Education
Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University. Fordham University.
Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University. Fordham University.
Mitchell-Smith"s very first passion was ballet. While there on his scholarship, he was discovered by a casting director and his film career began in 1982 at age 12 when he played a younger version of the title character in Sidney Lumet"s Daniel. After a starring role in the 1984 film The Wild Life, he was cast as Wyatt Donnelly in the 1985 teen classic Weird Science by writer/director John Hughes.
The film focuses on two nerdy teenage boys who create a woman of their own (played by Kelly Le Brock), as they are unable to find girlfriends.
Mitchell-Smith starred in several other films and television series, most notably The Chocolate War and Superboy. None of these brought him the same degree of recognition.
He decided to leave acting entirely in 1991, his final role being a guest appearance on Silk Stalkings. Recently Mitchell-Smith has done select voice over work (recording for two episodes -- "Moon Warriors" and "Heads Will Roll"—of Fox Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder"s "Axe Cop").
Mitchell-Smith received his Bachelor of Arts in Medieval Studies from University of California Davis and his Master of Arts in Medieval Studies from Fordham University.
He received a doctoral degree from Texas Agricultural and Mechanical University in 2005, and he is currently an associate professor in the English department at California State University, Long Beach. Mitchell-Smith publishes on chivalry in the later Middle Ages, and he also publishes on cinematic, television, and video game versions of medieval culture. Mitchell-Smith has published on Dungeons & Dragons, and is a staff writer for "Talk Wargaming" and writes a column for "Forces of Geek" called "Playing the Nerd." He works as a technical writer and editor for smaller independent game producers, and he is an active table-top gamer and an organizer of tabletop game events in Southern California.
Mitchell-Smith met Susannah Demaree at Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California.
They have two children, born in 1998 and 2000.