Chris Massoglia

Chris Massoglia was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Christopher and Karen Massoglia.[2] His father is a chiropractor and his mother a homemaker.[2] His parents are devout Christians and Republicans, and Massoglia grew up a fan of Christian pop music (as well as unable to listen to rap music).[2] Massoglia was homeschooled by his mother.[2] By the age of 13, he had enrolled in an online university where his coursework included developmental psychology, Biblical studies, algebra, and American history.[2] He also had studied jujitsu, played piano, trained as a hip-hop dancer, knew American sign language, and rode horses.[2] He was also a stand-out Little League Baseball player.[2]

He began attending acting workshops at a dancing academy in his home town of Minneapolis while in middle school, and auditioning for television commercials by creating home-made audition tapes.[3] His first jobs included commercials for Target, Marshall Field's, PepsiCo, and Best Buy.[2]

He began acting in 2003 under the name "Chris Kelly" (sometimes appearing as "Chris J. Kelly") in an episode of the television program Law & Order: Criminal Intent.[3] The same year, he was considered for the part of 10-year-old Sean in the Nicole Kidman film Birth, but the family refused to allow him to appear naked on screen with a nude, grown woman.[2] He auditioned for Spider-Man 2 (getting far enough in the casting process to spend an afternoon with Tobey Maguire) and Bad News Bears (he returned six times for call-backs but was not cast).[2] He spent the summer of 2004 away from auditions to play Little League Baseball; his team (the Robbinsdale All-Stars) won the Minnesota state title that year but did not go to the Little League World Series after losing in the Indianapolis regionals.[2] He appeared in two episodes of Medical Investigation in 2004,[4] and four episodes of the TNT cable television police drama Wanted in 2005.[3][4] He began using his family name of Massoglia in 2008.[3]

He made his feature film acting debut in 2007 in the motion picture A Plumm Summer,[5] but his most prominent role as of 2009 was as "Darren Shan" in the 2009 film Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant.[6] Originally scheduled to debut in theaters in 2010, the film was moved to October 2009 to "capitalize on the Halloween season",[7] and opened a month prior to another highly anticipated vampire picture, New Moon.[8]

His follow-up project was the 3-D horror film The Hole, directed by Joe Dante,[9][10][11] He also went on to play the role of older Sam, Zac Efron's brother in Charlie St. Cloud, but his role was cut from the film.[11][12]

After a four year break from acting, Massoglia returned to the profession. His first notable work was in the 2016 film The Matchbreaker, in which he had a minor role.[13] This was followed by the small film Because of Gràcia, in which he starred as teenaged boy trying to build a relationship with a chaste girl who refuses to kiss until she's married.[14] In the fall of 2017, Massoglia began filming another small independent film, The Lumber Baron.[15]

Massoglia wrote, directed, and starred in the short film Playball, which was released online in 2018.[16]

As of November 2009, critiques of Massoglia's acting have concerned his leading role in Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant. His performance has not won raves; motion picture industry trade publication Variety said, "The production puts far too much faith in the appeal of newcomer Chris Massoglia, who plays Darren Shan, a rule-abiding, good-grade-earning conformist with the shaggy coif and bland, gumdrop charm of your average Nickelodeon character."[17] The Boston Globe called his acting "too bland to deliver."[18] However, reviewing his 2009 film The Hole, The Hollywood Reporter called Massoglia "a young Zac Efron... who ably carries the film."[19]

• Chris Massoglia at IMDb
• Chris Massolgia interviewed on MLB.com about the Major League Baseball 2009 post-season