Growing Pains: Ashley Johnson on Nearly Being Kidnapped During Filming

Posted in: ABC, TV | Tagged: growing pains

Growing Pains: Ashley Johnson on Nearly Being Kidnapped During Filming

Ashley Johnson (Critical Role, The Last of Us) discusses the tragedy she averted: nearly being kidnapped while filming Growing Pains.

Published Tue, 14 Jul 2026 20:37:08 -0500
by Tom Chang
|
Comments

Article Summary

• Growing Pains star Ashley Johnson reveals a terrifying on-set incident where a man grabbed her during filming.
• Johnson says the scare happened early in her Growing Pains run, when cast members walked close to the studio audience.
• A threat had been sent in before the taping, and security stopped the armed man after he tried to run off with her.
• The Critical Role and The Last of Us star shares how the near kidnapping still stands out from her child-actor years.

Ashley Johnson has had a well-rounded career, making her on-screen debut on the ABC sitcom Growing Pains as the youngest Seaver child, Chrissy, in season six, and remaining through the final season from 1990 to 1992. While she racked up an impressive on-screen career, she unexpectedly elevated her profile behind the booth doing voiceovers. Among her animated and video game work, she came to be known for projects like Disney's Recess, Sony's animated series incarnation of Jumanji, DC's Teen Titans, Cartoon Network's Ben 10: Alien Force, Nickelodeon's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Cartoon Network's Infinity Train, Naughty Dog's The Last of Us (which she returned for the HBO live-action series playing her video game counterpart's mother of Bella Ramsey's Ellie in Anna Williams), Paramount+'s Among Us, and Critical Role universe of TV shows, which includes Prime Video shows The Legend of Vox Machina and The Mighty Nein. As she continues to proliferate in both worlds, it almost wasn't to be, as the former child star revealed her life was endangered by a fan on her podcast, Weird Kids, which she co-hosts with Taliesin Jaffe, on an incident that happened on the Warner Bros lot.

Growing Pains Star Ashley Johnson Reflects on Her Near Tragedy

Johnson reflected on the incident during a live taping of the series created by Neal Marlens. "It was in the first year I was on, and we had only done a couple of film nights," she said. "So, I hadn't done that many yet, and at that time, all of the cast sort of had trailers, and they were like old camper trailers. They're not like the fancy trailers that they are now. They were great. We would exit our trailers before the shoot, and the audience that would be walking in, you would walk by the audience before you would walk into the studio."

The actress said security wasn't as stringent as it is now, with metal detectors and other measures that are the standard today, saying the studio audience would be "within five feet" of the performers. "Somebody had written in and said that, 'I am coming to set and I am going to bring a gun and I am going to murder some of the cast,'" Johnson recalled. "So, I'm walking with my mom, and then I just remember some guy hops out of the line and he grabs me and grabs me up and starts booking it. And all I remember is like, there was security that somehow got on him after some time."

Security then apprehended the armed fan. "I was clueless as to what was happening, but I was very upset, and they were talking to me about it after. And they were like, 'Are you okay?' And I just said, 'I just think I'm gonna be in trouble,'" Johnson said, remembering how she was flung into the air during the scuffle. "Because I think I was such a polite kid at the time. I think he was running with me and running away. I was like, 'Who are you, sir? What is your name? I was very pleased to meet you.' But he was packing. They got him. This was the thing. He was high on something. It wasn't meth, but it was something — like, he was so strong." Johnson would reprise her role as Chrissy for the two Growing Pains reunion TV movies. For more, you can check out the full episode.

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!