Actors who are briefly all over and then they aren’t

Debralee Scott.

I totally remember Tamu. I think she was in People magazine after winning some kind of pageant saying “You don’t have to be a model-type to win!”

Thread Closed

Elliot Page

Taylor Kitsch

Tia and Tamara Mowry

This often happens with child actors--they're in everything, and then they disappear:

Pamelyn Ferdin

Moosie Dreier

Ike Eisenmann

Shia LaBeouf

Richard Kind

Brenda Vaccaro

Then there was some homely redhead named Judith Cohen who was in one episode of GOOD TIMES and sang a really dramatic “Be a Clown/Send in the Clowns” medley and you have a sense that they were trying to make her be a huge star … and she never appeared in anything again.

Judith Cohen was a regular on the NYC cabaret circuit in the 70's. One appearance on a Norman Lear sitcom, and poof, she was gone. She was quirky and eccentric in the piano bars, with many fans.

I still get mixed up with Tamu and Ta-Tanisha! Ta-Tanisha was Room 222; Tamu was never on the show.

Matt Keeslar

Matt Keeslar is now a physician's assistant and an instructor of urology in Portland, OR.

I remember reading Judy Cohen was working for the Lear’s as a cleaning lady and Frances Lear took an interest in her.

She looked like a girl mason reese.

Robbie Rist

Rodney Allen Rippy

Tina Andrews falls into OP's category. She was on every other 70s show--Good Times, Police Story, Streets of San Francisco, etc; plus films like Conrack.

I always liked her in a way I didn't always love Tamu.

Armie Hammer, selling timeshares

Pamelyn Ferdin was actually a child star who was around for a long time and worked a lot, especially throughout the 1960s into the mid ‘70s, across commercials, print ads, film and especially of course in TV guesting on almost every iconic sitcom and even a regular in the last network “Lassie” iteration and on Saturday morning kids’ programming. I think she is an animal activist now and has probably done pretty well by this point with savings. I believe she’s writing a bio, and that her manager mom really worked that kid hard.

Heshimu was one of the main actors in Room 222, then he disappeared.

Pamelyn Ferdin was a chillingly good little actress in The Beguiled, an underrated '70s film.

Cousin Oliver for reasons well known to him.

Lance Kerwin (rip) and Karen Valentine

I don’t understand the question, and I refuse to answer it.

I get Pamelyn Ferdin confused with Lisa Gerritsen.

Jean-Claude Van Damme

Sooner or later: Pedro Pascal

Kathie Browne

Loni Anderson?

[quote]Sooner or later: Pedro Pascal

That makes no sense. He's been all over for several years now. and he's starring in Fantastic Four, which is being released this summer. He's got big projects into 2027. It's already not "briefly," and if it's later as you suggest, he'll have had a long successful run.

Richard Kind?

Seriously? The man is still everywhere -- over 15 shows in just the last 2 years. He's probably the most well-liked guy in Hollywood.

I think Debralee got sick and died young.

Quinn Cummings

Hilary Skank

Actors on one hit series after which, they disappeared. Does not meet OP's criteria.

Cathy Silvers

Cathy Lee Crosby

I’m having a senior moment with r3. I know I know who that is but can’t remember the name.

James Franco.

Adrian Zmed

After I saw him in Moonlight, I expected Trevante Rhodes to do a lot more work, but he sort of disappeared. He was in Bird Box with Sandra Bullock and he did a recycled Predator movie and those are the only things I've seen.

Rebel Wilson isn’t as visible as she was.

R15- Bruce Villanch looks like a gay version of Mason Reece. His name should be GAYson Reece.

R42 Literally and figuratively. Does anyone really know who she is?

Stephen Dorff

Fairuza Balk

Tamu was an asst. director all the way through the 90s.

OP, I remember Tamu from a 1975 episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. She played the little sister that Sue Ann was mentoring.

A pre-One Day at a Time Mackenzie Phillips played the little sister that Mary mentored.

#r17 - “Mine’s BLACK!!”

With apologies to Pamelyn Ferdin and Lisa Gerritsen, we could only keep one marginally attractive child actress from the 70s-80s, and we decided on Helen Hunt.

Scott Jacoby

Lee Montgomery

I would have said Kristy McNicol was the new pamelyn and Lisa.

