Help me not get so upset about this celeb meltdown

Cafe Society
1

Okay, you may have heard about Haley Joel Osment getting arrested for being obnoxiously drunk. And having cocaine on him. And making an anti-Semitic slur. Gah. I hope that’s all of it; it’s just been unfolding for the past couple days, every headline sounding worse. (And why are people still saying Former Child Actor?! He’s an actor. At this rate, he’s been an adult, working actor longer than he was a child actor. If he’s a f@ckup, then he just is, but he’s 37. Someone who’s 37 can be a f@ckup without being a FCA.)

But this thread is not really about him; it’s more about my fanship. I may have said this before, but here goes. A.I., you know, the robot kid movie, came out at about the same time that Mr. Rilch and I were feeling that it was crunch time: either we planned to have kids soon, or forget it. IIRC, that movie prompted a discussion about adoption. For various reasons, we determined that we were not going to be parents, and we’re still not. So I think I fixated on Haley as a kind of surrogate: watch this guy grow up, and live vicariously. That’s been okay, although there have been times when I’ve been glad he’s not my kid. This, though, is just disturbing.

So can anyone help me not freak out about this too much? Convince me that he hasn’t torpedoed his career, and that I shouldn’t give up because of one thing he said. I mean, Mel Gibson and Michael Richards said what they said loudly and repeatedly; Haley just kinda slurred it. Although I’m not impressed by the “I was blackout drunk” excuse. If he regularly blacks out, that’s not good, but I noticed he wasn’t too out of it to smile for the mug shot.

On a positive note, there have been some posts on Reddit, and in video comments sections, from people who are giving him a good character. “I was on the crew of a movie he was in, and he was so nice!” “I was on a plane next to him, and we had a great conversation!” I haven’t seen anyone pipe up to say, “Let me tell you about a time he was even worse…” So that’s a good sign, right?

And I know how many people lost homes and everything else in the recent fires, but he was one of them. Escaped with only his dog, his passport and some family photos. He’s been living with his sister, whose home was spared. (Yes, Emily and Haley Joel Osment are brother and sister. No, they are not twins; Emily is four years younger.) Dunno why he wanted to go on a drunken ski weekend in the midst of this, but there it is.

Anyway, can anyone cheer me up on this?

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He’s acting out. For some reason.
It may be mental health related.

But, yeah. Getting over involved in the stars you appreciate is a You problem.
You cannot possibly affect his life or help him.
Either he’ll come away a better person or he’ll go the way of much of Hollywoods stars. And fully implode.

Don’t read about it. You’ll be happier.

3

I think the best thing to happen would be for him to get into rehab and treat his problems. Maybe this will be the thing that makes him decide to do it.

4

Didn’t he have a DUI some years ago?

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2006, when he was eighteen.

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Is his career over? Not necessarily. If he has a substance problem, and gets himself cleaned up and straightened out, there’s no reason he couldn’t continue as an actor.

Hell, look at how much of a train wreck Robert Downey Jr. was, with multiple trips to rehab, to the point where studios weren’t willing to even hire him, because he had become undependable. He got his act together, and rebuilt his career thanks to Iron Man.

As far as the slur, that’s certainly not great. People say and do stupid crap when they’re under stress – sometimes it’s because they’re actually assholes, and sometimes it’s the heat of the moment. If he apologizes for what he said, demonstrates contrition, and it’s not part of a pattern of bigotry and jerk behavior, he could recover from that.

7

I just looked. You’ve started 5 threads on this guy.

Yeah. Not to be rude. Or hurtful. Have you looked into why you DO care so much?
I get you remembered him fondly from your own growth.

Is this a healthy way to be about a famous person you’ll likely never really know?

I think you need to distance yourself from this story.

8

Five threads over twenty years. I don’t think that’s excessive.

9

Okay.
If you’re fine, so am I.

Good luck with this.

10

The difference is that was Robert Downey Jr. who already had a good career going and is one hell of an actor. Haley Joel Osmond already barely had a career, he does minor voice acting and gets the occasional “hey its Haley Joel Osmont” cameo. To be honest I don’t really think he had much of a career to lose and I doubt this affects whatever minor roles he would have expected to get going forward. I mean, as long as he gets his shit together of course. To be honest it probably helps him that he is not Downey, or Mel Gibson or even Michael Richards.

11

His parents house burned down and his house burned down and the insurance company is refusing to pay for it. It seems like this might be a low point for him, and I hope he gets through it. Life can be hard for former child actors.

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I think the answer to that is the films Osment made as a child are much better known than the films he made as an adult.

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I’m firmly of the belief that letting someone be a Hollywood child actor is a form of child abuse.

Like it’s simpler to list the child stars who haven’t end completely messed up. Like maybe just Jason Batemen and Christian Bale (though he’s hardly the most stable person in the world).?

14

Ron Howard and Jodie Foster seem okay.

15

We’re not gonna hear so much of the quiet successful ones.

The trouble makers get all up in the news.

16

Some former child actors left the business and work and live “normal” lives.

17

If you haven’t watched the new Seth Rogen show, The Studio, Howard guest stars as himself and is hilarious.

18

DigitalC, you’re making him sound like Corey Feldman. He is working a lot, and it’s not stunt casting, either. Although it is mostly stuff aimed at geeks, like Future Man and The Boys. Still, he’s been working steadily for the last eight to ten years. There’s also Kingdom Hearts; he’s the American voice of Sora, the main character. He was rolling along pretty well, building a good rep, connecting with a lot of people, and now this. He did have a career to lose, and I hope he hasn’t.

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Should we add Brooke Shields to the list? As far as I can tell she’s been pretty sane and normal in her adult life. She did suffer post-partum depression, which was successfully treated, but I don’t think that’s a sign she was screwed up by her exploitative childhood.

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I mean she was a cocaine addict at 12 so even if she has somehow gotten her adult life together despite that, she’s not really an example of not being messed by being a child star