Too short to model

About 1 1/2 years ago, Cristina Kernan thought she wanted to be a fashion model. 

But, the O’Fallon, Mo., middle-schooler is only a little over 5-feet tall. She said, “They told me I was too short to be a model.” 

However, the John Robert Powers agency in St. Louis suggested she try acting. “I had been in some school plays before that, but nothing major,” she said. 

After a St. Louis audition, she was picked to take a trip to Los Angeles. There, she met  with managers and agents for various shows. 

That led to her first big break, a starring role in the NBC comedy, “Daddio.” 

In the show, Cristina played the oldest of four children. The father, actor Michael Chiklis, decides to stay home with the kids when the mother gets a better job as a lawyer. 

Next year, Cristina will make her movie debut in an independent film, “The Greatest Adventure of My Life.” 

At home, Cristina is the youngest child of Michael and Carmen Kernan. She has three brothers, B.J., Ray and Pat. 

She’s a student at Fort Zumwalt South Middle School.

But, while filming in California, she got her schoolwork from an independent school. A teacher would come to the set and help her with her lessons. When she was home, she was back in her regular classes at Fort Zumwalt Middle. 

She said her friends didn’t treat her any differently after she got the TV role. “Other kids, who didn’t know me as well, did treat me a little differently. But, most people were very nice about it,” she said. 

Many kids seeking acting careers have to work for years to get a break. For Cristina, once she started auditioning, it took three weeks. 

In California, Cristina impressed Diane Hardin, an agent who agreed to manage her. One of her first auditions was for the “Daddio” show. 

“By the fourth or fifth callback, I was the only one there. So, I started to get pretty excited. It was unexpected, but I got the job,” she said. 

She said the show’s cast would start rehearsals for one episode on a Monday. Then, they’d film it in front of a live audience on Friday. 

“I wasn’t nervous because we practiced it so many times,” Cristina said. 

The show began airing last spring. Five episodes were shown during the 1999-2000 season. Then, another four were shown this fall before the show was pulled. 

Cristina said a total of 18 episodes have been filmed. She said NBC might bring it back next season or another network could pick it up. 

In the meantime, Cristina has worked on her first movie role. She plays the girlfriend of a drummer boy who goes off to fight in the Civil War. 

“I’m in just a couple scenes so I was only there for a day of filming,” she said. “I got to talk with a Southern accent and wear a hoop skirt. 

“I had bones in my dress, which was painful. But, I had this long, curly black hair. That was neat.” (In dresses of the Civil War era, it was common to have heavy braces to make the waist as small as possible.)

Cristina hopes to make acting a career. But, she’s also looking at being an architect, a teacher or possibly a singer. She said she hasn’t totally given up on being a model either. 

“I do want to go to college. But, if my acting career is going well when I get out of high school, I may wait,” she said. 

Cristina said she’d study drama, computer science or business in college. 

Cristina’s mother, Carmen, lived with her when she was filming in California. “That is the biggest change. The family is kind of split for part of the year,” Carmen said. 

She said seeing Cristina on TV is “very strange.” She added, “None of us in the family can believe it. We’ve all known Cristina was an actor all along. We just didn’t suspect she could make a living at it.”