A journey into the cutthroat and adorable world of professional child actors.
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The first time this ad appeared, I was on the subway, heading somewhere I cant recall.
I knew nothing about voice lessons, acting coaches, or talent showcases.
She might end up playing a tree.
The number and intensity of child-centered activities on offer could overfill even the most ambitious and efficient parents schedule.
I know of at least one after-school financial-literacy class for the 10-and-under set.
The same rules of abundance and opportunity apply in theater.
The classes in these institutions carve a path of increasing skill and dedication.
Cece had gone pro.
This was on Broadway?
How did it happen?
And then my daughter turned to me and said, I want to be an actress.
Then the clarifying elaboration: A child actress.
Children have been performing on Broadway for as long as Broadway has existed.
And as long as there have been kids onstage, there have been stage parents.
Minnie Marx pushed her sons into vaudeville.
Judy Garlands mother, Ethel Gumm, put her daughter onstage when she was 2.
(She was very jealous because she had absolutely no talent, Garland would later say.)
They crave their own fame and success and are interested in their children primarily as reflections of themselves.
Why did I do it?
What did it get me?
Scrapbooks full of me in the background!
(Shirley Temple, to be fair to stage moms everywhere, loved her mother.)
We all want the best for our children, Ceces father, Frank Popp, told me.
If your kids are good at chess, you probably want to find them the best chess teacher.
If they sing, we want them to have the best singing teacher.
In my defense, its sometimes hard to tell how seriously to take ones child.
Junes day is filled with more ideas and schemes than I produce in a year.
I am not immune, however, to parental striving.
And my daughter is talented!
I told her I would ask around.
or By the sea … thinking about what song to learn next .
The repeat parents at ACANY are all quietly enthusiastic about one anothers children.
I knew from preperformance chatter that Bea had recently acquired an agent.
We got one by mistake, her mom, Caitlin Goddard, told me.
Shes a self-proclaimed hippie with none of the fuzziness I associate with hippies.
There is, Goddard told me, an ideal window of time for the aspiring child actor.
Children get cast most often when they are somewhere between 7 and 13.
Any younger, she explained, and no one knows whether or not you’re able to read.
Any older, and the same part might be played by an 18-year-old.
You never know whats going to happen, but this is exposure for them, she said.
Its exposure and training.
Our kids talents it comes to a head much sooner than it did for us.
You, and your child, should be available.
And whats the other thing?
Oh, okay, the child is overscheduled.
It is hard to shake the feeling that without our help, our children might not thrive.
Honors family offered a good example of how a hardworking parent might combine ambition with a sense of playfulness.
A computer was propped up on a music stand, displaying a section of a script.
Nowadays, you want to dress for a role, Savage told me.
But not too much.
They had selected a bibbed skirt and a loose sweater and put Honors long strawberry-blonde hair in braids.
It looks good, Savage said.
Honor has perfect posture, and she accepted the pronouncement with a pleasant look on her face.
She watched as her mother slid an iPhone into a holder in the middle of the ring light.
Okay, Savage told her daughter, taking a breath, lets go.
Savage ran a local theater nearby, and she invited a group of agents to see her students.
I was so surprised they wanted her, Savage told me.
I said, You mean the little girl with the teeth falling out of her head?
The family moved to New York in part to give Honor a better chance at a career.
Their first apartment in the city was so small an earlier version of the blue screen barely fit.
One time, Honor told me, her mother fell into the bathroom when they unfolded it.
But more of a disastrous key in A. I love a puzzle piece in a schedule.
Im not a perfectionist; I truly can be a mess, but I enjoy it.
Many of the auditions kids like Honor get are for voice-overs.
(Last week, we did an audition voicing an aardvark, one mother told me.
What the hell is an aardvark supposed to sound like?)
Savage has an isolation box in her bedroom along with the ring light and blue screen.
Recently, she voiced a dung beetle singing in harmony with a bee.
Savage usually has Honor do at least three takes.
One thing you have to remember is to heart your videos to mark them as favorites.
Savage says it takes an average of 200 auditions before you get a role.
Parents have to learn to be readers so they can read with them.
A lot of my parents think they need to read the line in a leading way.
