Ascher

July 1, 2015

The 1950 s

I Love Lucy / The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour

9 Seasons: 180 half-hour I Love Lucy episodes (195157), 13 one-hour The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour episodes (195760), and one unaired 30-minute pilot (1951)

Network: CBS; All episodes black and white

Debut: October 15, 1951 / Finale: April 30, 1960

It is appropriate that the first major child star rose to fame on the show that built the mold for all the sitcoms to follow: I Love Lucy . When it premiered in October 1951, television was in its infancy. Indeed, many cities were still waiting for broadcast television to arrive; some areas had to wait well into the decade. This fact makes the size of the audience on the night Lucy gave birth to Little Ricky, January 19, 1953, all the more amazing. It was the night before President Dwight D. Eisenhower would be sworn in (and truly usher in the 50s). By coincidence, Lucille Ball gave birth in real life to Desi Arnaz Jr. as Lucy Ricardo brought Little Ricky into the world. More than 71 percent of Americas television setsa higher percentage than those who watched President Eisenhower take the oath of officewere tuned in to learn the gender of the Ricardo baby. The simple premise of a popular bandleader fending off his clever, redheaded spouses efforts to be in the show, with the aid of best friends and neighbors Fred and Ethel, continues to stir Americas imagination to this day. Little Keith Thibodeaux, Americas first television child star, will forever be remembered as the iconic Little Ricky.