12 Child Actors Who Stole the Show at the Oscars

The 1974 Oscars breakout star was a ten-year-old Tatum O’Neal, who starred in Paper Moon alongside her father Ryan—and managed to win the Best Supporting Actress prize for her turn as the sidekick of the con-man Bible salesman in the Depression-era story. Forty years later (and counting), she remains the youngest actor to ever win an Academy Award. She still acts in movies and television, but hasn’t made it back to the Oscars spotlight.

Foster was nominated for her supporting actress role in Martin Scorcese’s 1976 film Taxi Driver at the tender age of 14, where she controversially played the child prostitute Iris; child actors in Oscar-quality movies have often dealt with mature adult themes, despite their youth. Foster’s nomination foreshadowed a blockbuster career for the young veteran actor, who ultimately won Best Actress in 1988 for The Accused, and again in 1991 for The Silence of the Lambs.

Angelina Jolie was born into a Hollywood family, and hit her first Oscars red carpet when she was just ten years old as the guest of her thrice-nominated actor dad, Jon Voight. Even then she stood out in the crowd, thanks to a bold lace dress. In 2000, she’d return to the awards show to take home the prize for Best Actress for her turn in Girl, Interrupted.

Rookie actor Paquin snagged a supporting role win for her debut performance in The Piano in 1993 at the age of 11. She has gone on to act in a number of movies and TV shows, including X-Men and HBO’s popular series True Blood—although she hasn’t repeated her early Oscar success yet.

An 11-year-old Osment was a Best Actor nominee for his breakout role in the unforgettable The Sixth Sense, the M. Night Shyamalan vehicle that quickly became a supernatural horror classic. Although Osment has continued to act since then, his youthful part remains his sole Oscar nomination.

Keisha Castle-Hughes was just 12 years old when she was plucked from her New Zealand classroom to play the lead in Whale Rider, the 2003 movie about Maori heritage. She was ultimately nominated for Best Actress at the year’s Academy Awards. Most recently, Castle-Hughes appeared in TV hit Game of Thrones as fierce Dornish fighter Obara Sand.

The 2007 Oscars were a family outing for Will Smith, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and their then-7-year-old son Jaden. Father and son co-starred in that year’s critically-acclaimed movie The Pursuit of Happyness, and while Jaden wasn’t nominated, he did get the chance to present an award onstage alongside fellow child star Abigail Breslin. These days, the younger Smith is more often found in the fields of music, art, and activism than acting, though.

Everyone fell for the quirky charms of Little Miss Sunshine in 2007—and especially for a ten-year-old Abigail Breslin, whose mix of youthful confidence and insecurity as a wannabe child beauty pageant queen garnered her a Best Supporting Actress nod at the big awards show. Ten years later, Breslin is once again to set to star in a dancing role, this time in the Dirty Dancing remake.

Long before Ireland’s Saoirse Ronan nabbed an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in her role in the film adaptation of Brooklyn, the poised young star was noticed—and nominated—for carrying the early acts of Atonement, the sprawling war epic also starring Keira Knightley and James McAvoy. She was just 13 for her first go on the famous red carpet in 2008.

At nine, Quvenzhané Wallis was the youngest contender ever for the Best Actress prize, nominated for her performance as Hushpuppy in the magical-realist Hurricane Katrina tale Beasts of the Southern Wild. She was six when she made her movie debut in the indie that landed on favorite lists of everyone from President Obama to film critics. She followed it up with 2014’s Annie.

Room—the affecting movie about an imprisoned mother and her son, co-starring breakout duo Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay—produced plenty of Oscar buzz. It also brought into the spotlight the irrepressibly charming Tremblay, who lit up red carpets left and right at just nine years old.

And this year, all eyes are on Best Picture nominee Lion’s littlest star, Indian actor Sunny Pawar. At just 8 years of age, Pawar can count the heavy-hitter movie starring Nicole Kidman and Slumdog Millionaire‘s Dev Patel as his first. But if his red carpet charisma is any indicator, it won’t be his last.