Melissa Joan Hart has shared her children’s honest thoughts about her acting career, after the topic arose when they caught her watching herself on TV.
During an interview with The Independent, the 48-year-old actor spoke candidly about raising her three sons while working in Hollywood. Hart is the mother of sons Mason, 18, Braydon, 16, and Tucker, 11, who she shares with husband Mark Wilkerson.
According to Hart, her children aren’t necessarily interested in watching some of her iconic shows from the ‘90s and 2000s, such as Clarissa Knows It All and Sabrina The Teenage Witch. Rather, she said her sons find it “cringe” to watch anything she’s been in, noting they have avoided doing so for many years.
However, she shared that when she was re-watching her show, Melissa and Joey, for an episode of her podcast, What Women Binge, her 18-year-old son playfully mocked her for it, before watching the program himself.
“What’s hilarious is that my older one sat down and he’s like: ‘Are you watching yourself on TV?’” she said. “And he sat down and watched a few episodes.”
Hart then shared how another member of her family joined in to watch her old show. “My middle one walks in and goes: ‘Are you watching mom on TV?’” she recalled. “And then my older one goes: ‘Shut up. It’s funny.’ So it was a fun time.’”
Hart also recalled another sweet moment that she had with Mason, as he was getting ready for his senior prom this year. She noted that while he usually avoids coming to her for relationship advice, he recently asked for tips when making plans to attend prom with his first serious girlfriend.
“It was so nice that he wanted my help with prom, and there were some things around that that were really nice to bond with him about,” she explained. “Like how to make her feel special at prom, what they could do, and how they could look. All that stuff is sort of fun.”
During her interview with The Independent, the actor also discussed how her family is connected to her work with World Vision, which sees her sponsor girls in Zambia who are the same age as her sons. Since 2019, Hart has been working alongside the global Christian humanitarian organisation, which partners with “children, families, and their communities to reach their full potential by tackling the causes of poverty and injustice,” as noted by World Vision’s official website. Hart has gone to Zambia twice to see World Vision’s work firsthand and has also met the three girls she sponsors: Vera, Liness, and Civiness.
“I love being the ambassador for World Vision because I can really speak to what they’ve done. I’ve seen all of these programs at work and how sustainable they are and how helpful they are to the communities that they serve all around the world,” Hart added. “From getting the girls to school, creating another structure for the family in Zambia, which is very large, to helping them build a farm and all the agriculture. It’s just really incredible work that they’ve done there.”
She shared that when she first went to Zambia in 2019, she brought her oldest son with her, before returning with all three of her children in summer 2023. While noting that these trips have been an eye-opening experience for her boys, Hart also candidly described some of the conversations she had with them about privilege.
“My kids have been raised in a nice household and had all the options of afterschool activities and sports,” the Drive Me Crazy star continued. “There’s always been conversations about people who don’t have the opportunities that we do, or people who need a little extra help. And that it’s okay to live with less as well, so they have to walk that line of what it looks like to not go to big stores and buy everything. Or to be able to give back in different ways, even locally.”
