Kimberly Jean Brown (born November 16, 1984) is an Emmy-nominated American actress of stage, television, and screen. She is best known for starring in the first three Halloweentown movies, produced for the Disney Channel.
Born in Gaithersburg, Maryland, Brown began her career at a very early age, starting with commercials booked through the Ford Agency at age 5. From there, she landed her first Broadway job two years later, and at one point set a record by having appeared in three Broadway shows by the time she was 9 (Four Baboons Adoring the Sun, Les Misérables, and Show Boat). She also did voiceover work, including the famous line "Silly rabbit...Trix are for kids!", as well as voicework in Pixar's A Bug's Life. She also performed the role of Marah Lewis on the soap opera Guiding Light from 1993-1998 (see below; she returned briefly to this role in November and December of 2006).
Her first major role was would-be witch Marnie Cromwell in the Disney Channel film Halloweentown, which she reprised in two sequels, Halloweentown II: Kalabar's Revenge and Halloweentown High. Brown turned down appearing in the third sequel, Return to Halloweentown, due to prior commitments in filming the upcoming horror film, Big Bad Wolf (film). Sara Paxton, of Aquamarine fame, took up the role. Brown also portrayed 14 year old Jamie Grover in the Disney Channel movie Quints.
The film that first got critics' attention was Tumbleweeds, in which she played the mature-beyond-her-years daughter of a woman who kept drifting into bad relationships, keeping the two from ever staying in one place for too long. New York Times film critic Stephen Holden said Brown's work here was "the child performance of the year". Said Stephanie Zacharek of Salon.com:
"When we see Ava (Brown) flirting tentatively with the classmate who's got a crush on her, or building a tower out of frosted doughnuts with her new best girlfriend, she radiates a youthful awkwardness that's both believable and beguiling."
Brown has recently appeared in more mainstream films, including the role of Steve Martin's somewhat rebellious daughter in Bringing Down the House, a punked-up executive assistant at a record company in Be Cool, the younger version of Kathy Bates' bipolar character in My Sister's Keeper, and autistic psychic Annie Wheaton in the mini-series Stephen King's Rose Red.
Brown returned briefly to the soap opera Guiding Light, reprising her role as Marah Lewis in late 2006. Her first airdate was on November 17 and her final airdate was December 1.
