Haley Joel Osment on Access Hollywood

Haley Joel Osment on Access Hollywood
August 10, 1999

Reporter: Well, the number one movie at the box office right now may be a Bruce Willis film, but even he is amazed at his young co-star, Haley Joel Osment. As our Tony Potts found out, the psychological thriller, "The Sixth Sense," is getting rave reviews, especially when it comes to the talented eleven year old.
Bruce Willis: I can’t say enough about Haley Joel Osment. When the cameras rolled, he became a professional male actor that I would put up against any actor I’d ever worked with.
Tony Potts: (Talking to Haley Joel Osment) How’s that make you feel when you hear something like that from Bruce?
Haley Joel Osment: Just makes me feel good. But I know I can be better, I’m sure. He’s worked with a lot of fantastic people, being a great actor himself. So it was fun working with him.
Reporter Voiceover: He’s eleven years old, has his head on straight, and is quickly becoming one of Hollywood’s biggest stars.

"The Sixth Sense" Clip:
BW: How often do you see them?
HJO: All the time.

Voice-over: Haley Joel Osment steals the show in "The Sixth Sense" with his Oscar-caliber performance as a boy who can see the dead in this thriller that would normally scare any eleven year old.
TP: Did you have the heebie-jeebies and nightmares and stuff like that? Anything like that?
HJO: No, actually I slept really good in Philadelphia. When my dad and I were there, we had a movie store down the road, sort of a Blockbuster, and we always rented movies and we rented scary movies since we were shooting one. So I only had nightmares after I saw a scary movie.
Voice-over: Haley is certainly no one-hit wonder. He starred as Tom Hanks’ son in "Forrest Gump," had a role on the sitcom "The Jeff Foxworthy Show," and now he’s stealing the show from one of Hollywood’s biggest names, "The Sixth Sense" co-star, Bruce Willis. But as our Tony Potts found out, Haley is just a kid at heart. During a visit to the world famous Long Beach Aquarium with his sister, Haley says he’d rather spend time with the animals than act.
TP: One of the cool things, I think, that you told me is that you want to be a marine biologist, at least at one point, right?
HJO: Yeah. Then I found out they spend most of the time in a lab, so I think I’m going to be a zoologist.
Reporter: Sounds like a plan to me. Well, ABC will be the first to air "The Sixth Sense" on network television. It will cost ABC about fifteen percent of what the movie grosses domestically.