Danny Lloyd began his acting career by appearing in one of the scariest movies ever, but he didn’t end up staying in Hollywood after The Shining. Despite Stephen King’s infamous dislike of Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation, The Shining remains a towering classic in the annals of horror history. So many aspects of it have become iconic in pop culture, from the Grady Twins, to the woman in room 237, to the man in the bear costume, to basically everything about Jack Nicholson‘s crazed performance as Jack Torrance.
It shouldn’t be discounted just how integral the character of Danny Torrance was to The Shining‘s success though. So much of the story centers on Danny’s psychic abilities that casting the wrong young actor in the role could’ve seriously damaged the audience’s ability to suspend their disbelief. Unfortunately, child actors are often cast based more on their perceived cuteness than actual acting ability, leading to many great films with child performances that are as wooden as a log cabin.
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Thankfully, Danny Lloyd proved to be perfect for the role of Danny Torrance, believably performing alongside veterans like Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, and Scatman Crothers. To see how the Danny Torrance role can go bad, one need only look at King’s The Shining miniseries remake, in which Danny was so annoying one almost began to root for Jack to give him the axe. Sadly, Lloyd didn’t utilize his acting talents for long.
What Happened to Danny Lloyd After The Shining
Danny Torrance was Danny Lloyd’s first-ever film role, and he was cast primarily due to his ability to concentrate for long periods, a thing one needs when working with the infamously perfectionist Stanley Kubrick. Amusingly, Kubrick did his best to shield Lloyd from the subject matter of The Shining, convincing the child it was a domestic drama. After The Shining, Lloyd’s second and final film role came in the NBC TV movie Will: G. Gordon Liddy, a biopic of the titular Watergate co-conspirator. Lloyd played Liddy as a child.
Following that role, Lloyd did continue to audition for parts, but didn’t meet with any real success, and he began to get bored of the routine. By his early teens, Lloyd told his parents he was done with acting, and they supported his decision. As an adult, Lloyd now works as a biology professor at a university in Kentucky, and is happily married with four children. His students occasionally realize who he is and tease him about The Shining, but for the most part, he lives a normal everyday life. Lloyd did agree to make a brief return to Hollywood in 2019, making a cameo in The Shining sequel movie Doctor Sleep at a kids’ baseball game.