Bizarre life of 10 Things I Hate About You star Andrew Keegan (2024)

Heath Ledger as Patrick Verona, (left), and Andrew Keegan as Joey Donner. Photo / Supplied

Twenty years ago, Andrew Keegan became a bona fide teen heart-throb when he played popular jerk Joey Donner in 10 Things I Hate About You.

Keegan, then only 20 years old, was a rising star when he landed the role. He'd already appeared in hit '90s shows Party of Five, Full House, Sabrina The Teenage Witch and 7th Heaven and had a face that decorated many, many bedroom walls, reports news.com.au.

10 Things, released in early 1999, was responsible for catapulting its young lead actors, including the late Heath Ledger, Julia Stiles and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, into big-screen stardom — and Keegan seemed destined to go the same way.

But for some reason, his movie career never really took off.

After 10 Things, Keegan continued his Shakespearean teen-flick adaptation trend (10 Things was inspired by Taming With The Shrew) with high school thriller O, based loosely on Othello.

It was only a lukewarm success, and attracted mixed reviews from critics.

Keegan's next movie, The Broken Hearts Club, was much the same story.

By the mid-noughties, the once in-demand young actor's working life was almost entirely made up of guest roles on TV shows including House, CSI: NY, and 7th Heaven, and a handful of appearances in low-budget and direct-to-video movies.

HIGH-PROFILE ROMANCES

During the late '90s and early '00s, as his career was really blossoming, Keegan cemented his place in teen magazines everywhere with a string of high-profile girlfriends.

He briefly dated Party of Five co-star Jennifer Love Hewitt in 1997 before embarking on a relationship with LeAnn Rimes.

They made the perfect young celebrity couple — he was an in-demand actor, she was America's sweetheart singer.

But after three years, the romance soured and they called it quits in 2001 — reportedly around the time Keegan began taking an interest in Rimes' Coyote Ugly co-star Piper Perabo.

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In 2002, the actor met The Girl Next Door's Elisha Cuthbert, and the pair started dating but they broke up a year later.

Keegan, 40, has been in a relationship with Arista Ilona for six years. They welcomed their first child together, daughter Aiya Rose, in 2016.

RELIGIOUS CALLING

The actor, searching for an identity away from his childhood fame, claims his spiritual awakening first began after a traumatic experience. In 2011, he and a couple of friends were attacked by a gang of six men in Venice Beach, at least one of whom had a gun.

Keegan wound up in hospital and took the shocking experience as a sign, pointing him toward a higher purpose of bettering his community.

Keegan's spiritual transformation began to take a physical form in front of the 110-year-old Rose Temple in Venice, California, in 2013.

According to Vulture, the former child star felt "especially aligned with (the) place of worship", so he dug a hole in front of the building, and in the hole, placed "a small rose-quartz crystal" and made a promise.

"I was clear that if there was ever an appropriate time to be in the service of the temple, I would be," he said.

Keegan claimed that following that day, he experienced a string of bizarre coincidences which prompted him to realise his "true calling".

"I had a moment where I was looking at a street lamp and it exploded. That was a weird coincidence," he later told Vice.

"At a ceremony, a heart-shaped rose quartz crystal was on the altar, and synchronistically, this whole thing happened. It's a long story, but basically the crystal jumped off the altar and skipped on camera. That was weird."

In May 2014, Keegan leased the building he'd felt so connected to and launched his own new age temple called Full Circle, into which he claimed he sank $150,000 — or "everything" he had.

According to Keegan, the idea behind Full Circle was for "enlightened" members to gather at the temple to initiate change through events like concerts, political gatherings for self-help gurus, sit-ins and workshops.

The organisation briefly closed down in early 2017 as funding dried-up, before being granted a last-minute reprieve when an investor came on-board.

Unfortunately for Keegan, it was only a stay of execution, and just a few months later, Full Circle vacated the Rose Temple for good.

HOLLYWOOD DARLINGS

In the past couple of years, Keegan's appeared in a couple of short films, and — most notably — the surprise comedy hit, Hollywood Darlings (currently streaming on Netflix).

The faux-reality series stars former '80s and '90s child stars Beverley Mitchell (7th Heaven), Christine Lakin (Step By Step) and Jodie Sweetin (Full House), who play exaggerated versions of themselves.

Given his former teen heart-throb status and recent spiritual turn, Keegan was an easy choice to guest star.

"It was fun to take the opportunity to play to what some people think I do now, so why not have fun with it," Keegan said at the show's premiere.

"This was the perfect venue to explore that creatively. It is an extreme, most extreme version of what we do, but yes, there are things about it that we drew from to create the show."

Hollywood Darlings was recently renewed for season two, or if this story has given you serious Andrew Keegan nostalgia, 10 Things I Hate About You is currently streaming on Stan.

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