I was a huge 90s child star in a £100million movie – but I quit Hollywood and got a job as a ‘fact checker’
SHE may have been in one of 90s biggest Hollywood rom-coms, but My Girl actress Anna Chlumsky ended up quitting fame for a VERY different job.
Anna, who was just 11 at the time, caused fans to shed a tear when her My Girl character Vada broke down at the funeral of her young on-screen love, played by Macaulay Culkin.
It shot Anna to stardom and marked her first ever major motion picture, grossing nearly £100million.
After appearing in the 1994 sequel, Chlumsky went on to star in Blood Car, In the Loop, and Veep.
But the actress, now 42, decided to step away from the limelight and quit acting to head to college.
She told PEOPLE: “As a kid, you’re just along for the ride, but it can be extremely damaging. [In college] I had this out-of-body moment where I realised, ‘I don’t have to do this anymore.'”
Anna decided to put her acting career on hold and attended the University of Chicago, where she graduated with a degree in International Studies in 2002.
She then landed a job as a fact-checker for the restaurant guide Zagat and then pursued a career as an editorial assistant for publisher HarperCollins.
Last year, Anna opened up about her “traumatic” experiences as a child star.
She told the Independent: “I was lucky because I didn’t have any other huge traumas at the time.
“I’m the baseline of [child stardom] going relatively well. Yet it was only as an adult that I discovered any sense of reliability or security. When I was a child those did not exist, because I was for sale.”
However, Anna admitted that she felt like something was missing and recalled how she started seeing “signs” telling her to return to acting.
“A lot of angels I was meeting, inspiring me to get back into show business,” she said.
The star had a chance meeting with singer Roberta Flack at a nail salon, who told her to “keep doing it”.
Returning to her acting roots, Anna started classes at the Atlantic Acting School and made cameo appearances on hit TV shows 30 Rock and Law & Order.
She was also nominated for an Emmy Award for her role in HBO comedy series Veep.
Last year, Netflix viewers were stunned to see the actress appear in Netflix drama mini-series, Inventing Anna, created and produced by Shonda Rhimes.
Anna played Vivian Kent, the journalist who uncovers Anna Delvey’s scams.
In Netflix’s Inventing Anna, a journalist investigates the case of Anna Delvey, the Instagram-infamous German heiress who stole the hearts of New York’s social scene – and stole their money as well.
Anna and the reporter form a dark, funny love-hate bond as Anna awaits trial and Vivian fights the clock to answer the biggest question in NYC: who is Anna Delvey?
The series is inspired by the New York Magazine article “How Anna Delvey Tricked New York’s Party People” by Jessica Pressler.
While working on Veep, Chlumsky received six Primetime Emmy Award nominations.
Other big stars in the Netflix hit include Ozark‘s Julia Garner as the titular character, Jennifer Esposito and Orange Is The New Black‘s Laverne Cox.