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Article: Shots in the dark: why the slope from child to adult stardom has never been more slippery.(Column)
- Article from:
- Interview
- Article date:
- September 1, 2005
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 Brant Publications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Becoming a child or teen star can be a mixed blessing if there's no follow-through. The shift of pop culture's economic focus onto the youth audience over the past 15 or so years has put immense pressure on kid actors hoping to become adult stars. So fickle is the marketplace that talent and beauty are no guarantee of enduring popularity for most early overachievers; graft, tenacity, and bottomless charisma are crucial too.
Over the last year, I've enjoyed repeated family matinees of 1935's A Midsummer Night's Dream and 1937's Heidi. Fourteen-year-old Mickey Rooney's gurgling Puck in Dream is the uncanniest Shakespearean performance in cinema. In Heidi, ...