The Stunning Transformation Of Adam From The Goldbergs

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For those who tuned into ABC's '80s-tastic sitcom "The Goldbergs" for each of its 10 seasons on air, you may well feel that you've watched its hero grow up in real time. After all, Sean Giambrone, who played Adam Goldberg, the enthusiastic, unashamed pop culture nerd who documents much of his madcap family's daily life on his VHS camcorder, began the show as a fresh-faced 15-year-old. And therefore, he wrapped up its 229th final episode as a fully-grown twenty-something man.

But how did Giambrone land the role — based on the real-life trials and tribulations of show creator Adam Goldberg's highly entertaining life, of course — that skyrocketed him to fame? How did he manage to balance his high school education with fronting one of the most popular comedies on American TV? And what does a drug-induced quest for pizza have to do with his post-show career? Here's a look at the Michigan native's remarkable transformation.

Sean Giambrone shot to fame in the nostalgic ABC sitcom "The Goldbergs," playing an aspiring film director who spends much of his chaotic childhood making his own home movies. As it turns out, the actor could relate to his character Adam Goldberg's obsession with all things Hollywood.

Indeed, Giambrone and his older brother, Luke, were similarly creative while growing up in Park Ridge, Illinois, although in this case, the former was in front of, rather than behind, the camera. And such experiences made him further appreciate his on-screen alter ego. "I find it really cool because he takes a step back from his life to observe his life," the star told Patch. "He's filming everything he can."

And amateur filmmaking isn't the only thing he has in common with the youngest member of the Goldberg clan. "Like Adam, I can easily be annoying to my family and told to shut up and knock it off," Giambrone admitted while speaking to Glitter in 2021. "Most importantly, we both have a similar love for our families." Aww.

As well as spending his childhood acting in home videos, unlikely to have been screened outside his family home, Sean Giambrone also decided to showcase his talents to a wider audience. In fact, it was while performing at his elementary school in the Illinois city of Park Ridge that the star realized what he wanted to do for a living.

"I did this variety show where I had to do some acting, and I just loved it," Giambrone explained to Smashing Interviews magazine in 2016. "I liked being on stage and all that. It was sort of a random milestone where you say, 'Hey, let's try this acting thing!'" In fact, the youngster was such a natural showman that he even managed to become something of an influencer while delivering an eighth-grade book report.

"He showed up to school to deliver his book talk and was in costume and had props, and the kids were just mesmerized," Melissa Walters, Giambrone's language arts teacher told The Providence Journal. "Here was something that could have been just a dull what-I-did-on-my-summer-vacation report, but he really took that opportunity to bring the book to life. I remember, a few weeks later, spotting the book on the desks of some other students and they said, 'Sean gave such a great book talk that I couldn't wait to read it.'"

While the majority of Sean Giambrone's school years were relatively normal, his education changed significantly when he landed the leading man (well, leading boy) role in ABC's '80s fest "The Goldbergs." Indeed, the youngster went from attending Maine South High School in Illinois every day to never attending at all.

"I actually stayed within the curriculum of my high school back in Park Ridge in the Chicagoland area," Giambrone explained to Tell-Tale TV about how he continued his studies while simultaneously fronting one of network TV's biggest sitcoms. "They just sent me the curriculum and then I had a tutor on set. That was a lot of fun because they were kind of my closest friends. They called themselves the Sean-tourage."

Giambrone may have missed out on the full high school experience. But luckily, he still got to wear a cap and gown once he'd completed his final assignment. "And it was just a really special thing that both the show and my school and my teachers made that happen," he said about the graduation ceremony he was allowed to grace despite his four-year absence. "I really appreciate that because that was really important to me."

With both his mother Voni and father Dave working in the field of advertising, it makes complete sense that Sean Giambrone started his professional acting career in commercials. Indeed, before portraying '80s pop culture obsessive Adam Goldberg in "The Goldbergs," the youngster cut his teeth in ads for the likes of Friendly's, McDonalds, and SeaWorld.

The latter helped to further boost Giambrone's profile when it was spoofed on late night institution "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno." And by this point, the Chicagoan agency he'd signed to recognized that they had a potential star on their books.

