March 1974 article on daytime child actors

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3/74 TV Radio Mirror

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stead I have to go to a rehearsal - that's why I feel the way I do," he explains.

Jamie plans to be an inventor, just like his grandfather, when he grows up. In fact, he already claims to have invented a non-polluting car - on paper, anyway. But for now he wants to continue with his acting career, even if that means a little less time to play with his buddies. Jamie's skateboarding cronies, by the way, are all non-pros from the neighborhood, Manhattan's Upper West Side. What do they and the other kids who attend the local public school with Jamie think about the celebrity in their midst? "When I started on The Secret Storm about a year and a half ago, they were pretty excited about it and used to go home after school to watch me," Jamie says very nonchalantly. "But now it's nothing special to them any more, so they don't watch." Jamie also doesn't bother to watch. "I hate to see myself and hear myself on television," he confesses, squeezing his eyes shut tight and holding his hands over his ears for emphasis. "I'll do anything, anything, instead of watching myself."

Jamie got started in show business at the tender age of three, but those who know something about the Grover family might ask themselves what took him so long. It was just about inevitable. Jamie's dad Stanley has appeared on The Secret Storm, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, and most recently on The Edge of Night; his 15-ear old sister Cindy recently wrapped up a three year run on Love of Life; and Jamie's 12-year-old brother Steven appeared on The Best of Everything during its brief life. And all three of them have always made commercials, which was how Jamie got started and which remained his forte until he landed the role on The Secret Storm.

Jamie became an actor because of the old monkey see, monkey do syndrome, but his mom (Linda Grover writes for The Guiding Light) is quick to point out that all three kids know they are free to quit if ever and when ever they feel like it. Cindy did exactly that because she wanted to devote more time to her studies. But the only time Jamie has even thought about quitting was this past summer. It seems he found the long drive from the family country place in Connecticut to the Manhattan studio boring enough to consider retirement. Jamie is easily bored, he will readily admit - very bright children usually are plagued by boredom. Asked to describe himself, the first word he thinks of is "restless." More often than not, he finds school boring. Sometimes he also finds working on the soap boring. Then what do you do when things get dull? "I make my body go into funny positions," he says. "And I meditate. Thinking is a hobby of mine. Mostly I think about my friends - that I hope they're happy."

MATTHEW ANTON: With his tousled head of platinum blond hair, enormous blue eyes, and squeaky voice cum lisp, 9-year old Matthew Anton, who plays Gardner Martin on ABC's All My Children, was born to make it big in television commercials. And that's exactly what he's been doing - he's made around 25 of them - ever since the age of 5. The story of how he got started in show business goes like this: Matthew and his dad Nathan (he's an ABC cameraman) went to see the real ham of the family, Michael - who's now 16 - perform in an amateur production at the local Y. Volunteers were called for from the audience; Matthew bounded up on stage and quickly had everybody in stitches. After the show a man in the audience, whose own little son made television commercials, suggested to Mr. Anton that Matthew should do the same.

"The people at the agencies flipped over Matthew," his dad tells me, still sounding a trifle stunned by his son's phenomenal success. "It never fails to amaze me how Matthew so often gets a job over literally hundreds of other kids who show up for these auditions. The competition is incredible. I think the key to his success is that he's always himself at auditions. He never gets uptight."

Matthew also has extraordinary innate talent as an actor, it should be noted. His dad helps him learn dialogue for All My Children, but a few months after Matthew joined the show a year and a half ago, he began exploring the motivations behind his actions and words strictly on his own. Incredibly, he can even cry on cue. Matthew also attributes his success to being natural at all times, but like his father he's still not quite sure why he's as successful as he is. "I dunno what it is about me," he ponders. "Ya know, sometimes I go to an audition for a commercial and the casting lady will start to laugh every time I open my mouth."