Pamelyn Ferdin was a generation before Helen.

Gretchen Mol

Julianna Margulies

Joe Pesci

Meg Ryan

Ron Eldard

Richard Kind, R9, has continued to have a solid career.

Clive Owen

r35 Learn to. Write, in, complete. Sentences.

r51 You would have? Why didn't you?

Bridget Fonda

Mary Stuart Masterson

Mena Suvari

Brad Dourif

Jami Gertz?

Meeno Peluce

Matthew Labyorteaux

Chris Klein

Freddie Prinze Jr

Shannyn Sossamon

Seann William Scott

And he was good...

r65 seek help

R66 get laid gran

Mysterious Skin was a tour de force performance by JGL as I told him.

Seems once he got married his bad boy brand collapsed.

Siam Barbara Allen

Josh Hutcherson

Jennifer Lawrence

I've always gotten Pamlyn Ferdin mixed up with Pamela Franklin. The names look almost identical.

Shaun Cassidy

I love Tamu! Such great bargains!

The English kid who played The Artful Dodger in the musical Oliver. Extreme fame. Extreme alcoholism . Dead. RIP

I loved Pamlyn Ferdin as a kid . The Beguiled was indeed an underrated movie !

The cast of the Poltergeist OWNS this thread.

A little off-topic ... I've posted this elsewhere but I've become addicted to the Robert's Retro Rewind YouTube videos where he takes a TV season (from the '60s through the '90s) and shows intros and clips from every single "one-season wonder" show (i.e., they were cancelled after just one season -- often not even a full one.)

What's especially fascinating is all of the actors who I've never heard of (before or since.) And I'm old enough and trivial enough to know a lot about TV actors. I find it kind of depressing imaging their excitement about getting cast in a network TV series only to have it dumped ignominiously after six or ten episodes. And then they were never heard from again. One reason never to get into acting as a career.

R45

Steven Dorff had a guest role in The Righteous Gemstones but I didn’t recognize him at first.

Nancy Kwan

NBC had Ann Jillian everywhere for a while, then she more or less vanished

Crystal Bernard has vanished

Aaron Spelling worked Heather Locklear hard doing multiple series at one time plus guest shots

r76 Jack Wild - terrible demise

The elder guy from Lost. Can’t remember his name and don’t feel like googling. Terry something. Seems like he had a couple shows that flopped after Lost ended. One in particular, was some type of supernatural drama with Vanessa L Williams. Seemed intriguing, but I never got around to following it.

Kitty Winn

[quote] NBC had Ann Jillian everywhere for a while, then she more or less vanished

As did both of her tits.

Not an actress but more a presenter, Jillian Barberie. She was on TV consistently late 90s/early 2000s and then poof.

Jamie Smith Jackson, of Go Ask Alice. She appeared in numerous movies of the week in the ‘70s, married Michael Ontkean, and seemed to stop working. They divorced in 2019.

Laurette Spang. I first saw her in the ABC Movie-of-the-Week Short Walk to Daylight. She was Richie’s on-again, off-again girlfriend in Happy Days, then showed up as a different character in the Fonzie Jumps the Shark episode in LA. After that, Battlestar Galactica. She did some stuff with her husband, John McCook, then she disappeared in the early ‘80s.

Michael James Wixted, who played a lot of sensitive weird boys in various tv shows and movies in the ‘70s.

[quote] Jamie Smith Jackson, of Go Ask Alice. She appeared in numerous movies of the week in the ‘70s, married Michael Ontkean,

Good heavens what was that beautiful man thinking hooking up with that homely little mouse.

Kim Darby

Christopher Atkins

Joey Heatherton

Kathleen Beller

Laurie Prange

Nancy Allen

The hot guy from 16 Candles

Walton Goggins. Just everywhere.

Ah, yes, R47. I added that as my last line in my original post.

Hart Bochner

Riz Ahmed

William Katt

Leigh J. McCloskey.

Alice Playten

R97 Now he’s a philosopher into the occult. Worse than that, he named his children Brighton and Caytlyn! The horror!

Michael Parks.

Mischa Barton

Sasha Mitchell

Lorne Dean, Costas Mandylor, Ivan Sergei, Amanda Peet

Karen Cellini.

Paz de la Huerta (I miss her.)

Karen Lynn Gorney.

Horst Buchholz