15 Child Actors Who Died Too Soon

June 2024 ยท 14 minute read

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When a celeb dies, it makes us really feel a lot of feelings. Think again to 2016, when celebrities had been all of sudden dropping like flies. We were all of sudden terrified of our favourite well-known other people as it seemed like nobody was secure. This was with grownup celebrities, too. While one of the crucial actors who died were old enough to have died of outdated age, many of them died in freak well being events or injuries. The complete factor used to be simply an workout in remembering how brief and fleeting life in truth is. This sentiment is going double for child stars. It's incredibly tragic when any child dies, and we are reminded of that every time a child in the public eye dies.

While probably the most stars in this list died a long time in the past, others died inside of the previous couple of years. Some of them were adults when they died, whilst others have been still youngsters when their lives were minimize quick. Some of the youngsters struggled with despair, drug habit, and more, whilst others have been living completely commonplace lives, or a minimum of as normal as their lives may have been as child stars. You would possibly recognize a few of these names as other people who ended up becoming massive stars as adults or a minimum of maintained a undeniable level of reputation, however a few of these other folks dropped off the face of the earth after their flip at stardom, handiest getting into the public awareness once more once they died. Either way, their lives were all tragically minimize short by way of personal demons or freak instances. Here are fifteen child actors who died manner too young.

Jonathan Brandis

Jonathan Brandis began out as a child fashion, however made his acting debut in advertisements and eventually graduated to TV and film roles. His first main role was a guest spot on One Life To Live, and in 1990, he completed popular reputation for his position in IT, the Stephen King adaptation that is getting large consideration now. At 17, he landed a job on seaQuest DSV enjoying Lucas Wolenczak, a role that won him an enormous teenage feminine fanbase. That all ended in 2003 when he died through suicide in the hallway of his LA apartment. After his dying, it got here out that he'd been depressed about his profession, which started really declining in the last few years of his life. On top of that, a part he'd gotten in a movie in 2002 used to be largely left on the slicing room flooring.

Heather O'Rourke

Heather O'Rourke was born in 1975 and was once found out by way of Steven Spielberg when she was once visiting MGM Studios. He solid her as Carol Anne in Poltergeist, and he or she's the one who says "They're here!" She's additionally within the two sequels that got here later on. Additionally, she had a task on Happy Days and did numerous visitor spots on different shows. She died at the age of twelve. People to start with concept she died of the flu, nevertheless it ended up being an obstruction that gave her sepsis, which ended up killing her. She died in the course of selling the third Poltergeist movie, which used to be devoted to her reminiscence. Her circle of relatives ended up suing the medical institution that gave her the influenza prognosis since she'd had the obstruction for years and her docs all ignored it. The case was settled out of courtroom.

Sky McCole Bartusiak

Sky McCole Bartusiak starred in different main tasks over the course of her very brief existence. She were given her start in Stephen King's  Storm of the Century ahead of getting her giant damage as Mel Gibson's daughter in The Patriot. She additionally starred in Don't Say A Word, Riding In Cars With Boys, Love Comes Softly, Kill Your Darlings, and Wild About Harry. She's additionally been in episodes of SVU, Frasier, Judging Amy, Touched By An Angel, LOST, George Lopez, and more. She was once nominated for both the film and TV categories for youngsters under 10 in the 2002 Young Artist Awards, too. She died in 2014 in her condominium in the back of her folks' space in Houston. She'd plainly been affected by seizures earlier than she died, nevertheless it ended up being an accidental drug overdose. At her memorial carrier, her brother Stephen advised mourners: "If you want to know what makes Sky happy, go out and plant a tree."

Corey Haim

Corey Haim was born in 1971 and used to be majorly well-known within the mid-1980s for rules in quite a few motion pictures, including Lucas, Silver Bullet, Murphy's Romance, License to Drive, Dream a Little Dream, and Snowboard Academy. He was well-known for pairing up with Corey Feldman in The Lost Boys, which made both of them household names. He had a drug addiction up to now however made a comeback upon getting sober within the mid-2000s and shooting a truth show with Feldman. In 2007, Haim affirmed: "I want to be the guy they talk about when they talk about comebacks. I want people to learn from me, see I'm human, and understand that I make mistakes just like they do, but it doesn't have to consume you. You've got to walk through the raindrops, and that's what I'm trying to do." He ultimately opened up about his stories as a victim of sexual abuse, but he never printed the identify of his abuser. He died of pneumonia, however he'd additionally been seriously hooked on pain drugs at the time of his death.