Matthew is blessed with that special something you can't put your finger on. Whatever it is, he plans to continue tapping it and remain an actor for the rest of his life, although he also plans to do some directing, host his own talk show, and write novels. "I have a lot of fun acting, especially on All My Children because everybody works together day after day, so we're all friendly with each other." Matthew informs me enthusiastically. "I never think about growing up and becoming something like a doctor or lawyer instead of an actor, although my dad says I'd make a great lawyer because it seems that whenever I argue with him I win a lot."

Matthew spends his leisure time bicycling in Central Park with his pals (who are not in show business and are decidedly unimpressed by Matthew's status as a television performer), going to the movies with his steady girlfriend (Jennifer made up her mind in kindergarten that she'd marry Matthew one day) and going fishing at a "secret" Connecticut lake with his dad, brother Michael and brother Mark, who's a 20-year-old communications major at CCNY. Unlike most 9 year olds, Matthew is also an avid reader, Harried, The Spy being his most recent book read.

Life is just dandy for Matthew Anton except for one thing. "I wish I had a baby brother to pick on," he confides, echoing the sentiments of millions of kids who are low man on the family totem pole. Mrs. Anton is not about to remedy the situation, however. She's got her hands full teaching medical technology during the day, and attending Fordham University - where she's working toward her B.S. in education - in the evening. A short while ago, therefore, Matthew decided to try and remedy the situation himself. Enter Zsa Zsa, a Hungarian VIzsla he bought with his very own hard-earned money. "But I have something even better than a baby brother now," Matthew points out, trying his darndest to sound convincing. "I have a person who never screams at me and loves me no matter what I do to her - that's my faithful dog Zsa Zsa."

JUDY SAFRAN: Judy, who plays Lisa Kincaid on CBS' The Secret Storm, candidly admits she's in show business for the money. Once her nest egg is sufficiently enriched, she plans to pursue a career as a veterinarian. "This is a job to me, that's all," says this 12-year-old young lady in her most pragmatic tone of voice. "The money's good, so I figure why not make it now and I'll have some saved for when I'm older. I would never stay in this business because it's so unsafe - it makes people nervous and insecure."

The last thing in the world Judy would want is for her own children to follow her footsteps into show business careers, the way she and her sister Kerrie, who's now 15, followed their mother's. "I think it's nice when children follow in a parent's footsteps and since I want mine to, I don't want to be in an unsafe profession," she points out. "My mother, being a ballet dancer, knew how to get Kerri and I into show business, but I think we were too little at the time we started making commercials to know if we really wanted to work or not. We just did it because our mother was in it."

If there's an aura of glamour connected with being a television personality, Judy has yet to discover it. "I don't think it's any big deal being on television," she maintains. "I don't walk around saying, 'Yes, dahling, it's me, Lisa from The Secret Storm. Get out your pen and paper and I'll give you my autograph." Needless to say, she cringes with embarrassment if fans recognize her when she's out rollerskating or bicycling with neighborhood chums in Central Park. Judy simply can't understand what all the fuss is about. Ask her if her friends get a kick out of watching her on television, and she looks at you in total amazement, chiding, "Why would they watch me on television, when they can see me in real life whenever they want to."

Few actors ever learn to be philosophical about not getting a job, but Judy's delightful sense of perspective has always saved her from rejectionitis. "I don't get nervous when I go to auditions," she says. "I'm just natural, and if I don't get the part, I'm never upset, because I tell myself I wasn't the right type, that's all.

For now, anyway, acting is important to her. "I got really bored during those five months between being written off Love Is A Many Splendored Thing (Judy played the mentally disturbed Maria - brilliantly) and going on The Secret Storm. I couldn't wait to get back to work."

Her all-time happiest memory, in fact, is of touring in Fiddler On The Roof all around the United States for a year along with sis Kerri, who like Judy, played one of Tevye's daughters, their mom, who acted as the company wardrobe mistress, and their dad, who took a leave from his stockbrokers job and sold programs in the lobby just before show time. If things could always be a family affair like that, Judy would remain an actress forever.

