‘Goonies’ and ‘The Conners’ Star Sean Astin Grew Up Thinking John Astin Was His Dad—Then Learned There Were Three Possibilities
Sean Astin — whose long career began with star turns in The Goonies and Rudy, grew with the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and continues today with his role as Tyler on The Conners, which airs its series finale on April 23 — was born on February 25, 1971. But exactly who he was born to was, for many years, a question to both Sean and his mother, actress Patty Duke.
When Duke became pregnant with Sean in 1970, she wasn’t certain who the father was — she had been seeing actor and musician Desi Arnaz Jr., as well as Addams Family star John Astin, who was married to someone else at the time. Duke had also impulsively married concert promoter Michael Tell, a stranger who was subletting her apartment, that same year, in a union that lasted only two weeks.
In 1972, Duke married again, this time to John Astin. Astin adopted Sean and in 1973, he and Duke welcomed Sean’s younger brother, Facts of Life star Mackenzie Astin, who just wrapped up a role on the first season of The Pitt. John Astin raised Sean as his own; as John told People in 2001, “[Sean] basically grew up without any real knowledge of all that stuff.”
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Astin and Duke divorced in 1985; around the same time, Duke revealed to Sean what she believed to be the truth: that his biological father was Arnaz. After hearing this, Sean sought out Arnaz, and began to develop a relationship with him.
Following so far? Well, the story takes an even bigger twist in the ‘9os, when Sean randomly met the niece of Michael Tell, who suggested that he take a paternity test. He did, and found out, at the age of 25, that Michael Tell was his actual biological father. (Duke told People in 2001, “I don’t buy that test,” and claims that the results are impossible because she was never physically intimate with Tell).
In perhaps an even more unusual twist, Astin had good relationships with all three potential fathers, as well as Michael Pearce, his mother’s fourth husband, who she married in 1986 and stayed with until her death in 2016. “If you want to know who I am, John Astin is my father, Michael Tell is my biological father,” Sean told People in 2001. “I have a good relationship with Mike. That’s who I am. I don’t fault anybody, I don’t fault myself or with Desi, who is like my godfather, I have such a powerful love bond with this man, he’s a gorgeous human being.” In his Las Vegas Review-Journal obituary, Tell, who died on April 9, 2025, is quoted as saying of Astin, “We get along great.”
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But Sean regards John Astin, who raised him almost since birth, as his true father. “My feeling is that I want to honor my relationships with the people who looked after me,” Sean told People in 2002, but he especially wanted to honor John Astin, “who gave a huge amount of his time, energy and love.” During a 2003 panel at GenCon, Sean continued to praise Astin, saying, “My dad is awesome; he’s an amazing man; he’s a wonderful man … He’s my emotional, my creative, my sort of philosophical … he’s my touchstone. He really is … The reason I went to college was because of him; I wanted to live up to his expectations.”
Astin returned the sentiment in People in 2001, saying, “The greatest treasures are the treasures of the heart and Sean is a treasure.”
Sean has pursued a far more traditional personal life for himself than any of his parents did; he met his wife, Christine Harnell, when he was 19 and both were students at UCLA. They married in 1992, and have three children together, which, he told People in 2002, are the true focus of his life: “My priorities are clear. I provide for and protect my family.”
1980s Top Summer Blockbusters
July 2019
Celebrate the biggest summer movies of the ’80s, when moviegoing morphed from mere entertainment to blockbuster events.
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