River Phoenix

River Phoenix's real title is River Jude Bottom, and he was once the eldest of five youngsters who also are well-known. He started his occupation at ten and went on to megastar in movies that might cement his status as a teen idol for many years to come. He was nominated for an Academy Award in 1988 and 1991, establishing himself as a perfect actor who would almost certainly still be appearing as of late. However, he died on October thirty first, 1993 of a blended drug overdose. He'd taken medication at the sidewalk outdoor of the Viper Room (partly owned by means of Johnny Depp on the time) in West Hollywood, which is what a lot of folks remember about him now. What people have a tendency to overlook is that he was an animal and environmental rights activist who used to be passionate about being vegan. He additionally campaigned for Bill Clinton back in 1992.

Dana Plato

Dana Plato began her occupation at seven when she began appearing in different TV commercials. We don't in reality have a lot of what number of advertisements she was in, but it is someplace in the triple digits. She spent eight years as a standard on Diff'rent Strokes, and even then she used to be having drug issues. She admitted to smoking weed, taking cocaine and ingesting alcohol in her early teenagers, even suffering a diazepam overdose at 14. She was let move from the show after she married a rock celebrity and had a child as a result of they did not think a real-life being pregnant would have compatibility into the display's image. In 1991, she attempted to rob a video store and was arrested in an instant, and in 1992, she was once arrested and served a month in jail for looking to forge a diazepam prescription. She's in fact a part of the explanation why other folks began talking concerning the difficulties of child stars. She killed herself the day after she did an interview on Howard Stern where callers wondered her decade-long sobriety. Eleven years later, her best son would do the similar.

Gary Coleman

Gary Coleman is some other child megastar coming out of Diff'rent Strokes, and he'd had a troublesome existence. However, he's probably probably the most biggest child stars ever, even now with all these child stars showing up. He used to be the preferred actor at the sequence, and at the peak of his profession, he used to be incomes $100,000 an episode. He used to be filming all the time to the detriment of his well being and mental well-being, which contributed to his well being problems and made him separate himself from the remainder of the forged. He starred in a large number of flicks after Diff'rent Strokes or even ran a satirical campaign for Governor of California within the 2003 recall election, however voted for Arnold Schwarzenegger as a substitute. Even then, he still placed 8th out of A hundred thirty five applicants in the race. He died of an epidural hematoma after falling down the steps.

Judith Barsi

Judith was groomed to change into an actress from the instant she was once born. She was discovered on the age of 5 at a skating rink and was once cast in Fatal Vision, the place she played a three-year-old lady. Her small measurement led directors to solid her as younger than she actually was. By the time she was once in the fourth grade, she used to be incomes $100,000 a 12 months. That used to be largely due to her position as Ducky from The Land Before Time, Anne-Marie in All Dogs Go To Heaven, and Thea Brody in Jaws: The Revenge. The extra a hit she got, the more abusive her father got, even though. She was once remaining noticed driving her bike the morning of July 25, 1988, the day she and her mother have been shot and killed by way of her father, who wandered the house for two days sooner than killing himself. Judith used to be ten years previous. Her closing film was All Dogs Go To Heaven, and in keeping with director Don Bluth, she used to be "absolutely astonishing. She understood verbal direction, even for the most sophisticated situations," and he'd deliberate on that includes her in his long term motion pictures.

Michael Cuccione

Michael Cucionne wore many hats during his lifestyles. He was once an actor, singer, and dancer, and he also wrote books and raised awareness for cancer research. When he was once nine years previous, he was recognized with level 2A Hodgkin's lymphoma which went away with chemotherapy however got here back the next year. The subsequent bout of cancer additionally affected his lungs, however after a heroic dose of chemotherapy and radiation therapies, he used to be cancer loose, albeit with permanent lung and breathing issues. He established a foundation for cancer research and recorded a five-song CD to boost awareness. As for his leisure occupation, he played Jason McKnight in 2gether, a display about a fake boy band that was once so standard, they opened for Britney Spears and had albums that hit the Billboard Top 100. Sadly, once the display started taping season 2, Michael began suffering from respiring problems and spent his final Christmas, New Year's, and birthday in the hospital before death of respiratory failure. He had just turned 16.

