What Happened To Jonathan Lipnicki From Stuart Little & Jerry Maguire?

We all remember Jonathan Lipnicki as the bespectacled little boy with a lisp, proudly telling Tom Cruise in one of his best movies, "Jerry Maguire," that "the human head weighs eight pounds," or that "bees and dogs can smell fear." We also remember him as the older human brother to an adopted mouse in "Stuart Little." Jonathan Lipnicki also starred in family-friendly fare like the basketball fantasy "Like Mike" with Lil Bow Wow and "The Little Vampire," about a boy who moves to Scotland and befriends a tiny bloodsucker from the 16th century with a horde of terribly CGI'd flying vampire cows. 

But once Jonathan Lipnicki began to shed his adorable baby fat and grow into a young man, he never made quite the same mark on film and television as he did in the blockbusters of his childhood, leaving us to wonder what he has been up to in the meantime.

In 2005, Jonathan Lipnicki voiced an episode of "Family Guy" and starred in a crass satire of the Rodney King riots, "The L.A. Riot Spectacular," alongside Snoop Dogg and Ron Jeremy. After that, he took a four-year break from acting, returning in 2009 on an episode of the defective detective series "Monk."

During an interview with /Film writer Witney Seibold in 2022, he explains the reasons for his break and touches on the challenges of maintaining an acting career as an adult when you were beloved by audiences as a child:

"I didn't work for a long time. And people always frame that as, 'Oh, I went to high school,' and whatnot. And that's the story that people tell sometimes when they don't work. Or if they're a child actor or whatever, they took time off. I did take time off, in the sense that it wasn't the only priority I had. But I didn't work because I just didn't work. I didn't really get any roles for a while."

Lipnicki explains that he wasn't getting roles because he no longer had the "nice inherent childlike wonder" that contributed to his early talent. Once "the world comes into play," he lost that natural ability, and he had to rediscover himself after graduating high school and taking some theatre classes. He needed to get back to the root of why he loved acting in the first place and take his craft more seriously.

After his break, Jonathan Lipnicki starred in a handful of TV roles, web series, and indie movies, but nothing with a major impact. Even though he worked hard to hone his acting skills, Jonathan Lipnicki became involved in Hollywood behind the camera instead of just in front of it.

Jonathan Lipnicki's experience as an actor from such a young age makes him the perfect person to understand the ins and outs of show business. Today, Lipnicki can use this knowledge he's gained from being on the sets of successful blockbusters to assist up-and-coming filmmakers in developing projects that will draw in audiences. This is invaluable for his new role at the production, post-production, and distribution company Buffalo 8. Variety says that as Executive Producer, Lipnicki plays "a key role in packaging and project development within Buffalo 8's EP services division, identifying storytelling opportunities and bringing together top-tier talent based on his extensive relationships spanning Hollywood studio films to the independent sector." Buffalo 8 has released some amazing films and documentaries, including Spike Lee's powder-keg "BlacKkKlansman," the teen trauma drama "The Fallout," and the chilling "Conversations with a Serial Killer: The Jeffrey Dahmer Tapes." 

Jonathan Lipnicki also has fitness interests that take his attention away from Hollywood. He is a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He's also been involved in many different sports, including boxing, water polo, basketball, and baseball. He also helps train fighters as a sparring partner. We can see in social media footage that Jonathan Lipnicki is absolutely shredded. This love of physical fitness runs in his blood, since his family owns the mixed martial arts promotion firm Fight Sports Entertainment. Lipnicki explains to ESPN that his athleticism complements, not overshadows, his passion for acting:

"My focus is really acting right now, and jiu-jitsu is a passion of mine. I feel like that is what keeps me very level and concentrated. There's a certain level of concentration required that makes me a better actor."

Jonathan Lipnicki's famous co-star Tom Cruise, known for his dangerous stunts in the "Mission Impossible" series, admires Lipnicki's dedication to physical training: "Tom is one of those people who thinks you need to be a person who learns several sets of skills as an actor ... So he was really stoked on the martial-arts part of that." Lipnicki has also used his MMA skills for the public good of escorting Jewish men and women from synagogues after a rise in Anti-Semitic attacks (via The Jerusalem Post). 

Jonathan Lipnicki's adult career may not have reached the peak of his child performances, but he's found his own version of success by focusing on what matters to him: bringing new films into the spotlight and staying in shape.