Hollywood has a way of making child stardom look like the ultimate dream. Bright lights, magazine covers, adoring fans before you’re old enough to drive. For most kids who land a major role, the assumption is that they’ll chase that feeling forever. Many do. Some don’t.
The names on this list had every reason to keep going. Some were household names. Some had offers waiting. A few could have coasted for years on a single iconic performance. Instead, they chose something else entirely, and by every available measure, they’ve made peace with it. Some have more than made peace with it.
Peter Ostrum – Charlie Bucket Who Became a Vet
Peter made his one and only film appearance in 1971’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, playing Charlie Bucket at just 12 years old in the Oscar-nominated film. Although he was offered a three-film contract after filming wrapped, he opted not to accept it. Most people his age would have signed without hesitation.
Ostrum went on to attend Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine and became a veterinarian in 1984, beginning his practice at Countryside Veterinary Clinic in Lowville, New York in July 1985, before retiring in September 2023. Speaking to the American Veterinary Medical Association, he recalled how a local vet making farm calls had made a huge impression on him as a child: “This person really enjoyed what he did for a living.” That impression clearly stuck.
Danny Lloyd – The Kid From The Shining Who Became a Professor
Instead of haunting hotels, Danny Lloyd, the boy who played Danny Torrance in Stanley Kubrick’s horror classic The Shining, is now a biology professor at a community college in Kentucky. Lloyd has been out of the acting game since childhood, and told The Guardian it was in his early teenage years when he realized he was ready to move on.
He currently teaches in Kentucky, living a quiet life far from Kubrick’s haunted hotel, and is rarely recognized – which is exactly what he wanted when he left Hollywood behind. In 2019, Lloyd returned briefly to the screen for a cameo in the Shining sequel, Doctor Sleep. One cameo, decades later, on his own terms. That seems about right.
Mara Wilson – Matilda Who Chose Writing Over the Spotlight
Mara Wilson made her on-screen debut at age 6 in Mrs. Doubtfire, charming audiences in nine more roles including Matilda and Miracle on 34th Street, before deciding to retire from Hollywood after portraying Lily Rose in Thomas and the Magic Railroad at age 13. The experience on that final film was not a good one. The moment she started going through puberty, Hollywood began treating her differently, and she felt completely humiliated by what happened on set during that production.
In more recent years, Wilson has focused primarily on writing, including a produced play and a memoir of her child star career, while also working for Publicolor, a nonprofit that helps high-risk teens. She also works to raise awareness for mental health, having dealt with ADHD and OCD herself. The distance from Hollywood, it turns out, gave her something the industry rarely could: room to figure out who she actually was.
Jeff Cohen – Chunk from The Goonies Who Became a Hollywood Lawyer
As Chunk in 1985’s The Goonies, Jeff Cohen was a total scene stealer. After being immortalized in that role, Cohen left acting just a few years later when offers became less frequent. According to Cohen, his acting career reached a halt when he started going through puberty, telling the Daily Mail that there were basically only about four heavy-set kids in town competing for the same roles.
Cohen stopped acting as he entered adulthood, opting instead to pursue a J.D. degree from the UCLA School of Law, graduating in 2000. In 2002, he founded the law firm Cohen and Gardner. He even negotiated for his former Goonies co-star Ke Huy Quan in his deal to star in Everything Everywhere All at Once. Not a bad second act for Chunk.
Lisa Jakub – Robin Williams’ On-Screen Daughter Who Walked Away at Her Peak
One of Lisa Jakub’s most notable roles was playing Robin Williams’ character’s teenage daughter in Mrs. Doubtfire, and like her co-star Mara Wilson, she decided to retire from acting at a young age. She had roles in other major films including Independence Day, though she left acting behind in 2000. She was still in her teens when she made the call.
She is now a yoga teacher and has written two books: You Look Like That Girl: A Child Actor Stops Pretending and Finally Grows Up, and Not Just Me: Anxiety, Depression, and Learning to Embrace Your Weird. She wrote that acting wasn’t fun for her anymore, that she was ready to try something new, and that having watched how other former child stars had struggled, she had no desire to become a cautionary tale.
Ariana Richards – Jurassic Park’s Lex Who Became a Fine Artist
While Ariana Richards made her mark in Hollywood at just 14 years old starring as Lex in Jurassic Park, her acting journey had actually begun six years earlier with a role in an episode of The Golden Girls. After graduation, she continued her studies at the Art Center College of Design, honing her skills as an artist and painter. The shift from screen to canvas was a deliberate one, not a drift.
Though it might seem unusual to step away from a successful film career, painting is arguably in Richards’ blood – her ancestor was Carlo Crivelli, a noted artist of the Italian Renaissance. After leaving acting, she pursued a degree in fine art and drama and established herself as a painter. Her velociraptors are long gone. Her canvases are not.
Skandar Keynes – Edmund Pevensie Who Chose Cambridge and Politics
Best known for starring as Edmund Pevensie in The Chronicles of Narnia film series, Keynes appeared in all three installments: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. In 2010, he began studying Arabic, Persian, and Middle Eastern History at Pembroke College, Cambridge. The move from blockbuster franchise to one of the world’s most competitive universities was, for him, the obvious path.
Speaking to Business Insider about stepping away from show business, he explained that he had found an area of study he was truly passionate about and simply could not rationalize delaying that opportunity, nor was he convinced he could effectively balance both at the same time. Since leaving university, Keynes has worked for the United Nations and as a parliamentary adviser in the House of Commons, and currently works as a political adviser.
Bridgit Mendler – Disney’s Good Luck Charlie Star Who Became a Space Tech CEO
After signing with Disney Channel in 2009, Mendler played Juliet van Heusen on Wizards of Waverly Place and soon rose to fame for her lead role as Teddy Duncan on Good Luck Charlie, which ran from 2010 to 2014. After enrolling at MIT and Harvard from 2017 to 2024, she co-founded Northwood Space, a satellite data startup. The jump from sitcom star to aerospace entrepreneur is about as far as career pivots go.
In 2023, Mendler and her husband co-founded Northwood Space, where she serves as CEO. The venture-backed company is based in El Segundo, California, and intends to mass-produce satellite ground stations. Northwood had raised $30 million in funding from investors by 2025. Mendler described her shift by saying she started to feel a disconnect with her day-to-day work in entertainment and began putting out feelers into the research domain. She followed that feeling all the way to orbit.
Ross Bagley – Fresh Prince’s Little Nicky Who Chose Real Estate Over Hollywood
Playing Will Smith’s cousin on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and his stepson in Independence Day made Ross Bagley a recognizable name in Hollywood at a very young age. He left acting to attend California State University, Northridge, where he studied cinema and television arts. There’s something quietly admirable about a kid choosing a college campus over a casting call.
After graduating college, Bagley decided not to continue acting and went into real estate instead, though he did make sure to show up for the HBO Max Fresh Prince reunion. According to reports, he makes a living in real estate these days, having made the transition well into adult life. Fame came early. He filed it away and moved on, which, in the long view, might be the wisest thing on this entire list.
What connects all nine of these former child stars isn’t bitterness or burnout, though some of that played a role. It’s a more straightforward quality: the ability to recognize that one remarkable chapter doesn’t have to define the whole story. A golden ticket, a haunted hotel, a magical wardrobe – these were starting points, not destinations. The destinations, as it turns out, were altogether different, and in most cases, far more their own.
