Why The Grinch’s Cindy Lou Who Actress Taylor Momsen Disappeared From Hollywood

Actress and rock ‘n’ roller Taylor Momsen made her screen debut at the age of three, appearing in a 1997 Shake ‘n Bake commercial. In the ad, she noted that Shake ‘n Bake dinners were an excellent sign of her mother’s love, and she demonstrated the product with aplomb. It’s Shake ‘n Bake, and she helped. Momsen was also, at the time, working as a child model, something she recalls hating. In a 2011 interview with Bethesda, Momsen said that she recalls being busy a lot as a toddler and that she wasn’t given a lot of time to spend with friends. Her whole life, she said, she was in and out of school. 

That same year, while she was still in preschool, Momsen started appearing on a few TV shows, notably the 1997 “The Cosby Show” spinoff “Cosby,” and in a 1998 episode of “Early Edition.” Momsen’s first feature film was director David Worth’s 1999 serial killer thriller called “The Prophet’s Game,” starring Dennis Hopper. She only had tiny roles in those shows, however, and was hardly in “Game.” 

When Momsen was six, however, she had what might be considered her big break, playing Cindy Lou Who in Ron Howard’s gigantic 2000 Christmas hit “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” That film starred Jim Carrey as the titular Grinch, a green-furred, misanthropic yeti who hates all the secular trappings of the Christmas season in the fantasy kingdom of Whoville. The Whos of Whoville (played variously by Christine Baranski, Jeffrey Tambor, and Molly Shannon, have lost themselves in the bustle of the season, and have little time for gentleness amid the jollity. Only the young Cindy Lou still seems to possess warmth and compassion. 

In 2012, however, Momsen left acting to focus on a career in music. She currently fronts the band The Pretty Reckless and has talked a lot about her transition from film to music.

But to go back for a moment: 

“How the Grinch Stole Christmas” was overdesigned and expensive (it cost $125 million), but it hit the zeitgeist just right, making almost $350 million at the box office. Like many Christmas movies, it made its way into the culture’s annual Yule rotation, watched incessantly for years. A whole generation grew up on the film. The Whos, it should be noted, aren’t human characters, and the adult Whos all have animal-like noses and wear garish clothing. Cindy Lou still has her human nose, but sported outsize incisors, and her hair was always done up in elaborate braids. Momsen likely availed herself well merely because she could act with confidence while wearing such a strange costume. 

Of course, she had nothing on her co-star, Jim Carrey, who had to endure multiple hours of painful makeup every day to become the Grinch. Famously, Carrey was trained by a torture expert to make his way through filming every day. 

Momsen was nominated for a Saturn Award and a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for her performance as Cindy Lou Who, and it’s easy to see why. She had a natural assurance in the role, comfortable on camera. Of course, after spending half of her life to date in front of a camera, it likely came naturally. Momsen also made her singing debut in “Grinch,” and recorded the track “Where Are You, Christmas?” It’s not a standard, but it likely made Momsen used to singing for a crowd. One can assume it prepared her for her awesome wailing later in life.

While still in elementary school, Momsen’s acting career took off. In 2002 alone, she appeared in Robert Rodriguez’s high-profile fantasy sequel “Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams” as a very posh character. Momsen will likely not appear in the reboot. She also played “the daughter” in the Hollywood war drama “We Were Soldiers,” starring Mel Gibson. She also played one of the title kids in Gary J. Tunnucliuffe’s straight-to-video version of “Hansel & Gretel,” which also starred her contemporary Dakota Fanning. 

For the next three years, however, Momsen experienced something most actors must inevitably encounter: a dry period. She continued to model but didn’t find any significant acting work. It wouldn’t be until 2006 that she was cast in a WB series called “Misconceptions,” a show about a once-reckless sperm donor (Adam Rothenberg) who meets his biological daughter (Momsen), much to the consternation of her legal parents (Jane Levees and French Stewart). Seven episodes were filmed, and the show got the usual push from the studio, but curiously none of them aired. 

The same year as “Misconceptions,” Momsen also appeared in the third of the “Shiloh” movies, “Saving Shiloh.” She also was one of the finalists to play the title role in “Hannah Montana,” a role that, we now know, went to Miley Cyrus. One can imagine a parallel universe wherein Momsen’s career received as large a bump as Cyrus’ with “Hannah Montana.” Momsen might likely have moved into music just that much more quickly. 

