Can you believe that it has been a quarter century since four young chums walked along train tracks in Oregon looking for a dead body? The Stand By Me 25th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray arrives in stores today, so you may want to brush up on what the film’s cast members have been doing since they created this timeless gem. We’ll catch you up, after the jump.
Wil Wheaton – Gordie LaChance
Following his heartwarming turn as Gordie, Wheaton played bright, young Wesley Crusher for four seasons on Star Trek: The Next Generation. Among some circles (nerdy circles), he’s best known for that role, one he has embraced by making regular appearances at Comic-Con. In 1991, he was part of a young ensemble cast in Toy Soldiers. He has since had numerous cameos on TV shows like Numb3rs and The Big Bang Theory, taken part in the occasional Web short, and done voice acting for animated TV and video games. And he has become a writer, just like Gordie — for two years he wrote a column about video games for The Onion, he has self-published several memoirs, and has been an active blogger for a decade, first at wilwheaton.net, and now at wilwheaton.typepad.com.
Corey Feldman – Teddy Duchamp
For ten years, starting with The Lost Boys in 1987, up until his directorial debut, Busted, Feldman co-starred in seven films with Corey Haim, plus their reality show, The Two Coreys, from 2007 to 2008. Haim died of a prescription drug overdose in 2010. Feldman battled drug addiction himself in the late ’80s and ’90s, but is now clean. For the past two decades, he’s starred in many straight-to-video films, including two sequels to The Lost Boys. He was on the first season of the reality show The Surreal Life in 2003, marrying his girlfriend Susie, a former Playboy model, in the season finale. The ceremony was presided over by both a rabbi and MC Hammer.
River Phoenix – Chris Chambers
One of the most charismatic and acclaimed young actors of his time for his work in such films as Running on Empty, My Own Private Idaho, and Dogfight, Phoenix died of a drug overdose outside The Viper Room in West Hollywood at the age of 23 on October 31, 1993.
Jerry O’Connell – Vern Tessio
Seven years after playing fat kid Vern, O’Connell shocked moviegoers with his newly-svelte figure in the 1993 Jason Priestly vehicle Calendar Girl. Soon after came a starring turn in the singing cockroach comedy Joe’s Apartment, a supporting role as a star football prospect in Jerry Maguire, and an excellent uncredited cameo in Can’t Hardly Wait as washed-up jock Trip McNeely. From 1995 to 2000, this poor man’s Brendan Fraser starred on Sliders, a poor man’s Quantum Leap. Nowadays, O’Connell is often seen shirtless in gossip magazines, strolling around LA with his dog or his superhot wife, actress/model Rebecca Romijn. He can also be seen on CBS’ The Defenders.
Richard Dreyfuss – Adult Gordie LaChance
Prior to his portrayal of Gordie as an adult author, Dreyfuss starred in quintessential ’70s flicks American Graffiti, Jaws, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and took home the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1977 (The Goodbye Girl). He was nominated for another Academy Award for Best Actor in 1995 (Mr. Holland’s Opus), and that same year became a real life author, co-writing an alternate history novel, The Two Georges. He portrayed Dick Cheney in Oliver Stone’s 2008 biopic of our country’s 43rd president, W., a film he would later bash on The View, saying he only did it for the money, calling Stone a fascist and adding that he doubts the film “will have any historical legs.” This past year was a busy one for the oft-mustachioed actor, with a recurring role on Showtime’s Weeds, along with parts in the geriatric action flick RED and, returning to his early success in man-eating fish films, Piranha 3D.
Marshall Bell – Mr. LaChance
Distant as Gordie’s father, Marshall Bell was memorable as George, a guy with a tiny mutant leader named Kuato attached to his belly in Total Recall, General Owen in Starship Troopers, and, two years ago, as the principal in Hamlet 2. He shared the screen with Jerry O’Connell on a 1999 episode of Sliders. He’ll be appearing in the upcoming adaptation of Hunter Thompsons’ novel The Rum Diary, starring Johnny Depp.
Frances Lee McCain – Mrs. LaChance
From 1984 to 1986, Frances Lee McCain had quite a run, with supporting roles in the classics Gremlins (as the Gremlin-killing mom), Footloose (Kevin Bacon’s aunt), Back to the Future (Lea Thompson’s mom), and of course Stand By Me (Gordie’s mom – and, save for a few extras, the only female in the film). She currently resides in the Bay Area, working primarily in regional theater.
John Cusack – Denny LaChance
Since his flashback cameo as Gordie’s deceased brother Denny, Cusack has been a standout in scores of classic films, including Eight Men Out, Say Anything…, Grosse Point Blank, The Thin Red Line, Being John Malkovich, High Fidelity, and Must Love Dogs. Why were you in Must Love Dogs, John Cusack?! He atoned for the blunder with last year’s entertaining Hot Tub Time Machine. He’ll be depicting Edgar Allan Poe in the upcoming The Raven, a fictionalized account of the writer’s final days. What most people don’t realize is, not only has Cusack done more films with Jeremy Piven and his sister Joan (10 each) than Corey Feldman has done with Corey Haim (9), he has also done six with Tim Robbins. Familiarity is the name of the game for this thespian.
Kiefer Sutherland – Ace Merrill
In the two and a half decades since playing sinister teen Ace Merrill, Sutherland has also spent time as a villain in The Lost Boys, A Few Good Men, the underrated Freeway, A Time To Kill, and Phone Booth. He also spent some time behind the lens, directing 1997’s Tarantino-influenced Truth or Consequences, N.M. and 2000’s Woman Wanted, which he quickly disowned. The following year he began an eight season run as Jack Bauer on Fox’s 24, winning a Best Actor Emmy in 2006.
Over the years, Sutherland has had numerous struggles with alcohol, being cited for two DUIs. In 1990, he met Julia Roberts on the set of Flatliners and left his wife for her. They soon became engaged, but three days before their wedding, she left him for his Lost Boys co-star Jason Patric. What did Sutherland do to deserve this? Read People‘s 1991 coverage of the story to find out.
Sutherland has lately been doing some voice acting, in the goofy Monsters vs. Aliens and the idiotic Marmaduke, and will be starring later this year in Lars Von Trier’s latest sadistic melodrama, Melancholia. Sutherland is currently in the midst of a Broadway run in That Championship Season, a play in which he and Jason Patric share the stage as brothers.
Andy Lindberg – Davie “Lardass” Hogan
Stand By Me is a story being written by Gordie as an adult, and within this story, young Gordie spins a yarn about Lardass Hogan, a fat kid in a pie-eating contest who projectile vomits all over his competitors. The protagonist of this story-within-the-story-within-the-story, Andy Lindberg has since pulled a Jerry O’Connell and dropped some pounds. He lives in Portland, Oregon, where he performs in local theater and as a guitarist/vocalist for pirate-themed rock band Captain Bogg and Salty. He is an ordained minister from the Universal Life Church of Modesto, California, and has officiated at 13 wedding ceremonies. He also has a Twitter account. “Peter Jackson has lost so much weight,” Lindberg observed not long ago, “but every time I see a picture of him I think, ‘I bet he still farts like a fat man.'”