MIKE HAMMETT: Mike, the 15-year-old lad who plays Dennis Carrington on NBC's Another World, has been an actor for the past eight years and always intends to remain an actor for one very simple reason: "It's fun for me to step outside myself and pretend I'm someone else." Mike had a few footsteps to follow in when he decided to make show business his career: his dad Gordon is an actor and announcer, his mom was a band singer before she retired to raise a family, and his 19-year-old sister, Suzie, is an actress and singer. Only Mike's brother, Chris, who's 13 and a baseball freak, shows now show business inclinations.

Chris did decide to take a stab at it once, after being encouraged to do so one day when he had tagged along with his dad on a job. But when he went to his first audition, for a television commercial, Mike happened to tag along for the fun of it and it was Mike who ended up catching the producer's eye and landing the job. "I don't think I ever would have gone into show business if it hadn't been for that," says Mike.

Mike admits that there are times when he'd rather goof off with the guys and go swimming and horseback riding than go to work, but not too often. Thanks to the understanding and intelligence of his folks, Mike not only thinks he's a pretty lucky kid to be allowed to work, but he knows he's free not to work if that's what he wants. "It's not like I'm working to help the family pay the bills," he explains. "I'm acting just because I love to do it. My parents like to tell me that working at my acting career is a privilege, not a job, and as long as I keep my grades up I can continue to take advantage of that privilege. But they also remind me now and then that if I ever decide to quit, I should feel absolutely free to leave the business.

Mike recently added a feature length film, The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler to an already respectable credit list which includes a slew of commercials, appearances on The Garry Moore Show and Where The Heart Is, plus his current role, which he's been doing for the past year. What do the guys in the neighborhood think of all this? "They're cool. Friends who've known me all my life don't tease me or anything. Sometimes they'll watch the soap just as a goof, but usually my acting career never comes up. It's the people who don't know me personally but see me around in the neighborhood who get all excited. Now that I'm on Another World I even get phone calls from girls I haven't seen since the sixth grade. The really funny thing about that is some of them didn't like me back in six grade and I didn't like them either."

ELISSA LEEDS: Elissa, who has been portraying Hope Bauer on CBS' The Guiding Light for the past five years, was all of 15 months old when a television commercial producer spotted her shopping with her mom at a New York department store, Presto, Elissa became an actress. Perhaps because Elissa didn't have anything to say about that development, her mom and dad (she's a housewife and he's president of a wholesale lumber company) to this day periodically sit their beautiful and charming daughter down and ask, "Are you sure you want to be doing this?" Elissa always reassures them there's nothing to the world she could be more certain about. "I definitely want to continue my acting career," she says firmly. "I never think about quitting or eventually doing something else. In fact, I'd like to do more acting right now. IF a good stage part came up, I'd grab it. Doing the soap and a play wouldn't be any problem."

That might mean less time to devote to her very special hobbies, not to mention schoolwork. But Elissa will cross that bridge if and when she comes to it. For now, anyway, she gets excellent grades at the private school she attends in Manhattan, and she's an accomplished photographer who does her own printing and developing, she designs and makes gold and silver jewelry, and she writes short stories.

As anyone who watches television at all knows, Elissa manages to find time in her bus schedule to make lots of commercials. Thanks - or not thanks - to them, as well as the Hope Bauer role, it's almost impossible for Elissa to poke her head outside the door without being recognized. "Basically, I'd say I like being recognized," she says, "but sometimes it gets embarrassing. Like when I'm with my friends, most of whom aren't in show business. They've always regarded me as just one of the gang, but when I'm recognized they tend to get just as excited as the person who's recognized me. Like if someone says they've seen me in a particular commercial, my friends will start saying things like, 'Hey, did you know she's also on a soap opera,' or, 'Hey, have you seen all her other commercials'l then they'll mention the ones I have running. I die when they do that."

- LINDA ROSENBAUM

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In my opinion, Matthew Anton was the best child actor who appeared on any of the soap operas at any time.