In 2007, when Momsen was 14, she secured a regular role on the hit CW TV series “Gossip Girl” playing the aspiring fashion designer — and aspiring Mean Girl — Jenny. Momsen eventually appeared in 88 episodes of the series over its first four seasons and as a guest star in its sixth. That show, like, many, was rebooted for a spell. It was the most lucrative acting job Momsen ever had, and probably brought her as many fans as “Grinch” did when she was a young child. While starring on “Gossip Girl,” she also worked with director Gus Van Sant on his teen death drama “Paranoid Park,” showing she was becoming more sophisticated as a performer. Of course, she also had an eye for big commercial projects: she played a voice in the kid superhero flick “Underdog.” 

It was also during her stint on “Gossip Girl,” about when she was 16, that Momsen announced she founded her own rock band, The Pretty Reckless. The band also features Ben Phillips, Mark Damon, and Jamie Perkins, and they began performing small gigs in the late 2000s, opening for bands like the Veronicas in small venues in New York. Although a child of Hollywood, Momsen found a new home in the New York rock scene and began to thrive as a young adult. In 2010, The Pretty Reckless released their first single “Make Me Wanna Die,” Their first studio album, “Light Me Up” came out that same year, and it did decent numbers. 

At the time, many assumed that Momsen was just trying out music as a side hustle, but in an interview with Nylon, Momsen admitted that rock was her new passion. Acting was now the side gig. She would eventually leave acting behind. Why stay in acting when kids tease you all the time anyway?

In the Nylon interview, Momen said of her early days as a musician: 

“I get it. […] I wouldn’t have taken me seriously. I understand, especially coming from an acting background and being on a very popular television show at the time that was very tabloid-based, that it seemed ridiculous. Their thought was, ‘She’s young and she’s going through a phase.’ But in my core, I knew it wasn’t a phase.”

She said that she stopped encountering the “It’s just a phase” comments after a full decade of touring, writing songs, and putting out records. As of this recording, The Pretty Reckless has released four studio albums and two EPs. They have also released 14 music videos, seven of which Momsen co-directed. The band has played at dozens of festivals, from the Warped Tour to Lollapalooza, and was the opening band for Evanescence and Soundgarden. 

Touring with Soundgarden was a dream come true for Momsen, and she talked a little bit about it with People Magazine in 2021. Sadly, while touring in 2017, Soundgarden’s frontman Chris Cornell took his own life in Detroit. Shortly thereafter, Kato Khandwala, Momsen’s friend and her band’s producer, died in a motorcycle accident. Momsen admitted that it was the darkest period of her life, and spending an extended period depressed and taking drugs. About the period, Momsen said: 

“Opening for Soundgarden was the highest of highs for me. […] So to have it end so tragically was crushing. We were there that night in Detroit and spoke that evening. To wake up to the news that he had passed was such a shock. I was not equipped to handle that.”

Then, when news came in about Khandwala, Momsen said that she “went into this hole of just utter depression and substance abuse. I was in a very unhealthy space.”

In the Nylon interview, Momsen talked about rebuilding her soul. It was a cliché, she said, but she found solace in music. She listened to her favorite bands growing up, bands like the Beatles, biopic darling Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Then her bandmates arrived to implore that they channel their angst into a new record. Momsen was happy to do so. They put out their fourth album, “Death by Rock and Roll” in 2021, and it was cathartic for the singer. 

“As dramatic as it may sound, I really do credit the writing and the making of this album as the reason that I’m still around. It’s the thing that really saved my life and allowed me to find my center again and keep going. […] A lot of people might think that’s a really morbid title, but that’s not what that means to me at all. […] ‘Death by rock and roll’ is a battle cry for life; it’s living to the fullest. Live life your own way. It’s this ultimate freedom. I think that this record is probably the first album that I had titled before I had all the songs done.”

Momsen talked at length about “Death By Rock and Roll” in a 2021 interview with Kerrang!. A hint: if you’re being interviewed by Kerrang!, then you’re better known for being a rocker than for being a Hollywood moppet from a 25-year-old Christmas movie. “Acting was a job that I enjoyed,” Momsen said in the People interview, “But I was never in love with it. With music, I wouldn’t know who I am without it. When I got to an age where I could make my own decisions, I quit all my other jobs to just focus on music.”

So Momsen didn’t really leave the spotlight. She merely moved into a different one. If you haven’t heard the Pretty Reckless, check them out. They have a nice pop rock sound and Momsen’s voice is perfect.