"When you watch him on screen, you are just drawn to him and whatever he is doing in that scene," Big Mouth Talent co-owner Brooke Tonneman told The Providence Journal. "You find yourself watching his character. He can definitely read what a director is looking for and we could see that in him even at (age) nine."

While in California to record the first of many cartoon voiceovers, Sean Giambrone was encouraged by his agent to get some more invaluable auditioning experience. And one of the projects he tried out for ended up changing his life forever.

Indeed, the teenager might not have expected to get the star-making role in new ABC sitcom "The Goldbergs" when he walked through the casting room doors. But the real-life Adam Goldberg, whose frantic family life the show was based on, instantly spotted potential. "He really was just a normal kind of sweet, awkward kid, which reminded me of how I would have gone into an audition at that age, just totally clueless and not knowing what I was walking into," the latter told The Providence Journal. "It was a slam dunk right when he walked in."

So how did Giambrone, who was only 15 at the time, react to the big news? "It was really a whirlwind," he told the same publication. "It was just excitement and awe and kind of an unknown feeling because this was all happening so fast, but when we started filming, I just loved the
whole experience." 

After landing the role of film obsessive Adam Goldberg in ABC sitcom "The Goldbergs," Sean Giambrone had to quickly build a rapport with the rest of his on-screen family including Troy Gentile, who plays manchild older brother Barry, and Hayley Orrantia, who portrays musically gifted sister Erica. Luckily, the trio forged an instant long-standing bond.

"It's wild because we're becoming more like real siblings, so we're always happy to see each other," Giambrone told Smashing Interviews in 2016 before revealing that Gentile and Orrantia enjoy winding each other up. "... They have sisterly and brotherly fights, and she punches him in the arm when he gets her annoyed," said the actor, adding that Orrantia will get mad at Gentile when he pokes her side as a way to "taze" her. "It's kind of crazy because it is just like how siblings act."

Speaking to Tell-Tale TV ahead of the show's final episode, Giambrone said that he'd essentially gained hundreds of other siblings during its 10 seasons, singling out a boom operator named Howie, in particular. "... He's a semi-pro surfer, and he was like, 'I'll take you out,'" said Sean of a surfing lesson he got, before adding that Howie was cautious about keeping the star of the show out of danger. "So we didn't go again. But we went that one time." It sounds like a nice contrast to the TV show casts who couldn't stand each other. 

Sean Giambrone hadn't stepped onto a TV set before he was cast as the lead in "The Goldbergs." But the majority of his castmates, including "Bridesmaids" scene-stealer Wendi McLendon-Covey, "Curb Your Enthusiasm" favorite Jeff Garlin — whose on-set controversy later nearly derailed the show — and Hollywood legend George Segal, were far more experienced. Luckily, the youngster was soon taken under their wing. 

When asked by Broadway World about what it was like to share the screen with such talent, Giambrone responded, "Somewhat intimidating at first, but once you get to know them, they're
absolutely amazing people. What's great is they love to give me pointers and I love to get them. I try to soak it up as much as possible because I know they are incredible actors."

And the respect was mutual. "He is good at one of the most difficult things to do in acting, which is simply listening," Segal, who tragically died in 2021, told The Providence Journal. "He gets real joy from acting and that's contagious. When he gets it right, there's this wonderful feeling that we all get." And McLendon-Covey, who portrays Adam's mollycoddling mom Beverly, was equally gushing: "Sometimes I feel like I am in the presence of a little Buddha because he can stay calm and look at us and just laugh. I feel like, 'Oh, man, this kid is wise beyond his years.'"

Following a blink-and-you'll-miss-it part in the family comedy "I Heart Shakey," Sean Giambrone made his feature film debut proper when he starred opposite Joey Bragg in the Disney XD movie "Mark and Russell's Wild Ride." And in an interview with Pop City Life, the teen revealed he had a blast on Vancouver Island shooting the adventure comedy.

"It was a lot of fun because I got to be involved in car maneuvers that I've never done before and working with Joey was great," Giambrone enthused about the caper in which he played Russell, who goes on a literal wild ride when his learner driver best friend Mark is asked to drive their school's most popular girl to a swanky pool party. "I also got to explore a different type of character who had to bring out an inner Joe Pesci every once in awhile."

