Ron Howard knows a thing or two about the workings of Hollywood, having developed from a child star to an acclaimed director.
And it turns out that Ron’s experiences – dating back to the 1960s when he starred as Opie Taylor in The Andy Griffith Show at the age of six – helped him and his wife decide not to encourage their own children to to enter the acting world as a young person.
Because of this tough stance, the couple’s eldest child, Bryce Dallas Howard, now 43, got her screen start before she was 22, playing Rosalind in Shakespeare’s As You Like It (2003).
That role caught the attention of director M. Night Shyamalan, who later cast her as the blind girl in the period thriller The Village (2004).
“My parents were very adamant about not supporting anyone who wanted to be a child actor,” the Jurassic World star revealed to People.
Her famous father, who also became a big star in his twenties as Richie Cunningham on the hit ABC sitcom Happy Days (1974-1980), maintains that he wanted to protect his children from the dangers or early stardom.
Ron Howard, 70, recently revealed why he and his wife Cheryl forbid their four children, including Bryce Dallas Howard, 43, from acting as a child star; Bryce and Ron in the picture
“It’s possible for child artists to really find a lot that’s positive about it, but it’s full of landmines,” said Ron, 70, as he explained how to navigate the long and winding road of Hollywood at a young age.
The filmmaker, best known for Night Shift (1982), Splash (1984), Cocoon (1985), Willow (1988) and Parenthood (1989) in the early part of his career as a director and producer, was also motivated to to keep her children out of the limelight to avoid the inevitable comparisons.
“On top of everything else, because the characters I played as a kid were so well-known that they were almost iconic… I also thought, ‘Hey, if one of our kids tries to act as a kid, boy or girl, they will be unfairly compared,” he said in reference to his two hugely successful roles on The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days.
The Duncan, Oklahoma native went on to talk about the time and attention needed for parents to properly care for an aspiring child star.
He noted that his late father, Rance Howard, and his late mother, Jean Howard, were both actors who knew how much supervision they had to give their actor sons, Ron and his brother Clint Howard, on stage.
In fact, his mother ended up taking time off from her own acting career to support her son’s own Hollywood aspirations.
In retrospect, Bryce is now grateful that her parents encouraged her to explore other interests as a child, which she believes helped her gain the confidence to earn a paycheck in other ways in life.
‘I’m really glad they did because when I started acting it took a while to make a living,’ she explained, before adding: ‘To be able to be like, ‘Oh , Okay. I can actually support myself with this.”
Ron learned many lessons from his time as a young star on The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days that he and his wife refused to support their children as child actors; the proud father of four is seen with Bryce as a toddler
“My parents were very firm on the line that they wouldn’t support anyone who wanted to be a child actor,” Bryce revealed to People this week; seen with his father Ron
Ron Howard was six years old when he started his run on The Andy Griffith Show in 1960
Ron also found fame in his 20s playing Richie Cunningham on the hit ABC sitcom Happy Days (1974-1980); he is pictured with co-star Henry Winkler, who played The Fonz
Bryce has seen his star rise after appearing in The Village and appearing in other films such as Lady In The Water (2006), Spider-Man 3 (2007), Terminator Salvation (2009), The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010) , Hereafter (2010), The Help (2011) and 50/50 (2011).
But it was her role as Claire Dearing in Jurassic World (2015) alongside Chris Pratt that helped seal her status as an A-list leading lady.
She and Pratt would reprise their respective roles in the sequels Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) and Jurassic World Dominion (2022).
In his latest film, Howard stars in the spy-action comedy Argylle, which stars Sam Rockwell, Bryan Cranston, Catherine O’Hara, Henry Cavill, Sofia Boutella, Dua Lipa, Ariana DeBose, John Cena and Samuel L. Jackson .
Bryce has since started her own family after marrying Seth Gabel in June 2006 after five years of dating. They are now the proud parents of their own two children.
After waiting until her twenties to start acting professionally, Bryce got her A-list breakthrough in Jurassic World (2015) alongside Chris Pratt
After meeting at New York University, the actress dated Seth Gabel for five years before marrying in June 2006; they have since welcomed a son and a daughter aged 16 and 11 respectively
Along with Bryce, Ron and Cheyrl Howard are also parents to son Reed, 36, and twin daughters Paige and Jocelyn, 39
Their father has been hard at work in recent months directing the upcoming survival thriller Eden, which stars Ana de Armas, Vanessa Kirby, Sydney Sweeney, Jude Law, Daniel Brühl, Felix Kammerer, Toby Wallace, Richard Roxburgh, Paul Gleeson and Ignacio Gasparini in the main roles. .
The latter part of his career includes directing such hits as Apollo 13 (1995), How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000), A Beautiful Mind (2001), which earned him Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director, Cinderella (2005), The Da Vinci Code (2006), Angels & Demons (2009), abd Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018), among others.