C. Thomas Howell is an American actor and film director who was born on December 7, 1966, in Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California, in the United States. He was born to his parents Christopher N. and Candice Howell and grew up with two sisters and a brother. Howell's father was a stunt coordinator and a rodeo performer which inspired him to do the same. He began acting at the age of four and was cast in the Brian Keith Show. Howell's parents divorced when he was young and he graduated from Saugus High School in 1984. Howell tried his hand at rodeo riding for a few years before making his film debut in 1982 as Tyler in Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. He went on to land a role in Francis Ford Coppola's film "The Outsiders". Howell's performance in the Coppola film earned him a Young Artist Award.

He enjoyed a highly successful acting career which spanned from the 1980s to the present. His most recent film is "Rich Boy, Rich Girl" which is set to release in 2019. Howell married Rae Dawn Chong on July 11, 1989, but divorced a year later. He married again, this time to Sylvie Anderson in 1992 and went on to have three children before divorcing in 2015.