I watched the cinematic classic Kicking & Screaming (2005, not 1995) with my kids the other day, because why not? As I was watching and gaining inspiration from Coach Phil Weston, I got to wondering; what are Massimo and Gian Piero up to these days?

I’m sure you need no explanation as to who Massimo and Gian Piero are, but for posterity’s sake I’ll lay it out here. Coach Phil (Will Ferrell) starts coaching his son’s new soccer team, the Tigers. Said team is filled with misfits who at first blush are not that great at the sport they are playing (a fairly unique storytelling trope). The local Italian butcher has two nephews working for him, Massimo and Gian Piero, who just so happen to be great at soccer. Coach Phil convinces their uncle to let them play. There’s more to the story after that, but not really.

These kids were better at soccer than I am at being completely useless, so I was very curious to see how their lives turned out. As talented as they appeared, I figured child actors, there’s probably not much to see. As it turned out, I was pleasantly surprised at what I found.

Massimo actor Lorenzo Richelmy stayed in the profession and carved out a nice little career for himself. He’s got about 31 credits to his name according to IMDb, with the most notable being Marco Polo, the Netflix series. I actually enjoyed that show quite a bit. Benedict Wong, aka Wong from Doctor Strange, was the real star of the show as Kublai Khan, but Richelmy was Marco Polo. I’d say that’s a pretty big deal.

And then we have Manuel Locatelli, aka Gian Piero. He was the young stud in the movie, and I guess it wasn’t just a flash in the pan. Instead of taking the acting route, Manuel stuck to futbol. Locatelli came up through the AC Milan system and played with the main club for a couple of years. I’m not going to pretend for one second that I know anything about soccer, but I’ve heard of AC Milan, so he must be somewhat talented. He currently plays for Sassuolo (some other team) and is a member of the Italian National Team.

No, I’m just kidding. I’m not going to say the real Massimo (Alessandro Ruggiero) and Gian Piero (Francesco Liotti) actually led unremarkable lives because that seems unfair. What I am going to say is I’m not totally sure what years they were even born. I don’t even know if the people that I found on the Google machine were even them. But hey, we’ll always have Kicking & Screaming.