Breaking into Hollywood isn’t easy. It takes talent, determination, persistence through years of rejections, and an it-factor that’s difficult to describe. Breaking into Hollywood as a child can be even more difficult since success relies much more on luck than talent. (After all, how talented can a one-year-old really be?)
Despite all this, there are some entire families that have taken Hollywood by storm and turned several members into mainstream stars.
The Baldwin brothers (Alec, Daniel, William, and Stephen) have all had varying levels of success. Will and Jada Pickett Smith, meanwhile, have had uber-successful careers and paved the way for their children Jayden and Willow to do the same (though the kids admittedly have a long way to go in that regard).
One of Hollywood’s most powerful families is without a doubt the Olsens. They’re stranglehold on American entertainment began way back in 1987 when Mary-Kate and Ashley landed the role of Michelle Tanner on Full House and continues today with younger sister Elizabeth playing one of the most powerful characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Scarlet Witch.
The family has been in the limelight for the better part of three decades and yet there are plenty of secrets the public don’t know about the famous children.
Here are the 20 Crazy Secrets About The Olsens' Childhood.
the twins missed their high school prom to host SNL
To say Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen had unique childhoods would be hilariously understating just how crazy their upbringings truly were. For proof of just how extraordinary their lives are, look no further than the fact that the twins missed their high school prom because they were hosting Saturday Night Live on the same night.
Throughout the history of prom, there have undoubtedly been millions of teenagers to miss the event for various reasons. It's a safe bet that the Olsen twins are the only two to miss out because they had to host one of the most popular television series of all time.
Mary-Kate and Ashley poked fun at their prom situation (as well as their distinct lives in general) during the show's opening monologue when Ashley said she was sad to miss out on prom because "we'll never know what it's like to ride in a limo, and wear fancy dresses, and have someone do our hair."
The joke came when Mary-Kate immediately pointed out that the twins do that every day.
Luckily, Mary-Kate had a few tricks up her sleeve and invited SNL actors Jimmy Fallon and Will Forte onto the stage to pose as the girls' prom dates.
The twins were treated to a full prom experience including a ride in a limo, awkward conversations with their dates, and a run-in with a drunk classmate in the form of SNL actress Maya Rudolph.
elizabeth refused to use her sisters' hollywood connections
"It's not what you know, it's who you know" is a phrase that has relevance in all walks of life but seems to be particularly true when discussing careers in show business.
All of the talent in the world will get you nowhere in Hollywood if you don't have any connections to further your career. Conversely, many of Hollywood's current stars rose to prominence not solely because of their talent, but because of some of their powerful connections within the industry.
Jayden Smith can thank his parents Will and Jada Pinkett Smith for launching his career when he was a child. As can Tori Spelling, whose career received a significant push in the '80s and '90s thanks in large part to her father Aaron Spelling, a Hollywood producer.
In an industry where nepotism runs rampant, no one would have blamed Elizabeth and Trent Olsen for using their sisters' connections and fame to further their own careers. However, they never did.
In her 2011 interview with Nylon Magazine, Elizabeth said, "I went through a phase when I first got into college where I was thinking if I don't get a manager or agent, I'll ask the girls [Mary-Kate and Ashley] to help me. I was OK with that idea, but I never needed it."
Of course, the connections were always there if Elizabeth ever wanted to use them, but it must feel good for her to know that she was never forced to ask her sisters for help.
16. their brother trent sold autographed pictures of the twins to classmates
Audiences around the world are familiar with Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, and have been for the better part of the last three decades. Their younger sister Elizabeth, meanwhile, has taken her place in the limelight much more recently following star-making performances in 2011’s Silent House and Martha Marcy May Marlene.
It can even be argued that Elizabeth has surpassed her sisters’ in terms of fame with her role as Wanda Maximoff (aka Scarlet Witch) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
What audiences may not know, however, is that Mary-Kate, Ashley, and Elizabeth have an older brother named James Trent Olsen. Trent was born in 1984 and dabbled with acting when he appeared alongside Mary-Kate and Ashley in several episodes of The Adventures of Mary-Kate & Ashley.
Trent has since moved on from acting and considers himself an entrepreneur, a title that he began to earn all the way back in grade school when he allegedly began selling autographed photos of his famous sisters to his classmates.
Considering just how insanely popular Mary-Kate and Ashley were at the time, it only makes sense that Trent would try and turn a profit off of his sisters’ fame-- and turn a profit he did.
