Radames Pera

Born in New York City in 1960 to Eugenio Pera and Louise (also known as Lisa) Vinnichenko (1940-2013), Radames Pera moved to Hollywood in 1963 with his Russian-born mother, who was pursuing her own acting career. At age eight, he was discovered by director Daniel Mann and cast as "Stavros", the dying son of Anthony Quinn and Irene Papas, in A Dream of Kings (1969). Pera's mother found him an agent and he ended up starring and guest-starring in many TV shows in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. As he was able to "deliver the goods" emotionally, he became a successful young character actor which led to his landing the role of Young Caine, aka "Grasshopper", in Kung Fu (1972), and, later, of writer John Sanderson Edwards Jr., aka "John Jr.", Mary Ingalls' fiancée, in Little House on the Prairie (1974). In the summer of 1978, he began a three-year intensive study of acting and directing with Stella Adler, first in Los Angeles and then in New York, where he played Alan Bates's estranged son in the British feature film Very Like a Whale (1980). After returning to L.A. in 1981 he discovered the painful reality that so many child actors in that era faced: the near-impossible transition to an adult acting career. His last major feature film role was as "Sgt. Stepan Gorsky" in John Milius's Red Dawn (1984). His last major TV role was as a Nazi vigilante youth-gang leader in The New Mike Hammer (1984). In 1988, he started his own business designing and installing home theater and residential sound systems in Los Angeles. In 1993, he moved his business to Portland, Oregon and later to Austin, Texas. He now reportedly lives in France with his wife and daughter.