Giambrone returned to the Mouse House in 2019 when he played another BFF, Rob Stoppable, in the live-action adaptation of "Kim Possible." And leading lady Sadie Stanley was mightily impressed with what he brought to the project, telling The Hollywood Reporter, "He has the biggest heart of anybody. He is so caring. I talk about how much I love Sean all the time and people are going to think I'm obsessed, but he's just such a great guy. He listens and he'll bring things up that you talked about five days ago and you're like, 'How did you remember that?'"

A year after bagging his role in "The Goldbergs," Sean Giambrone landed his first animated voiceover part in "Clarence." And his experiences bringing the lead's cube-shaped-headed BFF Jeff Randell to life inspired him to further showcase his skills in the audio booth.

"It was here that I got to meet and work with Tom Kenney (SpongeBob) and have my first improv, collaborative session," Giambrone explained to Glitter magazine about his time on the Cartoon Network show. "To do improv like that reminded me of my days back in Chicago where I was able to use my imagination and creativity to come up with stories with my brother and my friends. Doing this as a job really drove home why I love acting and this business."

Giambrone went on to play Travis in "The Emoji Movie," eBoy in "Ralph Breaks the Internet," and Cotton in "The Secret Life of Pets 2." And on the small screen, he voiced the recurring characters of Richardson Mole in "Big Hero 6: The Series," Yumyulack Opposites Jr. in "Solar Opposites," and Ben Pincus in "Jurassic World" spinoffs "Camp Cretaceous" and "Chaos Theory." He was particularly proud to be a part of the latter dinosaur franchise, telling The Parent Watch, "Growing up being a big Jurassic fan, and now I'm actually with a group of people who all probably grew up the same way watching this stuff. Now we're the ones making it. It's unbelievable to me."

Sean Giambrone played pop culture enthusiast Adam Goldberg for 10 seasons and a whopping 229 episodes of "The Goldbergs." So it was perhaps little surprise that the Michigan native found it hard to say goodbye to the character once the ABC sitcom wrapped in 2023.

"Everyone was taking a moment and really cherishing those last couple days of filming," Giambrone told Tell-Tale TV. "And just hearing everyone getting wrapped out of the season, that was wild ... it definitely got emotional at the end." The star — who took several props from the set as souvenirs including Adam's watch, glasses, and various other clothing items — also told TODAY what he'd miss most about the comedy. "Yelling at Barry or just getting called schmoopie or Goldfarb or stuff like that," he said.

So what did Giambrone make of the ending? Well, in a joint interview for The Nerds of Color with co-star Hayley Orrantia, aka big sis Erica Goldberg, he gave it his seal of approval. " ... I remember talking about it with my family and I was like, 'I feel like we could go for another year because it doesn't feel like an ending,'" he said. "Then I was explaining some of the stuff that was happening, like, 'Oh crud, there are some kind of full circle things going on in this episode.' But you can kind of see potentially where each character might be going in the near future, and so I like it."

After playing a wholesome nerd on "The Goldbergs," Sean Giambrone tried to shake off his child star persona, making it to Hollywood as an adult with a role in "Pizza Movie," a stoner comedy in which two collegegoers overdose on a recreational drug and subsequently go on a Harold and Kumar-esque journey to find the antidote: yep, you guessed it, pizza.

Giambrone, who co-stars alongside "Stranger Things" graduate Gaten Matarazzo — no stranger to shaking his career up in exciting ways — as Montgomery, told The Wrap that although the project was very different, he was still able to take inspiration from his most famous role. "The character kind of felt like a mixture of Adam Goldberg and Yumyulack from 'Solar Opposites,'" he said, adding, "So it was a fun opportunity to do comedy again."

"One of the big notes I always got on 'The Goldbergs' was too much sauce, because I would crank it," Giambrone went on to add. "But with this, because I was on some experimental drug, I really could just take it there." The Hulu original received surprisingly strong reviews from the press, with The New York Times describing it as "fast, witty, and packed with clever punchlines" and Variety complimenting "the natural spark between Matarazzo's repeatedly foiled would-be swagger and Giambrone's disarming mama's-boy act." Suffice it to say, Giambrone can go on the list of child stars you'll barely recognize now.