On the topic of the photos, one anonymous classmate of Trent's told the New York Post back in 2014. “I definitely bought one. We all did!”
mary-kate said she wouldn't wish her upbringing on anyone
It's easy to look at the Olsen twins' upbringing, the money the sisters made, and the adoration that they received from millions of fans around the world and assume that their lives were nothing but sunshine and rainbows.
If you ask them about it, though, both girls will quickly point out that growing up the way they did was anything but easy.
Back in 2010, at the age of 24, Mary-Kate sat down with Marie Claire Magazine to discuss her childhood, ultimately comparing her and her sister to "little monkey performers" when they were children.
She also said that her sister and her busy schedules filled their friends with sympathy as opposed to envy.
One sentiment that seems to echo in each of the twins' interviews about their past is that the girls themselves seem conflicted by it.
Mary-Kate described this perfectly when she told Marie Claire, "I look at old photos of me, and I don't feel connected to them at all." She would go on to add, "I would never wish my upbringing on anyone... but I wouldn't take it back for the world."
That just about sums up the Olsens' childhood. It was incredibly unique-- though it was far from perfect and filled with peaks and valleys just like everyone else's.
13. they were millionaires by age 10
To truly appreciate just how insanely popular Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen were in the mid-'90s, look no further than their IMDb pages.
They starred in To Grandma's House We Go, Double, Double, Toil and Trouble, How the West Was Fun, and It Takes Two in 1992, 1993, 1994, and 1995, respectively, and launched The Adventures of Mary-Kate and Ashley in 1994.
Add to that their recurring roles on Full House (which ran from 1986 through 1995), Two of a Kind (1998-1999), and Mary-Kate and Ashley in Action! (2001-2002), and it’s clear that America just couldn’t get enough of the famous twosome.
However, that’s just the tip of the iceberg that was the Olsen media empire. Mary-Kate and Ashley had a stranglehold on the tween demographic (children ages 9 to 12), which meant that their faces appeared on all sorts of merchandise geared toward their fans.
This merchandise included board games, video games, toys, dolls, and make-up, all of which were incredibly profitable for the twins and their family.
Add to that their Full House pay, their movie salaries, and the profits from Dualstar Entertainment, and it’s no wonder the twins were millionaires by the time they were 10. From there, the Olsen fortune would continue to grow.
20. the twins are fraternal, not identical
If there’s one thing everyone knows about Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, it’s that the twins are identical-- because of course they are. Just one glance at the sisters standing side by side will prove this to be true-- except it isn’t.
As the twins have repeatedly said throughout their careers, they are in fact fraternal twins and not identical. The difference between fraternal and identical twins is how they develop in their mother’s womb. Fraternal twins each have their own placenta while inside the womb, whereas identical twins do not.
The differences don't end there, though.
Mary-Kate is one inch taller than Ashley and also has slightly wider eyes and thinner lips. Ashley, meanwhile, is the older twin by two minutes.
Ashley also claims that there was another physical trait that could be used to distinguish the two when they were younger: a small freckle on her upper lip.
Unfortunately, the freckle vanished as she aged, once again making it difficult to tell the two apart. Despite the physical similarities, the two swear that they didn't switch places when they were children to confuse parents or teachers.
In recent years, Mary-Kate has opted to dye her hair to allow friends to more easily tell the difference between the two.
9. Elizabeth almost quit acting because of her sisters' fame
Being a celebrity isn't easy. Now, that may seem like a ridiculous statement on its surface, but it is 100% true. Of course, there are plenty of perks that come with being a celebrity (like wealth, fame, the adoration of fans around the world, and plenty of opportunities to acquire more of the same), but there are plenty of drawbacks as well.
Also, the more fame a celebrity acquires, the more these drawbacks grow.
The Olsen twins have undoubtedly been in the upper echelon in terms of celebrity fame since they were children. Even now, years after either of them have appeared in a mainstream movie or television series, they still have two of the most recognizable faces in the world.
This prohibits them from engaging in activities that most people take for granted, like walking to the grocery store without a security guard at their side to keep them from being approached by fans.
Growing up, Elizabeth Olsen witnessed the havoc that her sisters' celebrity statuses wreaked on their lives and the fame almost made her give up acting entirely.
Back in 2011, the youngest Olsen told Nylon Magazine, "That was when the media was what I found to be abusive to my sisters, and I thought I really didn't want to be in the industry."
Obviously, she changed her mind, but no one would have faulted her for stepping away and not coming back.
