It’s a tale as old as time — or at least the late ’90s. Young actors cut their teeth on Disney youth programming and blossom into fully fledged pop stars or Academy Award-nominated actors. Some of today’s biggest stars — Zendaya, Selena Gomez, Olivia Rodrigo, and Sabrina Carpenter, for example — got their start in the Disney talent pipeline.
And a new wave of young megatalent is now ready to take over screens and make their impact on Hollywood at large.
It’s being led by one of Variety‘s Young Hollywood Issue cover stars Malachi Barton; “Descendants: Rise of Red” star Kylie Cantrall; “Camp Rock 3” songstress Liamani Segura; “Percy Jackson” actress Leah Jeffries, to name a few.
Filling the Disney halls with the next generation of mega-talent was the primary objective Kids & Family president Ayo Davis gave to Charlie Andrews, EVP of live action, and Brenda Kelly Grant, SVP of talent and casting, when they joined forces five years ago. That mission means identifying talent that can not only captivate a new generation of viewers, but also encompass everything it takes to be a star in 2026.
“Ayo said that priority number one is building the next generation of Disney stars. We all got into a room, and we talked about our best vehicles to do so,” says Andrews. “Brenda and her team have done an unbelievable job of identifying kids not just all across the country, but across the entire world for ‘Descendants,’ ‘Zombies, ‘Cheetah Girls,’ ‘Percy Jackson” and now our new show, ‘Coven Academy‘ coming out soon. It really started with the strategy right away that we need to rebuild that star-making machine that Disney Channel did better than anyone.”