J. Madison Wright Morris

J. Madison Wright Morris made her acting debut within the comedy Grace Under Fire, and her giant ruin came when she got solid as True Danzinger in Earth 2. She also played the very first child character to ever die on ER, which used to be a large enough deal when it aired that the episode got nominated for an Emmy. She left her appearing occupation and ended up desiring a middle transplant, which she were given in 2000. She then became an activist elevating awareness of the importance of organ donation. She graduated from faculty in the summer of 2006, and she used to be all set to start out her job instructing English to tenth-graders in Kentucky. She were given married on July 8th, 2006, and the day after she were given again from her honeymoon, she suffered an enormous heart assault, where she died on July twenty first, simply over every week away from her twenty second birthday and sixteen days after her Shiloh co-star Amzie Strickland did. Her funeral was held in the similar church she'd gotten married in simply days earlier than.

Lee Thompson Young

Lee Thompson Young is most probably most renowned for taking part in Jett Jackson in The Famous Jett Jackson and Chris Comer in Friday Night Lights. He was one of the main stars of The Disney Channel in the late 90s and early 2000s, however once Jett Jackson was canceled, he quickly found new work. He performed Cyborg on Smallville, appeared in Akeelah and the Bee, and had a ordinary position in Flash Forward. He was operating on Rizzoli and Isles on the time of his death. He hadn't shown as much as movie an episode, leading police to do a well-being test on him at his rental. That used to be where they discovered him lifeless of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. It was once printed later on that he'd been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and have been affected by depression earlier than he died. His family launched the Lee Thompson Young Foundation to check out and lend a hand take away the stigma surrounding mental sickness.

Bobby Driscoll

Bobby Driscoll was once a child actor and artist whose filmography was lovely long earlier than he died. He was once the kid in numerous the very early live-action Disney films from the forties and 50s, including Song of the South and Treasure Island. His career had began to decelerate the mid-Nineteen Fifties when he started doing guest appearances on anthology presentations to pay the bills. He gained a Juvenile Academy Award in 1950for his performances in The Window and So Dear To My Heart. Unfortunately, he got hooked on narcotics and ended up being despatched to prison for drug use. When he were given out, he was an avant-garde artist. He died at the early age of 31 without a money, hooked on medicine, and four weeks after his 31st birthday.

Bridgette Andersen

Bridgitte Andersen used to be the little woman who starred within the movie Savannah Smiles and had roles in a couple of TV presentations and movies after that. She wanted to be an actress from the age of 2, starting out as a model sooner than getting her first appearing gig on the age of 7. She used to be if truth be told in an episode of The Golden Girls and had a task within the Ryan O'Neil movie Fever PItch. Unfortunately, she evolved a heroin habit throughout her teen years. She wasn't on the subject of her family in any respect and in reality didn't have a lot contact with them. She died in 1997 of an overdose on the soft age of 21. At the time of her loss of life, she wasn't appearing in any respect, however operating at a well being food retailer in Los Angeles, California while she was once running on her sobriety.

Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer

Carl Switzer, proven above with Elizabeth Taylor as a child, began out his career as an actor in the Thirties when he landed the position of Alfalfa in the Our Gang shorts. The downside used to be that he did one of these just right job as Alfalfa that he was once by no means able to search out another role that wasn't typecasting him. As an adult, he ended up doing a host of B-movies and bit parts, but he never achieved the similar level of popularity. He in the end left show industry to turn out to be a canine breeder and hunting information. He additionally were given married in 1954 and had a son ahead of getting divorced two years later. He died on the young age of 31 because of a money dispute of $50. He was training a dog that were given lost that used to be found through a random man and posted a praise for locating it and wanted to get repaid that money by way of the canine's proprietor. The canine proprietor refused and Switzer attacked him, which led to him getting killed.

Anissa Jones

Anissa Jones performed Buffy at the CBS sitcom Family Affair in 1966, when she used to be simply eight years old. She was at the show 24/7, either filming the show or promoting it. This endured even if she broke her leg in a playground when the manufacturers wrote it into the show. The show was once canceled after five seasons in 1971 in CBS's infamous "rural purge" campaign. After that, she auditioned for the a part of Regan MacNeil in The Exorcist, however because she was once so well-known as Buffy, the director of the film concept there would be too much pop culture crossover, so Linda Blair got solid as an alternative. Anissa then went to high school and did not act anymore. She started shoplifting and doing medication and died a couple of months after her 18th birthday of a drug overdose. According to the coroner who tested her frame, she died of one of the critical ODs he'd ever noticed.

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