Child stardom was "traumatic" for Everybody Hates Chris star Tyler James Williams, too

Child stardom is a perennially hot topic, the subject of documentaries and books and furious debate. The question boils down to: Is it okay to make a kid work, particularly when that work might earn them an overwhelming and invasive amount of attention? The easy answer would be “no,” but of course, things are never that black and white. For Tyler James Williams, star of Abbott Elementary and former lead of Everybody Hates Chris, learning to carry a sitcom while growing up in front of the entire world was both “the most useful information I’ve ever gotten in my life” and “the weirdest shit in the world.”

His experience of child stardom was particularly loaded because it was happening at “the same time the internet was becoming more ingrained in the industry,” Williams tells GQ in a new profile. “So as I’m going through the most awkward years of my life, everyone sees it. I think my voice was cracking nonstop during seasons two and three. I was trying to find myself in front of everybody. And everybody had an opinion and was getting used to getting theirs out.”

Growing up like that was “traumatic”; he admits to getting “triggered by things that are part of everybody else’s childhood.” He shares that he’s been in therapy for years, in part to deal with his “hypervigilance,” he says, “because I would be listening to everyone’s conversation in a room. I could hear my name being brought up from two, three tables down. I could see how many people clocked me when I walked in the door. And that’s not healthy.”

Williams has since made the difficult transition from child star to grown-up performer, against all odds. He even recalls one of his Everybody Hates Chris producers joking that he’d probably never work again. But now he’s a beloved member of the celebrated cast of Abbott, and even earned a Golden Globe for his efforts. Plus, the student cast provides an opportunity for him to look out for a new generation of child stars. “Abbott, in general, has been therapeutic for me,” he tells the outlet. “I needed to know that I could influence it being done differently.”