19. the twins started acting when they were nine months old
Child actors begin their careers at all different ages. Haley Joel Osment was 11 when he gave his star-making performance in 1999’s The Sixth Sense. Macaulay Culkin was just five when he appeared in 1985’s The Midnight Hour (five years before Home Alone made him a global star).
Scarlett Johansson, meanwhile, got her first big break in 1994’s North when she was just nine. Needless to say, she has been a Hollywood mainstay ever since.
In terms of age, these three can't hold a candle to Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, who began their acting careers at the ripe age of nine months.
Fans of Full House will remember seeing the pint-sized actresses (or at least one of them, anyway) sitting in a car seat in the back of the family's car as it drove across the Golden Gate Bridge during the show's opening credits.
Even more impressive is the fact that the twins were cast in their role as Michelle Tanner a full three months before filming began, meaning that they were just six months old when they auditioned.
It's hard to tell for sure what the requirements of such an audition might be. Apparently, they were one of the only sets of twins to not cry in front of the show's producers.
18. the twins were credited as one person on full house
For those who may be unaware, there are several reasons why producers cast twins to play the role of a single character. The main reason is so that the show can abide by child labor laws, which limit the amount of time that a child actor can work.
Thus, when one twin has worked their allotted number of hours, the other can take over.
Using twins also has the added benefit of being able to swap one sibling for another when one simply isn’t in the mood to shoot. Unfortunately, babies don’t have the wherewithal to quit crying when it’s time to run a scene, so it makes sense to switch the twins out when one is behaving better than the other.
Most shows have no problem listing both twins in its credits. Full House, though, is an exception.
Fans of the show will remember during the opening credits that Michelle Tanner was listed as being played by “Mary-Kate Ashley Olsen,” whoever that is. It turns out that the producers didn’t want fans to know that the character was played by twins, so they merged the two twins' name sin the credits.
They wouldn’t change their tune until the show’s eighth (and final) season when Michelle was finally listed as being played by “Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen.” By then, the twins were mega-stars so there was no point in hiding the credit.
17. the twins wore dentures on the set of full house
Controlling continuity on major movie and television productions can be a difficult task. For proof of this, look no further than 2017’s Justice League. One of the biggest complaints that fans had coming out of the movie was the awful CGI used to remove Henry Cavill’s mustache.
To make a long story short, production on Justice League had wrapped when Cavill began shooting Mission: Impossible – Fallout, for which he grew a large mustache. Cavill was contractually obligated to keep his mustache throughout the filming of Fallout. Thus, when Justice League was re-shot, the mustache had to be removed in post-production.
Television show producers have to get a bit more creative when their actors undergo a physical transformation that doesn’t fit in with their character.
For example, when Kaley Cuoco broke her leg between seasons of The Big Bang Theory, her character was changed from a waitress to a bartender so that the cast on her leg could be hidden behind the bar.
The producers of Full House went through similar difficulties with continuity as Mary-Kate and Ashley grew up and lost their baby teeth at different times.
To overcome this issue, producers had the twins wear dentures while filming to ensure that Michelle’s smile didn’t change from scene to scene.
15. the twins became producers at age 6
The number of child stars who become hugely popular and make boatloads of money early on in their careers only to waste it all away within a few years is simply staggering.
For every Elijah Wood (who started acting at just 8-years-old and still does today at the age of 37), there’s a Corey Haim (who was a massive star in the 1980s before substances and alcohol torpedoed his career). For every Scarlett Johansson, there’s a Lindsay Lohan.
When Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen were just 6 years old, their parents took steps toward ensuring a successful future for the twins by forming Dualstar Entertainment Group, a production company that would produce many of the twins’ movies over the next few years.
Rather than hoping that the twins would continue to find work in the years to come, Dave and Jarnett Olsen put themselves in a position to create their own opportunities for their daughters.
Just like that, Mary-Kate and Ashley became producers at 6 years old. Dualstar Entertainment would go on to produce movies like To Grandmother's House We Go (1992), Double, Double, Toil and Trouble (1993), and How the West Was Fun (1995).
The company's last feature movie was 2004's New York Minute.
14. elizabeth made her acting debut in her sisters' movie
Elizabeth Olsen, the youngest of the original Olsen clan before their parents got divorced, first rose to prominence in 2011. That was the year she nabbed starring roles in Silent House and Martha Marcy May Marlene.
The former wasn’t very well received by critics, but Olsen’s performance was widely considered to be the highlight of the movie. The latter movie, however, was lauded by critics and Olsen saw her stock skyrocket as a result.
