Where Is Jared Rushton Now? The Best Friend Who Became a Guitarist

By CelebPaid Research · Updated October 7, 2026 · 8 min read

Thematic illustration: a live rock band, evoking Rushton's music career. This is a generic image, not a photo of the subject.Image via Wikimedia Commons

He was the best friend — Billy Kopecki, the kid who gets the top bunk in the Zoltar machine's fallout, Tom Hanks's pint-size partner in Big (1988). Jared Rushton was fourteen, holding his own against the future two-time Oscar winner, and the performance made him one of the most recognizable child actors of the late '80s. Then he did the slow, sensible thing: he kept working through the '90s, retired in 2000, and picked up a guitar.

Rushton is now a musician and family man. This is the verified story of where Jared Rushton is now.

The Peak: Billy and Ron Thompson (1986–1992)

Born Jared Michael Rushton on March 3, 1974, in Provo, Utah, he started at twelve as Richie in Tales from the Darkside (1986), then the climb: Overboard (1987) as Kurt Russell's character's son, Lady in White (1988) as Donald — and the big one, Billy in Big (1988), the best friend every kid wanted, opposite Tom Hanks's man-child Josh.

Then Ron Thompson in Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989) — the annoying-brat neighbor kid with the red flip-up hat, the baseball through the attic window, the superglue-tipped rubber arrow — nominated for a Saturn Award (losing to Adán Jodorowsky in Santa Sangre). Two Saturn nominations and two Young Artist nominations total. The run continued: A Cry in the Wild (1990, lead as Brian Robeson, the Hatchet adaptation), Pet Sematary Two (1992) as the bully Clyde Parker, three episodes of Roseanne as Chip (Becky's boyfriend), ER (1994), Dr. Quinn, Northern Exposure — steady work through the decade, ending with Cover Me (2000).

Consequence's retrospective nailed the Ron reassessment: "we had Jared Rushton's Ron Thompson all wrong... we all got a look at the real Ron when he knelt and cried over the death of 'Antie,' the noble ant." The brat had a heart; the performance had layers. Thirty years later, the red hat reads as iconic, not annoying.

The Music: Withdrawal to Deal by Dusk

"With the turn of the millennium, Rushton switched his professional focus to music" (Wikipedia) — and the music career is real, not a hobby: first Withdrawal, the Southern California rock outfit featuring his brother Ryan, whose sole album The Perfectionist Blacklist (2006) explored "the murky intersection of post-hardcore, electronica and post-rock" (Fandango). Then Deal by Dusk — formed in 2010 with brother Ryan and percussionist Todd Crayton, a quintet stretching "late-'90s indie rock into jam-band territory," sharing stages with Jerry Garcia sideman Melvin Seals.

The band's footprint is modest by design: covers with a few originals, five YouTube videos (last in 2014), "a project of passion for Jared and his friends" — the working musician's life, not the rock star's. "Glad to see Rushton hasn't forgotten how to shimmy shimmy rock" (Consequence). The kid who played air-guitar friendship with Tom Hanks grew up to play actual guitar, for actual audiences, on actual stages.

The through-line from Billy to guitarist is the film's own logic: Big is about refusing to stop playing. Rushton just changed the instrument — from the Zoltar-machine wish to the six-string, from the top bunk to the stage. The wish was to be big; the fulfillment was to be a musician.

The Family: Sarah, Emma, Bjorn, and the Dogs

The personal life, per the most detailed reporting: Rushton married Sarah in early 2014, and the family — documented on Instagram — includes daughter Emma (a toddler in the reports), son Bjorn (born around May 2020), a dog named Magnum, and a puppy named Frenchie. "It's clear that Jared places importance on his family" — one post with the two children captioned: "The reason behind it all: To be part of something bigger than ourselves."

He posts motivational quotes and feel-good snaps rather than band updates — "which has led some to think that the musical group is now defunct" — but the family content is the point: the former child star whose public presence is gratitude, not grievance. At 52, the best friend from Big is the dad from the Instagram captions, and the upgrade suits him.

The Rushton brothers' musical partnership — Jared and Ryan, Withdrawal to Deal by Dusk — is the quiet heart of the second act: siblings making noise together, the way they presumably did as kids in Provo. The band may be quiet; the family isn't.

Where Is Jared Rushton Now?

As of 2026, Jared Rushton plays guitar (Withdrawal, Deal by Dusk), is married to Sarah (since 2014), and is father to Emma and Bjorn — plus dogs Magnum and Frenchie. Retired from acting since 2000; musically quieter in recent years but family-active.

Billy wished on Zoltar to be big. Jared Rushton grew up to be something better: himself, with a guitar.

The Antie Scene: Ron Thompson, Reconsidered

Every Honey, I Shrunk the Kids retrospective eventually arrives at the same revision: Ron Thompson — the red-hatted brat, the baseball through the attic window, the superglue-tipped rubber arrow — was never just the brat. The proof is the Antie scene: Ron, kneeling over the dying ant who saved him from the scorpion, crying. The annoying neighbor kid, undone by an insect's sacrifice.

Consequence's 2019 reassessment put it best: "we had Jared Rushton's Ron Thompson all wrong... we all got a look at the real Ron when he knelt and cried over the death of 'Antie,' the noble ant." It's the film's emotional pivot — the moment the backyard adventure becomes about something: loyalty, loss, the small deaths that teach the big lessons. And Rushton, at fifteen, plays it straight — no winking, no comedy, just grief over an ant.

The scene reframes the whole character: the brat was armor, the hat was a flag, the baseball was a cry for attention. Underneath: the kid who cries for Antie, who learns the backyard's stakes are real. It's the performance's thesis — Ron Thompson contains multitudes, and Rushton knew it even if the script only hinted it.

And the hat — the red flip-up hat that "caused more fashion nightmares than I care to recall" — has completed the journey from eyesore to icon. The thing audiences mocked in 1989 is the thing they cosplay in 2026. Time does that: the annoying becomes the beloved, the brat becomes the heart, the kid becomes the guitarist. Ron Thompson, reconsidered, was the film's soul all along — and Rushton played him like he knew.

Then vs Now: Two Chapters

Jared Rushton played the ultimate best friend at fourteen and spent the next twenty-five years being one — to his band, his brother, his wife, his kids. The Zoltar machine granted the wish; the guitar granted the career; the family granted the meaning. Billy Kopecki wanted the top bunk; Jared Rushton got the whole house — the stage, the studio, the nursery, the dogs. The red hat is in the archive; the musician is in the present; the father is in the photos, captioned with gratitude. Shimmy shimmy rock, indeed — all the way home. Fifty-two years old, two kids, two dogs, two bands, one wife, one guitar: the arithmetic of a life well arranged. The best friend role was the rehearsal; the family is the performance. And somewhere, in a drawer or a frame, the red flip-up hat — retired, like its owner, but never forgotten.

Frequently asked questions