One of the things we know about Hollywood is that for child actors, it can be a hazardous place. We’ve heard time after time stories about child actors who were unable to escape from the shadow or gravity of their iconic roles. For example, everyone probably still thinks of Macaulay Culkin as the fresh-faced young boy from the Home Alone movies. However, even today, the actor struggles to escape from that character’s shadow as he’s also battled a number of personal demons that went with the fame he attained as a child. There are just so many stories of child actors growing up with abuse, substance addiction, and depression, especially after they discover that Hollywood doesn’t want them to grow up.
Neil Patrick Harris could have been one of those statistics, as he, at age 16, played the iconic TV character “Dougie Howser.” The figure had become a part of the American lexicon often used when describing a child of exception intelligence. Now, if you think about it, that’s a lot for anyone to live up to, right? Imagine feeling compared every day of your life to a character you play on TV, and the fact that his role was a genius didn’t help. But, as we know by now, NPH overcame the gravity of his character’s popularity and re-defined himself in the eyes of the public, with his name becoming even more popular than that of his role. In fact, kids today probably don’t even know who Doogie Howser is, but they do know about Neal Patrick Harris. But, NPH also did something else that most child actors never accomplish, he created yet another memorable TV character called “Barney Stimson” on the hit TV sitcom “How I met Your Mother.” In this video, we look at NPH as Barney Stimpson singing “Suits, Suits” during a musical fantasy dream sequence on the show.
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In the video, Stimpson is given an ultimatum by a beautiful woman who tells him he has to choose between her and his suits. This prompts a hilarious dreamlike musical sequence in which Stimpson professes his undying love for his suits. I’ve got to tell you, folks, I would definitely watch a play based off of this skit! NPH is simply dazzling! And the ending was absolutely perfect!
Watch Barney Stimpson singing a hilarious love letter to his cotton-blended best friends in the video below.