She followed that up with starring roles in 2013's Very Good Girls (opposite fellow child actor Dakota Fanning) and In Secret (alongside Oscar Isaac) before landing the role of Wanda Maximoff in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
She has since appeared in three additional Marvel Cinematic Universe movies and is set to be a large part of the blockbuster franchise going forward.
Silent House wasn't Elizabeth's first acting gig, though. She actually began her career way back in 1994 at the age of six when she appeared alongside her famous siblings in How the West Was Fun.
While Mary-Kate and Ashley got most of the screen time (because of course they did), Elizabeth does show up in a cameo role as "Girl in car."
It's safe to say that she's come a long way since then.
12. their parents divorced in 1996
History is full of child performers whose rapid rise to global superstardom was tragically followed by a quick descent into obscurity.
To this day, Lindsay Lohan remains one of the more famous examples of this type of career trajectory (having started acting at age 10, shot to superstardom by 17, and is unemployable today), but there have been plenty over the years.
Luckily, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen are not one of these tragic tales. Sure, they had their share of ups and downs over the years, but they didn’t have the same downfalls as child actors like Jake Lloyd or Edward Furlong.
Instead, it seems the two people who were most negatively affected by the twins fame and fortune were their parents, who divorced in 1995.
Details about the reason for Dave and Jarnett Olsen’s breakup are scarce, but what is known is that Dave eventually married his former secretary Mckenzie Taylor and had two children (Taylor and Jake).
There are also rumors that the divorce divided the twins as well. According to Star magazine, Mary-Kate went to her father’s wedding to Taylor, while Ashley stayed behind to spend time with their mother.
11. elizabeth took a break from acting at age 10
Acting is a thankless job. Sure, top-notch actors are well-compensated monetarily and also have millions of adoring fans across the world, but acting in general can be grueling work that involves lots of travel, long hours of filming, and countless hours spent promoting their work.
For proof of this, look no further than Dwayne Johnson, one of Hollywood’s most sought-after actors at the moment. When he isn’t filming one of his blockbuster hits, he is either promoting the last one or in pre-production on the next one.
For child actors, acting can be even more grueling work-- especially when you factor in the normal ups and downs of a child’s life.
In recent years, both Mary-Kate and Ashley have expressed differing levels of regret with regard to growing up in the spotlight. Elizabeth, meanwhile, took a break from acting when she was ten years old because she wanted to have a normal life.
According to Elizabeth, she took a small hiatus from acting because she “wanted to do my after-school sports and dance instead.
Considering the fact that she had a first-hand look at Mary-Kate and Ashley’s childhood and witnessed the social events that both twins missed on account of their busy schedules, it’s completely understandable that Elizabeth would want to take a few years to just be a kid.
10. the twins got their first clothing line at age 12
As mentioned above, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen were launched to superstardom very early on in their lives. They were cast in a major television show at six months old, had their own production company at six years old, and were millionaires by the time they turned ten.
Despite this decade of seemingly-unprecedented success, the most influential break of their careers wouldn’t come until two years later when they received their first clothing line at the age of twelve.
With the Olsen twins’ popularity at its peak, Wal-Mart released a Mary-Kate and Ashley clothing line designed for girls ages 4-14.
Since the girls had already become millionaires two years earlier, the money generated by the clothing line was secondary to the impact it had on the twins, as the two would go on to pursue their passion for fashion in the years to follow.
The twins were seen as the faces of upscale fashion line Badgley Mischka in 2006 before starting their own company (The Row) later that year. In 2007, they started Elizabeth and James, a line of contemporary fashion named after their siblings.
Both companies are doing extremely well and are a large part of the reason why the twins are worth an estimated $400 million today.
8. they were the first twins to receive a Walk of fame star
The Hollywood Walk of Fame was the brainchild of a man by the name of E.M. Stuart who served as the volunteer president of the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce in 1953.
According to Stuart, the Walk would be a means to "maintain the glory of a community whose name means glamour and excitement in the four corners of the world."
Since then, more than 2,600 stars have been added to the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the areas of motion pictures, television, recording, radio, and live performance. Motion picture actors currently comprise about one-third of the stars.
New stars are added to the Walk every year for performers of various ages and backgrounds. Both Zoe Saldana (39) and Mark Hamill (66), for example, received their stars in 2017.
Daniel Radcliffe is currently the youngest male actor to have a star at age 28. Scarlett Johansson, meanwhile, is the youngest female at the age of 33.
