For many child stars, the road to 'adulthood' often includes sexuality. Although Miley Cyrus may be the most extreme example of this, many Disney Channel alumni such as Zac Efron,Vanessa Hudgens, and Selena Gomez have also followed this path.
David Henrie, who played Justin Russo alongside Gomez on "Wizards of Waverly Place" and made his name as Larry on That’s So Raven, among other roles, is bucking the trend.
Recently the filmmaker of the new short "Catch," Henrie told The Christian Post last week that maturing in Hollywood did not imply that child and teen actors hoping to reshape their careers had to go to extreme lengths to alienate former fans.
"I think everyone as they transition out of a younger show wants to transition into a career of acting unless you didn't like acting and you don't want to do that anymore," explained Henrie. "You have to transition out of it and that comes with doing older, more mature roles, but that doesn't mean doing crazy things that just insult your audience. Your audience has to grow with you."
Henrie, 24, said that he had chosen to advance his career through selecting "good roles" and is currently filming a sequel to Mallcop and will be starring alongside Emily Watson and Kevin James in the World War II-themed movie Little Boy, which will be released in October. It was during the latter through which Henrie discovered his latest passion — working behind the camera.
"[While working on Little Boy] I became very good friends with this filmmaker named Alonso Alvarez Barreda and he did a beautiful short film that I loved called Crescendo and I really admired it," said Henrie. "I sort of hounded him and said, 'You know, man, I really want to make a short film. I've wanted to do this since I was little.'"
Henrie, raised Catholic, also spoke about his faith. He described his childhood faith as 'lukewarm' and said that he and his family attended church roughly once a year growing up.
"Now that I'm older, I take it more seriously," he explained, adding that a primary motivation behind the growth of his faith was "his family in the future."
"I always knew that a man was someone who would stand by something and live by something and as I got older I wanted to figure out what that was," said Henrie.
Unlike many of his more reluctant peers, Henrie said that he actively looks forward to getting married and having children.
"I think our generation especially has a weird stigma towards families, like people aren't wanting to have families and aren't wanting to have kids," he said.
The actor/filmmaker said that he realized that pursuing a Hollywood career can at times be in conflict with one's ability to prioritize their family.
"I get bummed out a lot of times with my peers because a lot of actors are running away from their families to come out here and act. They don't have the support of their families with comes with its own set of problems. If you're running away from something to pursue something else you better be a really tough cookie. You really better have a good head on your shoulders and strong moral fiber otherwise you're leaving structure to pursue something that's not structure and you're just letting your emotions take you wherever you want and if you're just living life by your emotions, you're going to blow with the wind," said Henrie.
Henrie critiqued his fellow Millennials as "the YOLO generation."
"'You only live once.' 'Do whatever you want.' 'Let your feelings guide you.' That's the worst advice ever! Let your feelings guide you - that's terrible. My feelings make me want to do crazy things all the time but no, you do what's right," he concluded.
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