While he has since been in many adult roles, many recall Jason Bateman in his role of James Cooper Ingalls on Little House on the Prairie.
On that note, Bateman recently opened up and made a surprise confession on being a child actor in the beloved series. Jason Bateman’s first acting role was playing James in Little House on the Prairie and reveals that, these days, he discourages child acting and has revealed why. Since then, he has enjoyed a decades-long acting career in many iconic series, including Arrested Development, Ozark, and more recently, Black Rabbit. Jason is also beloved for his role in Zootopia.
The music, jason bateman’s performance, the atmosphere, the words, EVERYTHING about this scene i love so much.. zootopia 2 was amazing.. pic.twitter.com/p9c0DZPLSe
— Cheezit 🇸🇻 #Z2Spoilers (@Cheezit2witter) December 11, 2025
However, he still recalls his first role in 1981 as James Cooper Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie and admits he discourages anyone getting into child acting. Clearly, child actors are a necessary thing, along with elderly actors, playing roles in their 80s and 90s. It’s all in the movie or show’s story.
As James, he plays a child adopted by the Ingalls family and he excelled in the role. However, in a new interview with Esquire, he explained that despite the success he has enjoyed in Hollywood as a child actor, he really wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. He admitted that even though he has thrived in acting, he still feels “like I’m trying to not be a child-actor failure.”
“Starting at the age of 10, I was teaching myself how to be a professional liar. How to convince people that I was something other than what I was thinking inside,” Bateman said.
“Number one, you teach yourself schizophrenia at an age when you should be allowing for all the clues and signals of who you are to come in,” he added. “You’re trying to figure out who you are at that age, not trying to develop believable other versions of yourself.”
“The other thing is you could be spending all those years training for an occupation where you can come out of college credentialed and say, I’ve got a base salary. I’ve got some job security,” Bateman said. “I feel like I can ask my girlfriend to marry me. I can provide. You don’t have that ever in this business.”
This isn’t the first time he has shared his thoughts on his role as a child actor. During September 2025, Jason Bateman shared that he was part of a “hazing ritual” when he initially joined the cast of Hot Ones. He explained that the older kids on set “pinned me down on the ground, straddled me with knees on my shoulders and gave me noogies or whatever they call it on my chest.”
However, despite the fact that Bateman was young, he knew exactly how to get them back and revenge was sweet to the actor.
“I went to the makeup artist and said, ‘Put a big black-and-blue mark all over my chest,’” he said. “And then I went to their parents and I said, ‘Look what your kids did to me.’ And that was good. I got them in trouble.”
He may have been worried as a child actor, but Jason Bateman’s fans know well his performance in all his movies and TV shows.