The Olsen twins currently hold two Walk of Fame records. They are the only twins to share a star, and they are also the youngest performers to ever be honored by the Walk.
Mary-Kate and Ashley were just 18-years-old when they received their star back in 2004, breaking the record set by singer Jimmy Boyd who was just 20-years-old when he received his star 40 years earlier.
7. elizabeth studied theater in Russia
Over the last six years, Elizabeth Olsen has established herself as one of the best young actors in Hollywood today. She first raised eyebrows in Silent House where she earned rave reviews from critics despite the movie's shortcomings overall.
She then followed that up with a stellar performance in Martha Marcy May Marlene, which earned her a boatload of awards including Best Actress from the Indiana Film Journalists Association, Best Breakout Star from the Florida Film Critics Circle Awards, and Most Promising Performer from the Chicago Film Critics Association.
Elizabeth credits these awards to the college courses she took at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and particularly to the semester that she spent studying at the Moscow Art Theatre School. Elizabeth described her experience in Russia in a 2017 interview with the Village Voice.
Elizabeth said her time in Moscow was "really physical."
She continued: "I don’t think there’s better theater in the world than in Russia. It was a nice abandonment of the work I was doing in New York in college. The semester I studied at the Moscow Art Theatre was much more about using your imagination. I thought a lot about theater in my life when I was there."
mary-kate developed an eating disorder and went to rehab
Mary-Kate and Ashley did exceptionally well as hosts of Saturday Night Live. There was one joke, however, that hit particularly close to home considering the events that would unfold just a few months after the show aired.
During one segment in which cast members posed as paparazzi snapping pictures of the famous duo, one paparazzo shouted, "Mary-Kate, you're so skinny-- eat a sandwich."
Unfortunately, Mary-Kate was noticeably skinny at the time and it was revealed in June of that year that she was dealing with an eating disorder.
The news came from Mary-Kate's representative, Michael Pagnotta, that she had been admitted to an undisclosed facility for treatment related to the eating disorder. At the time Pagnotta said, "This is a challenge that Mary-Kate has made a decision to face. This is a challenge she will meet.”
Mary-Kate has never officially commented on her alleged disorder. The closest she came was in 2008, when she was asked about it during an interview for Elle Magazine.
She told the publication, "Everybody is going to go through hard times. It’s a part of life. I think the hardest part to get to is that point of asking for help or reaching out to other people and being honest with yourself."
the twins have shared memories
Twin telepathy is a term coined years ago to describe the powerful connection between both fraternal and identical twins compared to the connection between regular siblings.
Twins are often able to finish each other's sentences with ease and even claim to think the same thoughts at the same time, though these occurrences likely have much more to do with their shared experiences than with any psychic phenomena.
What's fascinating about the Olsen twins, in particular, is not just that they have many shared memories (they did, after all, spend practically all of their time together working), but that they don't know which past events happened to which twin.
The twins elaborated on this fact in a 2011 interview with Vogue Magazine. Mary-Kate said, "Some of our memories are shared. We don’t know what actually happened to whom. One of us was stung by a bee, but we can’t remember who because we both felt it.”
The twins also have difficulty remembering who bought which items of clothing that hangs in their closets. When it comes to sorting clothes, Ashley told the magazine, "There’s hers, there’s mine. And a huge ‘maybe’ pile."
Considering the fact that the twins are essentially the same size, that must not be too big of a problem.
ashley compared her work schedule to being in the army
The twins have never been shy when it comes to discussing their unique upbringing. That must come naturally when you're thrust into the public's eye before you even manage to say your first words.
They don't limit their interviews to the happy moments of their childhood, though. Both twins have no problem discussing the unfortunate aspects of their past as well.
Ashley Olsen got pretty candid in a 2009 interview with Marie Claire Magazine when she was asked about the pressure that she and her sister faced growing up.
She said, "I look back at the things that we did and the clothes that we wore, and I think, 'Wow, we really were troupers.' It was almost like I was in the army. School, work, homework, fly to New York, get in at 2 in the morning, do a morning show at 5 am, then another one at 7, then a radio interview at 10, you know?"
Ashley would go on to say that she was grateful that she and her sister didn't crack under the pressure, citing Britney Spears' infamous public meltdown in 2008. "That's why I look at Britney, and I'm surprised I didn't end up like her," she said.
Considering the amount of scrutiny that the twins faced at such a young age, it's a small miracle that they didn't break down as well.
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Are there any other secrets that you know about the Olsens' childhood? Let us know in the comments!