Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Hollywood - Missing out on Childhood?

Pin It Now!
If you are new to my blog, on Wednesdays I post about my experience in Hollywood as a former child/teen actress. If you want to start at the beginning of these posts go here.
------
It has been said that child actors miss out on childhood. Definitely true. In a lot of cases.
But I think it depends on the kid, the kid's family, the level of pressure and fame, the amount of work, the atmosphere of your show/movie, your friends, etc.

I feel really blessed by the healthy experience I had in Hollywood. I got to live out my childhood dream, but I still enjoyed a lot of normal childhood stuff. I was never really "famous," I wasn't a workhorse, my parents didn't pressure me or depend on me financially, and I didn't run with a fast crowd. I feel like I got the best of both worlds - a little Hollywood success and the maintenance of normalcy in my home life. I moved to LA and for acting and lived with family friends at the end of 8th grade and stayed there through my junior year, but I was not there the whole time. I came home to Nor Cal a lot and participated in normal childhood activities.

Did I miss out on some stuff? Of course. I did sacrifice some normal child/teen stuff, but it was worth it. It was a trade off. One of the things I did miss was junior high graduation. I missed the ceremony - and we all know how exciting those are. But I was late for the graduation dance and I had a date. I think there was a dinner or something beforehand that I missed and so my date had to fly solo, but I eventually did make it to the dance. Here is our graduation dance pic.


The producers for Lassie knew I was trying to get home in time for the dinner and dance so they did what they could to wrap up my scenes that Friday. They felt bad that I couldn't be home in time so Al Burton (executive producer) brought me a corsage.
Sweet, huh?
I worked with some really great people.


Pin It Now!

3 comments:

Denise said...

first, it was TERRIFIC meeting you last night. you are a blast!!

how sweet that the producer brought you a corsage!

yes, 8th grd graduations are very exciting {sarcasm}, at least mine was.
one of the girls in my class wore a wrap around skirt under her white see through gown. she did not know how to wrap it around properly and her skirt FELL OFF when she got up to get her diploma! AND she was wearing bright red wednesday panties on a friday!!

what? how do i know so many details about this girl?? yeah...it was me.

Mauimandy@The Grains of Paradise said...

This is adorable! All you guys look so cute ( and so young! ) Where does the time go???

Alicia@ eco friendly homemaking said...

That is so sweet that he brought you a corsage! I agree that is such a cute picture!