For as long as movies have been made, they’ve needed children to star in them, and MANY MANY of those performances have been unremarkable, teetering into downright bad. Occasionally though, a child actor is so talented or so charming or so well cast that they leap off the screen, and you just can’t help falling in love with them. And mileage varies on if they’ll choose to continue acting (or continue to be good at it), but we will forever have that one performance cementing their legacy. This weekend we add Mateo Zoryon Francis-DeFord to the pantheon of great child actors. Francis-DeFord plays the younger version of Sammy Fabelman, the lead role in Steven Speilberg’s semi-autobiographical film, The Fabelmans. While Francis-DeFord passes the role along to Gabriel LaBelle in the back half film, he is incredibly engaging during the film’s opening. Watching him light up on-screen got me thinking about other child stars that have done the same. What follows is a catalog of impeccable child stars and the roles that launched them into stardom. I’d also like to make a quick aside and say that Keke Palmer’s sister LC recently appeared on my favorite new reality show, Claim to Fame, in which the relatives of famous people compete to keep their “claim to fame” a secret. LC is just as delightful as Keke, but revealed on the show that Keke’s birth name is actually Lauren, named after her dad Lawrence, who named his four daughters Lauren, Loreal, Lawrence, and Lawrencia. Now I’d like to see Akeelah try to keep those names straight and spell them correctly. Currently in theaters. Buy tickets at Fandango or Cinemark.