If you ask them that way, theyre going to singsong an answer right back to you.
You dont want a kid to look like theyre acting.
Thats the beauty of kids acting.
Ceces parents said that, despite those complications, the family was in a better spot than most.
Their older son was in seventh grade perfectly capable of being left home alone.
The other three children working inTommywere all from out of town.
Rachel Braverman had to do something similar when she had two kids in traveling productions and two at home.
Im sure this sounds totally insane, she told me.
But all four of my kids are really happy.
Theyre really grounded, and all of them are doing what they love.
Being at ACANY feels to June like joining a team.
(Its like football, my Texan father quipped, without the head injuries.)
There is noMatildawith its cast of 15 or so kids, noBilly Elliotwith its ballet-dancing child star.
It is hard to overstate the talent of the theater kids I meet.
When Cece first opened her mouth to sing NYC inAnnie Jr.,someone in the audience audibly whispered whoa.
Beatrice is both adorable and poised.
Honor can sing, act, and tap-dance without breaking a sweat.
Back in my day, a triple threat was like this rare bird, Savage told me.
Now its like, What tricks can you do?
Can you do trapeze and fly a jet?
Boys, as a rule, have an easier time of it because there are simply fewer auditioning.
(Girls, there are 17,000 more of them than boys, said Pedell.
Boys have a meteoric success rate if theyre even a little talented.)
Many professionals still talk about the It factor.
Pedell says she has been in this business long enough to recognize someone who will draw your eye onstage.
Its a combination of talent and enjoyment professionalism combined with some essence of kidness.
Honor is getting taller now and is visibly strong from gymnastics.
Height can be a problem in child showbiz.
There are riders in most kids Broadway contracts that limit growth to two or three inches.
No one wants a Molly who can look Miss Hannigan in the eye.
Savage says some theater kids keep wearing jumpers and braids well into their teens.
If thats your look, then go for it, she says, but lets be realistic here.
Your average 13-year-old wears wide-leg cargos and a crop top.
Doubtfirerecently toured the U.S., whileThe Sound of Musicwas touring in Asia.
And then, of course, there is the longtime pinnacle of child acting: a traveling production ofAnnie.
Savage says she stays out of the group chats because the atmosphere can turn so quickly toward cattiness.
Thompson was in the original cast ofAnnieas a kid, playing an orphan named Pepper.
Back then, though her parents were dedicated to her career, they were hands-off.
For instance, Thompson took a cab by herself every day to the theater and back.
Parenting was so different, she said.
We were so much more on our own.
Thompson and her friends took tap lessons, and there were certainly vocal coaches and acting coaches available.
(We were all active in our pursuit of mastery and employment, she joked.)
But the range and availability of theaters and classes back then pales in comparison to the current landscape.
Broadway shows themselves still preserve some parental distance.
Parents are not allowed backstage in New Yorks theaters.
Child performers are tended, instead, by their guardians.
In a traveling production likeAnnie,however, parents are necessarily more hands-on, which can lead to trouble.
The first year of the tour was right after the pandemic, Thompson told me.
I didnt really get to know the parents very well.
Thompson does not hire two casts, for example, because she doesnt want any animosity between different Annies.
Now, Thompson is strict with her cohort of parents.
In a dance call, youre watching the parents interact with each other, she said.
Does it feel weird and competitive?
Are people being jerks?
Sometimes people dont realize whos watching.
They are not encouraged to buy tickets and see the show.
You have to know your children, said Savage.
I dont want them to feel pressured or that theres an expectation to be other than really solid humans.
If this is the route, great, and if its not, great.
I dont want them to think this makes them valid.
You invest all you’ve got the option to, but you cannot be too invested.
I mean, do you know any child lawyers or dentists?
Junes commitment to the theater, so far, is unwavering.
while walking down the sidewalk.
That doesnt mean every day is a happy day.
I have not yet started the hunt for an agent.
I havent spoken to any managers, and June has appeared in zero showcases.
I watched Junes friends post videos this summer of their theater camps and workshops they rarely miss a note.
They sing and dance and, quite literally, do flips.
I worry that my ambivalence will rob June of her limited window for child success.
This isnt, Ive realized, a measured decision Ive made about promoting unstructured time.
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