Jake Lloyd’s mother says young Anakin didn’t quit acting over Star Wars

Over the last 25 years, it was widely assumed that securing the role of Young Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace was more a curse than a blessing. Selected from more than 3,000 other young actors, Lloyd disappeared from Hollywood shortly after his big break. Aside from voicing Anakin in a couple of video games, Lloyd hasn’t acted since 2001’s Madison.

Much of this was attributed to the backlash against Episode I. As hard as it might be to believe now, with weekly airings of the Star Wars prequels on TNT normalizing and canonizing the once-despised trilogy, The Phantom Menace and, especially, Lloyd’s performance, were heavily criticized in 1999. Nowadays, with Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker taking its rightful place as the worst entry in the series, people are much, much kinder to George Lucas’ children’s film about trade disputes and the decades-long work of installing a dictatorship. But not before taking their rage out on actors, an age-old tradition Star Wars fans continue to this day. Many assumed that Lloyd left acting due to the backlash to Phantom Menace. His mother tells a different story.

Speaking to Scripps News, Lloyd’s mother, Lisa, said that his troubles “would have happened anyway” because she and his psychiatrist believe his schizophrenia was “genetic” and he was “going to become schizophrenic.” Lloyd’s mother said that she “protected him” from the backlash, insisting “he didn’t know” or “care.” While everyone was making “such a big deal” about the response to the film, “Jake was a little kid when that came out, and he didn’t really feel all that stuff because I didn’t let him online.”

In the past, Lloyd has described his post-Star Wars life as “a living hell” and that he entered “early retirement” because he was hounded for “up to 60 interviews a day” and was bullied by schoolmates who made “the sound of the light saber every time they saw me,” which seems really annoying. He ultimately destroyed his memorabilia.

However, Lisa refutes the idea that he quit because of Star Wars. In fact, she insists “it didn’t have anything to do with” the film but rather the concurrent family crisis, including an “unsettled” and “kind of rough” divorce. Around this time, she says, Jake “didn’t seem to be having a lot of fun auditioning anymore.” Still, she recalls that he “loved” and “had so much fun” making Star Wars.

Lloyd’s troubles were much more psychological. Throughout the 2000s, Lloyd suffered from numerous episodes starting with trouble in school. Things soon got worse. In 2007, her son began reporting he saw people with “black eyes” staring at him on the street and began hearing voices, carrying on conversations with Jon Stewart while watching The Daily Show. His post-struggles continued in the 2010s. He allegedly assaulted his mother in 2015 and was later arrested for reckless driving, driving without a license, and resisting arrest. The following year, Lisa made his diagnosis public. More recently, he caused a traffic jam by stopping his car in the middle lane of a highway. When the police arrived, she says, “He was talking to them, but none of it made sense. It was all word salad.”

Throughout this time, Lloyd’s mother, who refused to press charges, repeatedly explained that her son had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. He was held for nearly a year in a South Carolina prison before being transferred to a psychiatric facility for treatment.

Lloyd is currently 10 months into an 18-month stay at a mental health facility, where he is “doing much better” than expected. He recently watched and “really loved” Wonka and even gave Star Wars another shot. He’s been watching Ahsoka on Disney+ and received an action figure of the character for his birthday.

“He loves all the new Star Wars stuff,” she says. “People think Jake hates Star Wars. He loves it.”