{"id":601388,"date":"2026-08-22T17:30:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T17:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/601388\/"},"modified":"2026-08-22T17:30:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T17:30:13","slug":"anna-paquin-laments-sad-lives-of-female-child-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/601388\/","title":{"rendered":"Anna Paquin laments &#8216;sad lives&#8217; of female child stars"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Anna Paquin has said it is &#8220;not a coincidence so many former female child stars have profoundly sad lives and untimely ends&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Following the death of actress Hayden Panettiere, aged 36, this week, Paquin addressed the treatment of young actresses who have grown up in Hollywood.<\/p>\n<p>Sharing a post on Instagram, she wrote: &#8220;It&#8217;s not a coincidence that so many former, specifically pre-sexualized female, child &#8216;stars&#8217; have profoundly sad lives and untimely ends.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We were not as protected by the &#8216;systems&#8217; that look great on paper, (sic) as we are supposed to be.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>She added: &#8220;RIP HP (Hayden Panettiere), MT (Michelle Trachtenberg), DC (Daveigh Chase) and too many others. It&#8217;s a strange small club we belong to and you are worthy of support no matter how our industry made us feel.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Literally DM me. I believe you and I will stand by your side. You aren&#8217;t alone. Let&#8217;s have each other&#8217;s backs. It might make public disclosure less terrifying.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Posting in the comments, she later added: &#8220;Quick edit I&#8217;m speaking very specifically about the experience as a child on set that finds themselves prematurely a &#8216;sex object&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not implying damage is not done outside of the context of entertainment. But that is a longer post for a different moment. Also I used the women&#8217;s initials because I ran out of space. Nothing to be read into. Just logistics.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Former child star Mara Wilson, who appeared in Mrs Doubtfire, Miracle on 34th Street, and Matilda, commented: &#8220;Thank you so much for this.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Paquin, 44, rose to fame in The Piano, winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, aged 11.<\/p>\n<p>As a child actress, she also had roles in Fly Away Home, Jane Eyre, and Almost Famous.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Hayden Panettiere discusses Nashville with the Build Series at AOL HQ on 5, January, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Roy Rochlin\/FilmMagic)\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/0024daf7-614.jpg\"\/><br \/>\nThe death of Hayden Panettiere was announced earlier this week<\/p>\n<p>Sharing her own tribute to Panettiere, Rose McGowan also posted on Instagram: &#8220;Rest in Power Hayden Panettiere.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t put kids in show business,&#8221; McGowan continued. &#8220;None of this is normal.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>McGowan, 52, played Tatum Riley in the original 1996 Scream film before Panettiere starred as Kirby Reed in Scream 4 and Scream VI in 2011 and 2023.<\/p>\n<p>Panettiere made her first on-screen appearance in a toy commercial when she was 11 months old and went on to work as a child actor in films and shows including Remember the Titans, Ally McBeal, Raising Helen, Ice Princess, and Malcolm in the Middle.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;From a very young age, I lost the chance to have a normal childhood, friends, relationships and my privacy,&#8221; Panettiere wrote in her autobiography, This Is Me, which was published earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p>The actress also detailed in her memoir that she &#8220;suffered from body dysmorphia for years&#8221; after reading a headline about her &#8220;cellulite&#8221; as a teenager.<\/p>\n<p>She also recalled being given a &#8220;happy pill&#8221; by a former publicist when she was 16, describing it as &#8220;the gateway drug that ushered me toward the good of pharmaceuticals and the downfall of addiction&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>A statement from Panettiere&#8217;s representatives on Monday said the star will be remembered by her family as an &#8220;incredible light&#8221; who brought &#8220;immeasurable love and joy to all who knew her&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Police in South Carolina said the actress, who had struggled with addiction and her mental health, was found unresponsive and in cardiac arrest, and there were &#8220;no signs of foul play or suspicious circumstances&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Her death follows that of Chase \u2013 who died aged 35 in June \u2013 and Trachtenberg, who died aged 39 in February last year.<\/p>\n<p>Source: Press Association<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Anna Paquin has said it is &#8220;not a coincidence so many former female child stars have profoundly sad&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":601389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[93,61,60],"class_list":["post-601388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}