Issue II: Six Degrees of China Anne McClain

The Disney Channel Web

Apr 12, 2024

Click the link above and find the product of hours on imdb and Disney wikia- a web of Disney’s talent and projects from Even Stevens to High School Musical: The Musical: Series. I started this during lockdown, and apologies to the people who created this great tool Kumu for, like, hard science because I used it for this. Disney Channel may be where my first passion for pointing out actors having been in other things comes from. It’s interesting to me that they fundamentally revived the studio system but entirely with children. Will we ever get the full story of all the ways that company failed to protect their child employees, like Nickelodeon has going on right now? Probably not, as they’re owned by the most litigious company in history, and Disney was signing contracts/NDAs with, again, children, and the oft unreliable group known as the parents of child actors.

Methodology:

Gray dots are people and gray lines are projects they worked on.
Blue dots are movies- DCOMs, if you will.
Magenta dots are TV shows.
Green are miscellaneous projects.
Purple lines show when people dated because intra-channel incest is of course a huge part of the DC machine.
Red lines show blood relatives. There were a lot of hustling momagers out there.
I combined 3 notable sibling acts into one dot because that’s certainly how Disney saw them.
I cut this off in 2020 because I don’t care beyond that! That’s actually way past when I should have stopped caring, but I love that little Olivia Rodrigo!
I have tags marking common trends- people who went on to be on ABC or ABC Family, compete on Dancing with the Stars, people who are SuperChristian (the church choir to child actor pipeline is real!).

Conclusions:

Our namesake, China Anne McClain, has the most projects with 8. My highest count for degrees from anyone is 4. I didn’t include crossover episodes like That’s So Suite Life of Hannah Montana because it looked too messy, but that reduces degrees significantly!
Becoming a lead vs. a supporting actor is truly a decision that can be made for you when you’re 9 and determines the rest of your life.
I remember a time when having Disney Channel on your resume could prevent an actor from crossing over to other projects, but that’s completely gone away. Zendaya really paved that way by becoming a couture fashion icon while still starring on KC Undercover. Also, social media, probably, flattening our entire culture.
Playing with the dots and lines is so fun, I want to make more of these if anyone has any requests.
Because the internet has shortened our nostalgia cycles to 5 minutes and the streaming monster demands existing IP, it’s so funny how many of these shows are already being “rebooted” or have been. (That’s So Raven, High School Musical, Wizards of Waverly Place).
Also there’s a noted number of people whose present careers are churning out content based on reliving their DC days including Christy Carlson Romano, Alyson Stoner, and Harper and the dad from Wizards of Waverly Place (they mostly talk about Selena Gomez not texting them back).
Biggest Stock Value Increase has to be Austin Butler who went from a guest actor at DC to Oscar nominee.
Unless you’re counting literal stock value, which might go to Bridgit Mendler.
Person Most Deserving of her due: Brenda Song! Brenda Song!!! GET THAT BITCH ON WHITE LOTUS OR SOMETHING, SHE’S SO TALENTED!!!

good reads:

A Place Without a Door’ and ‘Uncle Give me a Cigarette’—Two Essays by Palestinian Political Prisoner, Walid Daqqah

The guard shouted at him to drop the cigarette and then muttered to himself in Hebrew, bemoaning the sight of a child smoking. Nevertheless he proceeded with the handcuffing, remaining unmoved by the sight of those small hands in handcuffs.

The Baffler | Dance Dance Revolution? By Hubert Adjei-Kontoh

It’s not like music cannot offer commentary on the world as it is. But when it is as pathetic as Pitchfork telling you which artists to support on Juneteenth, or Resident Advisor’s suspending ratings and its comment section, lest an offensive review rankle its custodian-of-the-oppressed image, you have to wonder if all of this activity is simply a way of burnishing irrelevant brands as forces of social change.

Vulture | Nicki Minaj Tour: The Barbz are sticking by their queen by Scaachi Koul

He delivers these words like a pledge of allegiance. “I hang my Barb flags on my camp bunk at my autistic summer camp.””

good cheese:

At the Westside Market, I was inspecting these cheeses to see which Arthur Ave establishment they came from and found they all have little messages on their labels. Whoever wrote this, I see you!