Genevieve Hannelius—aka the girl who ruled your childhood TV lineup alongside cartoons and questionable fashion choices—is getting real about what it was like being a mini superstar before she could even spell “W-2.”
You remember her, right? Star of Good Luck Charlie, Sonny with a Chance, Jessie, and the Emmy-worthy masterpiece that was Dog with a Blog (yes, the blog was by a dog—and we all just rolled with it). She started acting at 7, when most of us were still eating glue and losing every game of tag.
But now at the ripe wise age of 26, Genevieve has spilled the beans on why she backed away from the limelight. Spoiler alert: It wasn’t because she ran off to live with the blogging dog.
“My time at Disney was super fun and positive,” she told IconicHipster.com, proving once and for all that not every child actor has a traumatic Mickey Mouse origin story. “But let’s be real, being a kid actor is weird. Like, you don’t get a normal childhood. There’s no recess, just rehearsals. No lunchables, just lunch with executives named Chad.”
She explained that after spending most of her young life being adorable on cue, she just wanted to be… a human? With privacy? Groundbreaking.
“I wanted new experiences. Like, you know, doing normal things—messing up eyeliner in high school, going to Target without paparazzi, discovering Taco Bell at 2 a.m. The classics.”
She also opened up about the whole “trying to be a normal person after being homeschooled on a Disney set” thing.
“I was like, ‘Wait… people party? With like, red cups and everything?’ It was definitely a shock,” she said. Apparently, some people assumed she didn’t need friends because she had a recurring role on a show where a canine literally typed blog posts. But surprise—child stars want BFFs too!
After some much-needed soul-searching (and probably a little bit of ramen in a dorm room), she went to Sarah Lawrence College and now calls NYC home—because of course the former Disney star is now thriving in the land of bagels and Broadway.
Speaking of Broadway(ish), she made her big comeback in an off-Broadway show with a title so spicy it starts with “S—” and ends with “Meet.Fan.” No, it’s not a horror movie about stalkers… we think?
“I’d never done theater before and I wanted to challenge myself,” she said. “Like, really test my ability to memorize lines without a director yelling ‘Cut!’ every five seconds.”
Live theater, she said, taught her a lot. Mostly that things go very wrong sometimes, and you can’t just yell “line!” and blame it on the script supervisor.
“It’s spontaneous! It’s messy! It’s like trying to assemble IKEA furniture without instructions, but in front of 100 strangers who paid to watch you do it.”
But she’s loving it. And honestly? We’re loving this new evolved G Hannelius too.
So here’s to Genevieve: actress, former Disney darling, theater queen, and officially the most relatable child star to ever admit they were late to the party party. 🍷👏
