The studio didn't ask them to learn their trade, they just worked them, and when that personality or that gimmick or whatever they had ran dry at the box office, they were dropped and out.

Norman Taurog while directing Jackie Cooper in a crying scene ordered a security guard to take away his dog and pretend to shoot him backstage. The movie catapulted young Cooper to super-stardom. He was responsible for packaging series (such as Bewitched) and other projects and selling them to the networks.

He was a child actor who managed to make the transition to an adult career. Kramer (1979). At age 9 he was also the youngest performer to have been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role—an honor that he received for the film Skippy (1931).