It has been many years since Charles was the new kid on the block, yet Charles in Charge still holds a place in the memories of fans who followed its five-season run.
Rare among network shows that later moved into syndication and still found success, Charles in Charge kept only Scott Baio (Charles) and Willie Aames (Buddy) when it made that transition. Most of the cast changed when the series entered its new life.
That means there are more names to revisit than usual in this look back at the series, but if Charles was responsible for their days, their nights, their wrongs, and their rights, then it only makes sense to check in on all of them.
Scott Baio (Charles)
Although he spent five seasons portraying a live-in housekeeper and nanny for two different families, Charles never received a last name. Even so, the character still managed to teach plenty of lessons to the kids in his care.
Baio’s early fame came from Alan Parker’s oddball all-kid gangster musical Bugsy Malone (1976), where he played the title role and Jodie Foster appeared as nightclub singer Tallulah. Not long after, he landed the part of Chachi Arcola, Arthur Fonzarelli’s cousin, on Happy Days.
What began as a recurring role quickly made him a series regular. He stayed with the show until he and Erin Moran were spun off into Joanie Loves Chachi. After 17 episodes, they returned to Happy Days and remained there until the series ended, after which Baio moved directly to Charles in Charge.
After that series ended, he remained active in television, co-headlining the second season of Baby Talk and later joining Dick Van Dyke for the first two seasons of Diagnosis: Murder.
He also moved into directing early, helming 36 episodes of Charles in Charge alone and later directing installments of Out of This World, The Wayans Brothers, and The Jamie Foxx Show.
Baio got another boost in 2005 when he reunited with Henry Winkler as attorney Bob Loblaw on Arrested Development. A few years later, he took another starring sitcom role in Nick at Nite’s See Dad Run.
More recently, his film credits have mostly been faith-based projects, including Courting Mom and Dad, God’s Not Dead: In God We Trust, and the action film A Line of Fire.
Baio and his wife, Renée Sloan, have been married since 2007.
Willie Aames (Buddy Lembeck)
Aames played Buddy, Charles’ loyal but dim-witted friend. It was actually their second pairing, after the 1982 teen comedy Zapped!
Like Baio, Aames was already well known as a teen star thanks to Eight Is Enough, along with guest roles and a regular spot on the short-lived The Swiss Family Robinson.
After Charles in Charge, he hosted the syndicated children’s version of The Krypton Factor before taking on one of his best-known later roles: the title character in the direct-to-video Christian children’s series Bibleman, which ran from 1995 to 2003. He also stayed visible with an appearance on Celebrity Fit Club in 2005.
In later years, he appeared in several Hallmark movies. His most recent listed screen credit is the indie horror-comedy Armageddon Road.
He and his wife, Winnie Hung, have been married since 2014. He also has two children from earlier relationships.
Jennifer Runyon (Gwendolyn Pierce)
On CBS, Runyon played Gwendolyn, Charles’ off-and-on girlfriend. When the show entered syndication, she returned for a two-part story in which the pair reunited, got engaged, and then split again.
She began her career with a two-year run on Another World before moving into film work. In Ghostbusters, she played the student Peter Venkman questioned about possible psychic powers. She also appeared in The Falcon and the Snowman, along with roles in Up the Creek and The In Crowd.
Runyon later replaced Susan Olsen as Cindy Brady in the special A Very Brady Christmas and appeared in the Roger Corman film Carnosaur.
She married Todd Corman in 1991 and had two children. After largely retiring from acting, she returned in 2015 for Silent Night, Bloody Night 2: Revival and later worked in a few more horror projects.
James Widdoes (Stan Pembroke)
Widdoes portrayed Stan, the head of the Pembroke household. Before that, he had already become familiar to viewers through his role as Hoover in National Lampoon’s Animal House and the less-remembered ABC sequel series Delta House.
He kept acting after the show, with appearances on Simon & Simon and Night Court, but eventually shifted his main focus to directing. That has remained his primary work for decades.
Over the years, he directed episodes of Dave’s World, My Wife and Kids, The King of Queens, The Bill Engvall Show, and Til Death.
He earned a DGA nomination for 8 Simple Rules, which he directed for 63 episodes. He also directed 142 episodes of Two and a Half Men and 123 of Mom, and later received an Emmy nomination. More recently, he directed five episodes of the first season of Netflix’s Leanne.
Julie Cobb (Jill Pembroke)
By the time she joined the cast as Jill Pembroke, Cobb was already an experienced television performer. Her credits included Star Trek, The Brady Bunch, The Waltons, Little House on the Prairie, CHiPs, The Incredible Hulk, and Tobe Hooper’s miniseries Salem’s Lot.
She also appeared in two episodes of Gunsmoke, including one that paired her with her father, Lee J. Cobb.
After Charles in Charge, she never landed another regular series role, but she continued to appear on major shows, including Magnum P.I., Family Ties, Growing Pains, Home Improvement, and ER.
Her most recent screen credit came in an episode of Teenage Bounty Hunters.
Cobb has been married four times, including a marriage that lasted nearly two decades to actor James Cromwell.
April Lerman (Lila Pembroke)
Lerman was a season 1 regular as Lila, the oldest of the Pembroke children.
A few years earlier, she had made her film debut as Kate, one of the orphans in John Huston’s screen version of the musical Annie.
After Charles in Charge, she made several guest appearances on television, including Growing Pains and Parker Lewis Can’t Lose. She later appeared in the film Sorority House Party, which was later released as Rock and Roll Fantasy, and then ended her acting career.
