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Son of the 1970s sitcom legend Freddie Prinze, who died when Freddie Jr. was a baby. He grew up carrying one of television's most poignant legacies—and then became the face of the late-90s teen-movie boom. Dimpled, kind-eyed, and impossibly likable, he was THE heartthrob of an era that believed in nice guys.
The church-family daughter from 7th Heaven who shed her wholesome image and fought her way into 2000s movie stardom. Cast at fourteen as Mary Camden, she became one of The WB's defining faces—and by her early twenties she was headlining studio films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Blade: Trinity.
The face of the mid-90s: Randy Taylor, the wisecracking middle son on ABC's Home Improvement, whose image covered a million bedroom walls. "JTT" was the defining teen-magazine heartthrob of the decade—three initials that meant the same thing to one generation that Elvis meant to another. At the absolute peak of his fame, he walked away to go to college.
A Minnesota kid who exploded into stardom in 2001 with Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down, then famously stepped away. Josh Hartnett was the rare leading man who'd had enough of the machinery by 2006, turning down Superman and Batman to reclaim his life. His withdrawal was deliberate—a quiet rejection of what the moment demanded.
The floppy-haired heartthrob whose face covered every bedroom wall and Tiger Beat cover after Titanic. Before he was an Oscar-winning elder statesman of film, '90s Leo was pure teen-idol "Leo-mania."
From the daytime soap to teen idol, Ryan Phillippe was the smirking heartthrob who could play both the innocent and the seducer. I Know What You Did Last Summer introduced him; Cruel Intentions cemented him as the defining rich, dangerous charmer of his moment. He married Reese Witherspoon in 1999 and became one of the era's most visible celebrity couples before their 2006 separation.
![Video thumbnail — Rookie of the Year (1993) Theatrical Trailer [4K] [FTD-1393]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/gUAoirkeaVE/maxresdefault.jpg)
Las Vegas native who became the face of two defining family-movie fantasies—and then grew up into American Pie. From Rookie of the Year's 100-mph kid pitcher to King Arthur's time-traveling Calvin to Kevin in the American Pie gang, his roles bookend an entire decade of growing up.