Tracey Gold

Tracey Gold
Born	Tracey Claire Fisher (1969-05-16) May 16, 1969 New York City, New York, U.S.
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1976–2017
Spouse	Roby Marshall ​ (m. 1994)​
Children	4

Tracey Gold (born Tracey Claire Fisher; May 16, 1969) is an American actress and former child star best known for playing Carol Seaver on the 1980s sitcom Growing Pains.

Early life

Gold was born in New York City. Her younger sister is fellow actress Missy Gold, who appeared on the sitcom Benson from 1979 to 1986; their mother, Bonnie Fisher, was an advertising executive.

The name "Gold" is a shortened form of the name acquired by Tracey and Missy when they were adopted by Harry Goldstein, who married Fisher when Tracey was a preschooler; an actor in his own right (he had supporting roles in Carrie and on The Secrets of Isis), he later became a Hollywood agent. Missy and Tracey have three younger sisters, Brandy, Jessica (Jessie), and Cassandra (Cassie) Gold. Both Brandy and Jessie are actresses.

Acting career

Gold has been an actress since the age of four, first appearing in a Pepsi print ad. She appeared in two canceled series, Shirley with Shirley Jones in 1979, and Goodnight Beantown, starring Bill Bixby in 1983. Gold was originally cast as the youngest daughter in the original pilot series of the sitcom Gimme A Break! starring Nell Carter, but was replaced by actress Lara Jill Miller when the show went to series. She played one of Albert Finney and Diane Keaton's four daughters in the feature film Shoot the Moon (1982). Gold also guest starred on her sister Missy's series Benson in 1985, playing the cousin of Missy's character, Katie Gatling.

In 1985, Gold auditioned for the role of Carol Seaver on Growing Pains, but was not initially cast. The actress chosen for the pilot was Elizabeth Ward, who had starred alongside Gold in The Hand-Me-Down Kid, a 1983 ABC Afterschool Special. However, test audiences did not favor Ward in the role of Carol, and she was promptly replaced by Gold. Growing Pains ran from 1985 until 1992. During this time, Gold became a famous teen star and battled anorexia. In 1988, Gold also starred as Angela Strull in the teen film Dance 'til Dawn. On the 9 of August 1988, Tracey and her two sisters were the only celebrities at the funeral of Judith Barsi. She read A Child Of Mine (from the poet Edgar Albert Guest) as eulogy.

After the end of the series, Gold continued to work as an actress. Over the next decade, she starred in several television movies.

Battle with anorexia

Gold is also famous for her battle with anorexia nervosa, which almost killed her. From about the age of seven, Gold says that she thought about dieting, having learned the word and the concept on the many television sets she worked on as a very busy child actress. She became preoccupied with the television movie The Best Little Girl in the World, starring actress Jennifer Jason Leigh, about an anorexic teenager. In her autobiography, Gold says that in an attempt to control her development into a woman, she began restricting what she ate. When she was 11, she was diagnosed with the early stages of anorexia by her family pediatrician after a weight loss that accompanied a growth spurt. After some counseling, she eventually returned to a more normal weight for most of her teenage years. In 1988 at age 19, Gold gained some weight over the Growing Pains series hiatus. That season, the sitcom's scripts called for her to be the brunt of fat jokes from her television brothers for many episodes in a row.

Beginning in October 1988, Gold dieted from 133 pounds to about 110 pounds on a medically supervised 500-calorie-a-day (2,100 kJ) diet, but still occasionally the scripts included fat jokes at her expense. In her autobiography, she says that between 1989 and 1991, she became increasingly obsessed with food and her weight and continued to slowly and steadily lose weight. In 1990 Gold began group therapy in an eating disorder program, but only learned more ways to lose weight. That season, her problem with weight loss was touched upon slightly on her television series, when Gold is seen looking at her body in a carnival mirror, and describes to another character the distorted image in her head. In 1991, she started starving herself more than ever and vomiting, and lost a massive amount of weight, to the point that she was admitted to a hospital in early 1992. Her lowest weight is estimated to have been near 80 pounds. She was suspended from the show for her skeletal appearance. Photos of Gold's emaciated body were plastered all over tabloid magazines, and she was one of the first celebrities ever to be formally outed for anorexia. She last appeared in the 1991 episode, "Menage a Luke" after missing the two prior episodes where her problem is very obvious in some scenes, and did not return until the last two episodes of the series in the late spring of 1992, although she was not nearly recovered at this point.

