We will, we will stalk you

by Ellen Barry

Perhaps the most spellbinding feature of Joal Ryan's new e-zine Former Child Star-Palooza is its regular dispatches from across the country reporting sightings of former child stars. They may not be an accurate census of prime-time alumni, but they do drive this point home: one little sitcom and you're marked for life. A mixture of slack-jawed respect and thumb-screw cruelty, the sightings below exemplify our strange fixation with marginal celebrity.

Apparently, the only Brady man who never permed

"It's Amy in New York, with the ROBBIE (Cousin Oliver on The Brady Bunch) RIST sighting. My source wishes to remain anonymous, but here is his account of what happened:

"I was enjoying the on-stage band [at an alternative music club in NYC] when I glanced to my right to see a familiar blond John Denver-style bouffant. . . . I gasped to realize it was Cousin Oliver! . . . The natural reaction is `Hey, it's Cousin Oliver!,' not `Isn't that the great thespian?' Anyway, it was definitely him and he seemed to be trying to pick up a girl at the bar who wanted nothing to do with him. I believe he has a band of his own in the alternative vein but hanging onto the haircut may not be the best musical image one could come up with."

Snap judgments can be fun!

"About two years ago, I walked past one-time cute and cuddly, now rat-bastard ex-star, that kid [ANTHONY MICHAEL HALL] from `Sixteen Candles.' And boy was he chubby! I think he lives near me. . . . He was with his mom and neither looked very friendly."

Why children should never stick their tongues on poles, frozen or otherwise

"I don't know if you'd call this a `brush' with a child star but . . . remember that kid in The Toy with Richard Pryor? He was also in A Christmas Story, he was the kid [FLICK] that got his tongue stuck to the pole. Anyway, he's a porn star now, and ugly-ass one that -- about 5'6", chubby, same face, freckles, pouffy hair. He was on Jerry Springer yesterday."

(A spokeswoman for The Jerry Springer Show confirms that SCOTT [A Christmas Story] SCHWARTZ appeared on a show about actors in the porn industry in February. Schwartz told Jerry he made his first "adult" movie about five months ago. -- The Editors.)

Reports from TV-land retirement village

"My Little Margie star [GALE STORM] seen in Ojai launderia, I think. Red hair, right? . . . And then, also, Joan [JOAN DAVIS], from I Married Joan. It was the big swirly skirt that gave her away."

Of course, there was that incident with the nunchuks

"The only child star I have ever met was RHADAMES PERA, who played Young Cain in the TV-movie pilot of Kung Fu. My childhood chum was Korean, and so he was one of the rubber bald-wigged extras in the castle scene. . . . I got to wander around unsupervised on the Warners lot. . . . I played cards with Pera [and] as I recall he was a sportsman and did not cheat or cry when he lost the hand."

Has anybody out there not seen Gary Coleman?!?!

"Back when I was using a Commodore 64 I went to buy a 1571 disc drive advertised in the Recycler. It was GARY [Diff'rent Strokes] COLEMAN. He was upgrading to the Amiga."

"When I worked at The Good Guys two years ago, I heard that GARY COLEMAN would go to the 24-hour Good Guys at the Beverly Connection [in Los Angeles] in the middle of the night quite often and buy Nintendo games. Apparently one day, he bought a big-screen TV and the guys (presumably the good ones) who took it to his house said it was completely vacant except for one room with a giant Nintendo set-up."

"A couple of years ago, I was at this coffeeshop -- Foxy's. GARY COLEMAN and his bodyguard, I think, walked in and sat front-and-center at the counter. When it came time to order, Gary turned on his booming voice. `How's the pork sausage links?' he bellowed. The waitress's answer apparantly wasn't to his liking, because he then announced that `I'D LIKE EIGHT STRIPS OF BACON, PLEASE!' "

Take a guess

"A friend of mine, a 6 foot tall female photographer was at a party in the late '80s, snapping pix of the event when she saw [ACTOR WHOSE NAME WE'VE EXCISED FROM THE ITEM IN FEAR OF BEING SUED]. She swears [ACTOR . . . ] was standing next to her, looking UP HER DRESS!!!"

To contribute, send sightings to this e-mail address: be700@lafn.org.