NEED TO KNOW
Norman Golden II was 8 years old when he starred in the budding cop-comedy Cop and a Half opposite Burt Reynolds
The former child actor, 41, left Hollywood in 1998 to focus on his education
Golden, who now works in the tech space, recalls the generosity of his Oscar-nominated costar, whom he considers a mentor
At 8 years old, Norman Golden II was jumping into a moving bus, driving a speed boat in Florida, and hanging from a suspension bridge. The idea of a child actor doing these stunts seems incomprehensible today, but the Cop and a Half star has a simple reason why those stunts were allowed.
“It was the ‘90s,” he smiles and shrugs, thinking back to the 1993 film, in which he portrayed a wannabe police officer opposite Burt Reynolds.
Though Golden had a stunt double, he still performed several of his own stunts in the cop-comedy film. And, for every major stunt Golden performed, the Evening Shade legend compensated his pint-sized costar with a $100 bill.
“I probably shouldn’t have been doing them,” Golden said of the stunts. “Burt understood, because he’d been in the business for years at that point. He wasn’t going to overstep, but he also wanted to make sure that I was safe and taken care of. He knew I wasn’t probably getting compensated well enough to be performing and doing the things that I was doing.”
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Norman D. Golden II & Burt Reynolds in ‘Cop And A Half’.
The Smokey and the Bandit actor also gifted Golden with four custom pairs of cowboy boots, a video camera and more electronics during their time on set.
“He was so generous,” Golden notes, adding that the Gunsmoke star also advised him and his parents how to avoid the pitfalls of Hollywood.
Although Golden, who was 7 when he read for the role of Devon Butler, came to know Reynolds as a mentor, he was never starstruck by the Oscar nominee early on, because he didn’t know who he was.
“I had no idea, and I think that was my saving grace. If it had been, let’s say Eddie Murphy, or even Arnold Schwarzenegger, I obviously knew who those guys were, but Burt, I’m like, ‘I don’t know who this guy is,’ ” he recalled. “My parents knew him. So they’re all like, ‘Wow.’ I’m like, ‘Okay, I guess.’ ”
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Norman D. Golden II and Burt Reynolds film a scene for “Cop and a Half”.
While Cop and a Half put Golden’s face on the big screen, major on-screen success didn’t follow, and he essentially left Hollywood in 1998 after his last professional gig, wherein he starred in the TV miniseries Moby Dick. At the time, Golden was 14 years old and wanted to focus on school. Additionally, the roles he was being offered didn’t fit who he was becoming as a young man.
“I wasn’t Macaulay Culkin, if you know what I mean. So the opportunities that were afforded to me were a little bit different,” he said. “It was a smaller pool of opportunities and roles that were available to me that I was up against with other kids that was in my same demographic, like [child actors] Brandon Hammond or Arjay Smith or any of those guys.”
Now 41, Golden, a husband and father to a 3-year-old daughter, works in the tech space and is launching a startup company called Golden Path, which is designed to help those in the creative world, specifically former child actors, deal with fame after being thrust into the spotlight. The company, he says, falls under the “educational tech” banner.
Using his career as his inspiration, Golden, a Los Angeles resident, aims to help young actors navigate the challenges of an entertainment career through mentorship and resources.
“There’s an adjustment period that a lot of people don’t talk about,” he said. “I want to give artists the kind of support that I wish that I could have had, or at least my parents could have had.”
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Norman Golden II attends the Los Angeles premiere of “Smothered” on May 3, 2023.
Although he largely left Hollywood nearly three decades ago, he’s still managed to keep a toe in the entertainment waters, having released a short film in 2017 titled Misperception, which is being expanded into a one-hour TV drama. He’s released another short film, available on Amazon Prime, called The Hollywood Kid, which is loosely based on his experiences as an adult trying to establish a writing career.
Fully diversifying himself in entertainment, Golden also released a rap album under the artist name Enormus.
“I wouldn’t necessarily say I had a music career,” he laughs. “I did release an album, and it had varying degrees of success. I mean, I think a lot of people were like, ‘Oh, okay, the Cop and a Half kid could rap. He got skills.’”
Music, he said, is a hobby.
“I’m not going to do anything with that professionally, obviously,” he said. “I’m also not trying to be a 45 or 50-year-old rapper.”
Golden estimates he has about two to three albums’ worth of material he’s already recorded, but he prefers to stay behind the scenes.
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