After a several year struggle, Gold eventually recovered, and starred in the television movie For the Love of Nancy (1994) with Jill Clayburgh. The film explored a young woman's battle with anorexia and its effects on her family. Although she was warned of the possibility that she had done damage to her reproductive organs by the years of anorexia, Gold was later able to bear four children. As she entered her thirties, she maintained a normal weight for a woman her age, and often holds speaking engagements warning young women about the dangers of eating disorders, while continuing work as an actress.

Personal life and post-Growing Pains

Gold met her husband Roby Marshall through Growing Pains co-star Joanna Kerns, who portrayed Marshall's mother in the TV miniseries adaptation of the 1989 true crime book Blind Faith by Joe McGinniss. Marshall had served as a consultant on the miniseries, which dramatized the 1984 case in which his father, Toms River, New Jersey businessman Robert O. Marshall, was charged with (and later convicted of) the contract killing of his wife (and Roby's mother) Maria.

Gold and Marshall married on October 8, 1994, and have four sons: Sage Gold (b. February 16, 1997), Bailey Vincent (b. March 4, 1999), Aiden Michael (b. May 9, 2004), and Dylan Christopher (b. April 1, 2008).

In 2003, Gold wrote the book Room to Grow: An Appetite for Life with Julie McCarron.

Arrest

In 2004, Gold was arrested for drunk driving after rolling her SUV down a California freeway embankment. Gold was arrested by California Highway Patrol officers and charged with a felony count of driving under the influence causing injury. According to a CHP spokesman, Gold was driving a 2001 GMC Yukon on Route 118 on September 3 when she lost control of the vehicle. While Gold's husband and two of her sons (ages five and five months) were not seriously injured in the late-night crash, the actress's oldest child, 7-year-old Sage, suffered a broken clavicle and a head laceration. After CHP officers administered sobriety tests, Gold was arrested on the DUI charge, said CHP spokesman Steve Reid. Booked under her married name, Tracey Gold Marshall, she spent five hours in the Ventura lockup before being released on $50,000 bail.

Present day

In 2003, Gold appeared in an episode of the TV show The Dead Zone as the character Penny Barton. Gold was a contestant on the program Celebrity Mole 2: Yucatán in 2004, and starred in the movie Safe Harbor in 2006. She is currently hosting the TV Guide Channel mini-show Trapped in TV Guide. In addition, she is the host of the TLC series The Secret Life of a Soccer Mom, which debuted on March 3, 2008. Recently, Gold appeared as the spokesperson in "Baby Sleeps Safe", a national television infomercial for Baby Guardian. On January 2, 2012, she appeared on the ABC network's reality series, Celebrity Wife Swap, trading places with singer Carnie Wilson for a week. On July 24, 2013, Gold returned to sitcoms with an appearance on the Melissa & Joey episode, "Something Happened," as one half of a lesbian couple with a home-schooled daughter. Gold starred in the first episode of Heartbreakers called "Shot Through The Heart" on ID on August 13, 2014.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1978	A Rainy Day	Stephanie as a Child	Short film
1982	Shoot the Moon	Marianne Dunlap
1986	The Best of Times	Jaki's Friend (uncredited)
1988	The Girl Next Door	Annie
1990	The Willies	Carol Seaver
1998	Wanted	Sue Bentley
2001	What's the Worst That Could Happen?	Woman at Auction (uncredited)
2008	Solar Flare	Dr. Joanna Clark
2011	Your Love Never Fails	Samantha Pierce	Video
2014	My Dad's a Soccer Mom	Lori Brookstone
2016	All Hallows' Eve	Didi Hallow

