Corey Haim, The Lost Boys

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Profession: Actor
Place/Date of Birth: Toronto, Canada , 23 December 2020

Whatever happened to.Corey Haim?
By Kavita Trivedi

He was the pin- up teen idol of the 1980s and had an army of strong fans. With his baby- faced boyish good looks, he was probably one of the fewest child stars to have such pulling power at a young age.

Canadian-born Corey has starred in a total of 35 films till date and started off his career by appearing in TV shows and commercials, until he broke into the film world at the age of 11. In 1985, he debuted in the film ’Firstborn’, which showcased his talent and soon had other offers pouring in.

Next gave an award-winning performance in ’A Time to Live’ where he played Liza Minelli’s dying son. This led to a role in the hit teen drama ’Lucas’ also starring Charlie Sheen and Winona Ryder. Other hits followed such as the teen comedy ’A Licence to Drive’ where he co-starred with Corey Feldman. The duo made a successful pairing and co-starred in a string of movies such as ’Busted’, ’ Dream a Little Dream’ and ’Blown Away’.

However, his most memorable film till date and my personal favourite, was Haim’s role as the cute and loveable Sam in director Joel Schumacher’s 1987 teen horror flick ’The Lost Boys’, which transformed the young actor into an overnight sensation.

However, things seemed to be going pear shaped when at the peak of his career, rumours about his so-called drug and alcohol addictions soon began to circulate. This resulted in Haim releasing a video Diary in 1990 entitled ’Me, Myself and I’ in a bid to salvage his clean- cut reputation, and has since been in and out of rehab.

The 1990s marked the start of his downfall when movies ’The Dream Machine’, ’Oh What a Night’ and ’Fast Getaway’ went straight to video. Corey was last seen in the 2000 thriller ’Without Malice’ but has not been seen in anything else since.

Not quite forgotton though - the music band The Thrills released a single in August 2004 entitled ’Whatever Happened to Corey Haim’ sparking a whirl of interest, and odd rumours that Corey had been last seen trying to get a job in his local McDonalds and / or selling teeth on auction site ebay to fund his drug habit - neither of which are proved, but make for interesting if rather sad reading.

Selling teeth regardless, Corey recently wrapped the 2004 film Groove Society, where he plays a character called Jim, a writer/director suffering from a writers block who tries to escape his career problems in an after hour club. This is currently in post production. Those rumour mills are also at work wondering if Corey would star in a sequel to The Lost Boys - although I’d like to see Keifer Sutherland and Jason Patric agree to a reunion (Keifer was engaged to Julia Roberts, who promptly ditched him for Jason Patric..)