Jared Rushton is good at making the wisecracking friend seem like someone worth having around. His natural delivery suits the gentle comedy of Big and the shared dangers of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, without demanding extra attention.
Fi1m perspective
In Big (1988), Jared Rushton’s Billy is the best friend beside Tom Hanks’s uncertain child, and his easy delivery matters to the comedy. A knowing young sidekick can become tiresome quickly; Rushton’s timing keeps the part companionable. We warmed to him because the friendship feels unforced, even within the film’s fantasy. Penny Marshall’s gentle handling helps: the performance belongs in a film where the jokes leave room for a child to be unsure of himself.
His first major film part was Charlie Proffitt in Garry Marshall’s Overboard (1987). Supporting roles in Lady in White (1988) and Big followed, before Joe Johnston’s Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989). That short late-1980s run established the familiar Rushton part: the loyal, streetwise boy alongside the lead. The appeal is easy to understand: he supplies a bit of cheek without making the boy seem rehearsed by an adult.
In Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, his Ronald Thompson has to move between jokes and danger as part of the young ensemble. Rushton handles that mixture well, helping the children carry Johnston’s brisk garden adventure. Some of the adult performances push their jokes too hard, which makes Rushton’s natural delivery especially welcome. Rick Moranis helps keep the family comedy appealing, but Rushton’s contribution matters to the adventure. The part needs more than a supply of wisecracks, and he adjusts without making a fuss.
The lead in A Cry in the Wild (1990), a wilderness survival film, took him beyond the best-friend role, while Pet Sematary II (1992) cast him as a school bully. His reputation remains tied chiefly to the earlier work. That gives us a fairly narrow basis for judging him, and we would not pretend otherwise. Start with Big, though its sweetness sometimes makes adult life look too easily dismissed.
Biography
Jared Rushton is an American former actor, also credited as Jared Michael Rushton. He is best known for his roles in late-1980s films including Big (1988), in which he played Billy, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989) as Ron Thompson, and Overboard (1987) as Charlie Proffitt.
Rushton began acting at the age of twelve in an episode of Tales from the Darkside and went on to appear in Lady in White (1988), Pet Sematary II (1992), A Cry in the Wild (1990) and television series such as Roseanne, ER, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman and Murder, She Wrote. He received two Saturn Award nominations and two Young Artist Award nominations. He retired from acting around 2000 and has since worked as a musician.
