10 Actors Who Still Haven't Outdone Their Debut Performances

5. Tatum O'Neal - Paper Moon

When you are the youngest ever winner of a competitive Oscar at the age of ten, there's really not a whole lot of things you can do to top that. Cure cancer? Be the youngest person to win two competitive Oscars? Sadly, none of that was in the cards for Tatum O'Neal. After a ground-breaking performance as the newly discovered daughter of a con man (played by her real life father, Ryan O'Neal), nothing would ever really measure up. She was mature beyond her years, with an intuitive acting ability that allowed her to give an emotionally honest performance while most child actors her age are still struggling to spit out their lines. She followed Paper Moon with The Bad News Bears two years later, where she played a talented young pitcher on the verge of puberty who is tempted to reject baseball in favor of more feminine pursuits. While The Bad News Bears is a classic and she does a great job with it, she's in a much smaller role and as such has less to do in terms of acting. Paper Moon, to this day, remains her finest achievement.