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Former Child Star: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:babyjane 7479.jpg|link=What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?|frame|Apparently, ''this'' is what happened to Baby Jane. Not a pretty sight.]]
{{quote|''He's a former child star?! Oh, just lock him up and throw away the jail!''|'''Bosco''', ''[[The Adventures of Sam & Max: Freelance Police|Sam and Max]]: Culture Shock''}}
Probably one of Hollywood's biggest [[Acceptable Targets]], the [[Former Child Star]] is [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|just what it sounds like]]: a star of TV or film whose career was at its peak in their formative years. Alas, such an unorthodox childhood can leave its mark on anyone (especially if they were [[Not Allowed to Grow Up]]), and it always does in fictional depictions of the Former Child Star. In adulthood, they may be a struggling actor who finds it hard to be taken seriously when everyone remembers them as "[[I Am Not Spock|that one kid from that one show]]", if they're remembered at all. And that's if they're lucky: the unlucky ones wind up mourning their glory days in a dead-end job, or (dis)gracing the covers of tabloids after a run-in with the law. Sadly, a case of [[Truth in Television]], as the troubled biographies of some real-life Former Child Stars will show. On the other hand, there are other child actors who grew up well, like [[Jodie Foster]] and Bill Mumy, because their parents took care to raise them up right under the circumstances.
While some kids idolize these stars and want to be like—or be—them because of how "glamorous" their lives are, their lives more or less suck 80% of the time. Can you say [[Blessed with Suck]]?
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Compare [[White Dwarf Starlet]].
{{examples}}
== Film ==
* The title character of the 1962 film ''[[What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?]]''
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* Donnie in ''[[Magnolia]]'', a former [[Child Prodigy]] on a TV quiz show who fell on hard times.
* ''Life With Mikey'' starred [[Family Ties|Michael J. Fox]] as a former child star turned talent agent.
** Although in his case it's even weirder, most of his fame came from him playing a child while he was an adult. These weren't roles he had played since he was a child, his entire
* Philip Seymour Hoffman's character in ''[[Along Came Polly]]'' plays with this trope, even featuring a movie poster in the style of ''[[The Breakfast Club]]'', and a character meltdown when he tries to direct and play every role in a community theatre production.
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