She later earned a law degree from Pepperdine and was admitted to the California Bar, though she did not pursue law professionally. She went on to complete a master’s degree in Counseling Psychology and became a licensed marriage and family therapist, with experience counseling children and adolescents.
Jonathan Ward (Douglas Pembroke)
Ward played Douglas, the Pembrokes’ eldest son.
After that single-season run, he starred in the short-lived drama Heart of the City and later led the FOX sitcom The New Adventures of Beans Baxter.
He continued acting for several more years, including a lead role in the much-maligned Mac and Me and a smaller part in Steel Magnolias.
Ward remained in the business into the late 1990s before stepping away. In 1996, he and his wife Jamie founded TLC, a Toyota Land Cruiser service and restoration center, and later launched the automotive design company ICON.
Michael Pearlman (Jason Pembroke)
Pearlman played Jason, the youngest of the Pembroke sons. A few years before the role, he made his film debut as Paul Simon’s son in One-Trick Pony.
He left acting after Charles in Charge, but people in Wyoming may still know his name. From 2019 to 2025, he served as communications director for Gov. Mark Gordon and now works with the Wyoming Nonprofit Network as director of external affairs.
James T. Callahan (Walter Powell)
Callahan played Walter, Ellen Powell’s father-in-law, and served as the family patriarch while his son was away in the U.S. Navy.
A highly accomplished character actor, his screen career stretched back to the late 1950s. Early on, he showed a talent for moving easily between comedy and drama, from a recurring role on Dr. Kildare to a regular part on the George Burns and Connie Stevens sitcom Wendy and Me.
During the 1970s and 1980s, he was a familiar guest and recurring presence on television, including a memorable episode of M*A*S*H, and he also had a regular role as Sgt. Hal Grady on The Runaways before joining Charles in Charge.
Later credits included episodes of The Golden Girls, ER, The Practice, Medium, and 7th Heaven, among many others.
Callahan died of esophageal cancer at 76. He was survived by his wife, Peggy Cannon.
Sandra Kerns (Ellen Powell)
Kerns joined Charles in Charge in its second season as Ellen, the mother of Jamie, Sarah, and Adam.
Although her husband was supposedly in the Navy, he was never seen on the series. Even Ellen herself gradually disappeared from the show, appearing only three more times during the final two seasons.
Kerns had been acting steadily since the mid-1970s, with early credits on Police Story, The Rockford Files, and Sanford and Son. She also had a supporting part in House Calls and later guest-starred on The Incredible Hulk, Who’s the Boss?, and Punky Brewster.
By the early 1990s, she had retired from acting, reportedly to concentrate on family life. She and stuntman Hubie Kerns Jr. have been married since 1975 and have two children.
Nicole Eggert (Jamie Powell)
Eggert played Jamie, the oldest daughter in the Powell family.
By then, she already had an impressive résumé as a child actor, with TV movies and recurring roles on T.J. Hooker and Who’s the Boss?.
After Charles in Charge, she made three films with then-fiancé Corey Haim and later took on the role most viewers still associate with her: Summer Quinn on Baywatch.
Following two seasons on that international hit, she kept acting while also becoming a frequent presence on reality television through the 2000s and 2010s.
More recently, she has hosted the podcast Perfectly Twisted with Nicole Eggert.
Josie Davis (Sarah Powell)
Davis played Sarah, the youngest of the Powell sisters.
This was her first television role, but it was far from her last. A few years after the series ended, she joined the cast of The Young and the Restless and originated the role of Grace Turner.
Although that job lasted only a year, she kept working steadily in one-off TV roles on shows such as Arli$$, Baywatch, and Nash Bridges. After a guest turn as a different character on Beverly Hills, 90210, she returned in a recurring role and later became a series regular on Aaron Spelling’s Titans.
Since then, Davis has remained active in television films and series, appearing in projects ranging from Two and a Half Men to Hawaii Five-0.
Alexander Polinsky (Adam Powell)
Polinsky portrayed Adam, the youngest of the Powell children.
He was only 12 when he joined the show and had very little acting experience. As his career progressed, he shifted away from on-camera work and found another path in voice acting, beginning with the 1999 animated series Roughnecks: Starship Troopers Chronicles and continuing ever since.
Along with a recurring role as Control Freak in multiple Teen Titans projects, he has voiced characters in A.T.O.M.: Alpha Teens on Machines, The Life and Times of Juniper Lee, Legion of Super Heroes, Breadwinners, Monster High, Blaze and the Monster Machines, and more. He also provided additional voices for Minions and voiced the Dark Elves in Krampus.
Ellen Travolta (Lillian)
When Ellen Travolta joined as Charles’ mother, Lillian, it was actually the second time she had played Scott Baio’s mom.
Years earlier, she portrayed Chachi’s mother on Happy Days and later on Joanie Loves Chachi.
And yes, she is John Travolta’s older sister. She began working in Hollywood a few years after him, making her TV debut in an episode of the Jack Palance drama Bronk in 1975, the same month Welcome Back, Kotter premiered.
Her first real breakout came with the short-lived 1979 sitcom Makin’ It, which was openly inspired by Saturday Night Fever.
After Charles in Charge ended, she spent several years away from television before joining General Hospital as Gloria Cerullo in 1994. She later appeared on The Single Guy and The Pretender and continued working intermittently in film and TV.
More recently, she appeared in the Hallmark movies Haul Out the Holly and Haul Out the Holly: Lit Up, returned to General Hospital, and also appeared as Grandma in her brother’s feature directorial debut.
Where can I watch Charles in Charge?
Charles in Charge is currently available to stream on The Roku Channel.
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