“Hello? Anybody out there?” - Part One
by Paul Petersen

Lindsay, Paris, the “Kid Nation’s” cast of 40, and dozens of names folks outside the Industry don’t even know…yet…are simply the “2007 Poster Children” in this on-going battle the members of A Minor Consideration have been waging since our beginnings in 1990 when Rusty Hamer’s suicide was announced (January 19th 1990).

Hello! Anybody out there?

With apologies to those who actually “get it,” let me run this down again…by the numbers…so that the connections between Cause and Effect, Then and Now, Fame and Failure, Children and Parents are perfectly clear.

Parents are not perfect. The choices they make throughout a child’s life have consequences. The first measure of a Stage Parent worthy of the title is whether or not they have actually brought a talented child to the dance. Your child is either a world-class performer capable of winning competitive auditions at the professional level or they are not. Raising and training this sort of talent has its own challenges. Recognizing your child’s special abilities and preparing them to display their wares is just the first part of a stage-parent’s burden. Assuming the child hasn’t been permanently damaged by mindless pursuits like beauty pageants and over-emphasized pre-teen sports you can be sure that by the Fourth Grade the talented child will be recognized by his or her peers. This is where The Pecking Order really means something. You would be amazed how many potential state parents totally ignore this phase of artistic development, insisting against long, long odds that their child has “the gift” without a scintilla of demonstrable proof. If your kid isn’t the big fish in your pond, forget about trying for success in the ocean of professional endeavors.

“The definition of insanity,” says Melissa Gilbert, “is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

That is handy reference point. Each year thousands of youngsters are brought to Hollywood by parents with stars in their eyes…or by Managers looking for a piece of the action…kids who for all their charm simply don’t have a chance at professional success. Not a chance.

You can say what you will about the parents of Lindsay or Britney or Dakota or for that matter Hannah Montana’s Miley Cyrus (and I’ve said plenty), but here’s the deal, my friends. They ARE in the game. Their parents have been proved Right, for better or worse, at least when it comes to their judgment about “talent.” This same thing can only be said for the parents of all of today’s steadily working young celebrities. The proof is in the visibility and earning power of their kids. Here’s a tip: Unless you have walked in these shoes you simply don’t understand the path…and listening to the shallow advice of today’s stage parents whose own children haven’t achieved success is the surest path to disappointment and failure.

There is a mind-numbing excess of advice on the Internet offered up by today’s stage parents. If their kids were actually working they wouldn’t have time for the Internet. They’d be too busy with the real issues of work calls, educational demands, dealing with agents and managers, and a thousand and one other things that occupy a stage parent with a child who is gainfully employed.

The 2nd critical function of a stage parent worth the title is how well they have prepared their child for what comes after the work goes away. We’ll deal with this 2nd aspect of competent stage parenting in the next essay. Remember the Math; the longest a child can have a career as a young performer is 17 years. These days adulthood might last sixty or seventy years. As Parents, I ask you, is our task to raise a successful child, or a child who will become a successful adult?

Thirty years ago I wrote a book in which the following quote has been widely circulated. Since we are re-stating the obvious here in 2007, allow me to repeat it:

“Parents of a child star are like rabbits on a night-time highway. Bright lights blind them.”