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1976	Captains and the Kings	Rosemary Armagh	TV miniseries
1977	Roots	Young Missy Reynolds	TV miniseries
1978	The Dark Secret of Harvest Home	Missy Penrose	TV miniseries
1978	Night Cries	Donna Blankenship	TV movie
1978	Little Mo	Cindy Brinker	TV movie
1978	Quincy, M.E.	Lisa Carson	Episode: "A Test for Living"
1979	The Incredible Journey of Doctor Meg Laurel	Laurie Mae Moon	TV movie
1979	Eight Is Enough	Tracey Kappleton	Episode: "Best of Friends"
1979	Jennifer: A Woman's Story	Emma Prince	TV movie
1979	The Child Stealer	Pam	TV movie
1979	CHiPs	Linda/Donna	Episode: "Drive, Lady, Drive: Part 1" Episode: "Drive, Lady, Drive: Part 2"
1979	Fantasy Island	Monica	Episode: "Amusement Park/Rock Stars"
1979–1980	Shirley	Michelle Miller	13 episodes
1980	Here's Boomer	Laurie	Episode: "Overboard"
1980	Trapper John, M.D.	Ellie	Episode: "Girl Under Glass: Part 1" Episode: "Girl Under Glass: Part 2"
1980	Marilyn: The Untold Story	Young Norma Jean	TV movie
1981	CBS Afternoon Playhouse	Carrie	Episode: "I Think I'm Having a Baby"
1981	A Few Days in Weasel Creek	Buddy	TV movie
1981	CBS Library	Jane	Episode: "A Tale of Four Wishes"
1982	Father Murphy	Jenny	Episode: "Eight-Eight Keys to Happiness"
1982	Beyond Witch Mountain	Tia	TV movie
1982	The Phoenix	Jan	Episode: "The Fire Within"
1983	Another Woman's Child	Lisa	TV movie
1983	ABC Afterschool Special	Ari Jacobs	Episode: "The Hand Me Down Kid"
1983	Thursday's Child	Alix	TV movie
1983	Who Will Love My Children?	Pauline Fray	TV movie
1983	Fantasy Island	Michelle Robbins	Episode: "Three's a Crowd/Second Time Around"
1983–1984	Goodnight, Beantown	Susan Barnes	18 episodes
1984	Trapper John, M.D.	Jennifer Robins	Episode: "Where There's a Will"
1985	A Reason to Live	Ellen Maynes	TV movie
1985	Lots of Luck	Cindy Maris	TV movie
1985	Benson	Laura	Episode: "Katie's Cousin"
1985–1992	Growing Pains	Carol Seaver	166 episodes
1986	The Blinkins	Shady (voice)	TV movie
1988	Dance 'til Dawn	Angela Strull	TV movie
1990	DuckTales: The Movie Special	Hostess	TV movie
1990	ABC Afterschool Special	Shauna Kelly	Episode: "A Question About Sex"
1993	Labor of Love: The Arlette Schweitzer Story	Christa Uchytil	TV movie
1994	For the Love of Nancy	Nancy Walsh	TV movie
1995	Sleep, Baby, Sleep	Sylvie Pierson	TV movie
1995	Lady Killer (1995 film)	Sharon	TV movie
1995	Beauty's Revenge	Beth	TV movie
1995	Stolen Innocence	Stacy	TV movie
1996	A Kidnapping in the Family	Sarah Landers Taylor	TV movie
1996	Face of Evil	Darcy Palmer / Barbara Richards	TV movie
1996	The Perfect Daughter	Alexandra Michaelson	TV movie
1996	Diagnosis: Murder	Amy	Episode: "An Explosive Murder"
1996	To Face Her Past	Lori Molina	TV movie
1998	Dirty Little Secret	Sarah Wheetley	TV movie
1998	Touched by an Angel	Darlene Jones	Episode: "Vengeance Is Mine: Part 1"
1998	Promised Land	Darlene Jones	Episode: "Vengeance Is Mine: Part 2"
1998	The Girl Next Door	Anne 'Annie' Nolan	TV movie
1999	A Crime of Passion	Alyssa Pierce	TV movie
2000	Chicken Soup for the Soul	Anita	1 episode
2000	Stolen from the Heart	Leslie Wagner	TV movie
2000	Twice in a Lifetime	Blair Wilson / Polly Murtaugh	Episode: "Party Girls"
2000	The Growing Pains Movie	Carol Seaver	TV movie
2001	She's No Angel	Liddy Carlyle	TV movie
2002	Wildfire 7: The Inferno	Nell Swanson	TV movie
2003	Stephen King's Dead Zone	Penny Barton	Episode: "Misbegotten"
2004	Growing Pains: Return of the Seavers	Carol Seaver	TV movie
2005	Captive Hearts	Elizabeth Sorenson	TV movie
2006	Safe Harbor	Carly Segan	TV movie
2006	Trapped in TV Guide	Host	TV series
2007	Final Approach	Lina Howren	TV movie
2009	Sight Unseen	Molly	TV movie
2012	Arachnoquake	Katelynn	TV movie
2013	Melissa & Joey	Polly	Episode: "Something Happened"
2016	I Know Where Lizzie Is	Judith	TV movie
2017	Battle of the Network Stars	Herself	Episode: "Competition 20"
2017	Daily Blast Live	Herself	Host

External links

• Tracey Gold at the TCM Movie Database
• Tracey Gold at IMDb