The “Family Affair” Child Star Hollywood Broke
The “Family Affair” Child Star Hollywood Broke
In 1976, the entertainment industry and the American public were collectively shaken when child star Anissa Jones—noted in reports as Ana Jones—was discovered dead at a friend’s house following a party. As law enforcement officials began their investigation into the tragedy, they uncovered a series of chilling details regarding the final hours of her life. Anissa Jones had spent years charming audiences across the United States with her endearing performance as Buffy Davis on the CBS hit sitcom Family Affair. However, as the history of Hollywood has demonstrated far too often, the glamorous and polished facade of a child star’s life frequently obscures a deep, troubling darkness beneath the surface. Jones’s tragic life and untimely death were, unfortunately, no different.
Mary Anissa Jones was born on March 11, 1958, in Indiana. Not long after the birth of her younger brother, Paul, the Jones family relocated to California. While this move would ultimately set the wheels of Anissa’s destiny in motion, significant personal hardship began well before her acting career took flight. Her parents divorced shortly after their move to the West Coast, sparking a bitter, years-long custody battle over the two children. While the legal conflict eventually resulted in a victory for Jones’s father, Anissa spent much of that tumultuous period with her mother, Mary. Recognizing her daughter’s innate talents early on, Mary began working to nurture them, perhaps with a degree of intensity that proved overwhelming for a young child. Mary was determined to see her daughter succeed and enrolled Anissa in dance classes when she was only four years old.
The Jones family’s new neighbors in California were clearly captivated by young Anissa’s charm as well, and they suggested that Mary start taking her to auditions for television commercials. Anissa found immediate success in this arena; by the age of six, she was already appearing in national television commercials for breakfast cereal. She would go on to star in three more commercials over the next two years, but this early work served only as a prelude to her eventual stardom.
At eight years old, Anissa Jones landed the role that would define her life. She was discovered by a producer and cast as Buffy Davis on CBS’s new sitcom, Family Affair, which premiered in 1966. The show followed the story of three orphaned children sent to live with their wealthy, sophisticated uncle. It was a wholesome, family-friendly premise, and Jones was considered perfect for the role. Physically, she was well-suited for the part; she was small for her age, which allowed the eight-year-old actress to convincingly portray the six-year-old character of Buffy. Audiences were instantly smitten.
Viewers embraced Family Affair and the character of Buffy with rapture. Her blonde hair, often styled in pigtails, and her charming, genuine smile made her an immediate hit among America’s rapidly expanding television audience. Anissa Jones was easy to love, but the reality of the show’s production was anything but easy. As Family Affair grew in popularity, so did the professional demands placed upon the young cast, and it hit Anissa particularly hard. The production schedule was grueling, and she found herself dedicating almost every waking moment of her life to the series. The show filmed throughout the year, and the youngster would frequently work seven-day weeks just to meet the intense deadlines imposed by the network.
Family Affair continued to climb in popularity, and CBS executives considered the show a bona fide hit. It did not take long for it to reach the number-one spot in the ratings, and Buffy and her onscreen siblings became household names practically overnight. Jones’s character was rarely seen without her signature doll, Mrs. Beasley, and the character’s popularity was so immense that the network released a real-life version, which quickly became the bestselling doll in America. There were Buffy coloring books, lunch boxes, a full line of children’s clothing, and even a cookbook featuring Jones on the cover.
Despite the fame, Anissa was known for her profound kindness and her undying love for her brother, Paul, who would always accompany her to the set. Whenever she received gifts from the studio or fans, she would insist that her brother receive one as well. If such a gesture was not possible, she would graciously give her own gifts away, demonstrating a selfless desire to share equally with her brother. Cast and crew members alike on Family Affair continually praised Jones’s natural intelligence and her ability as an actor. One co-star later gushed about her professional demeanor, noting that she would always make it a point to befriend guest stars so that they would feel welcome on the set.
She even managed to charm some of the biggest names of the era during her short career. In 1969, at the absolute height of her celebrity, Jones made her only feature film appearance, landing a small role in the movie The Trouble with Girls, starring none other than Elvis Presley. Despite her low movie count, Hollywood nonetheless pursued Anissa Jones for her charming personality in various other media. Between 1967 and 1971, she appeared as a guest on no fewer than five popular talk shows, including those hosted by Merv Griffin and Dick Cavett. Furthermore, in 1967, she presented an award at that year’s Emmy Awards, likely making her one of the youngest people ever to do so.
However, the weight of fame soon began to wear on the young star. While Family Affair provided the kind of steady employment most young actors dream of, as the years passed, Anissa began to see the darker side of her popularity. She grew tired of playing the role of Buffy. She began to resent the character for seemingly trapping her in a perpetual state of childhood, viewing the role as increasingly babyish and restrictive. Soon, her dissatisfaction began to manifest on screen. Her performances in the later seasons of Family Affair were arguably not as energetic or convivial as they had been in the beginning, perhaps in part due to Buffy’s less-than-enthusiastic screen presence.
Family Affair’s ratings began to decline, and in 1971, the show was cancelled after five successful seasons. Anissa Jones, now twelve years old, was initially delighted and eager to begin the next phase of her career. However, the looming shadow of the character of Buffy would prove exceptionally difficult to shake. She auditioned for the role of Regan MacNeil in the 1973 horror classic The Exorcist. Playing the part of a young girl possessed by a demon would have been the perfect pivot for the burgeoning actress, offering a complete departure from her previous work. However, director William Friedkin gave the role to Linda Blair instead, citing his difficulty in imagining the adorable, recognizable Anissa Jones in such a horrific role.
In yet another attempt to avoid being typecast, she later auditioned for the role of Iris in Martin Scorsese’s 1976 classic Taxi Driver. Again, the part could not have been more different from the innocent Buffy; Iris was a thirteen-year-old street worker who attracts the attention of Robert De Niro’s character, Travis Bickle. Perhaps Scorsese suffered from the same mental blockage as Friedkin, because the role was ultimately given to Jodie Foster.
As she entered her teenage years, Jones began to spiral. With little professional success coming her way, Anissa decided to lean into the freedom that had been previously denied to her. She turned to substance use and shoplifting as outlets for her frustration and boredom. She attempted a few normal, non-acting jobs, but she could not seem to hold one down, and reports from the time indicated that she suffered from increasingly erratic mood swings.
By this time, the long custody battle between her parents had ended, and she and her brother had gone to live with their father. However, on March 7, 1974, he passed away from cardiovascular disease, just four days before his daughter’s sixteenth birthday. Although Jones’s mother, Mary, was technically her guardian, she and Anissa did not spend time at the family home. This situation infuriated Mary. Anissa would often disappear for days at a time to be with friends, whom her mother felt were a detrimental influence on her. Such was her mother’s contempt for Anissa’s new lifestyle that Mary frequently filed missing person reports with the authorities after not seeing her daughter for several days.
Her transition into adulthood did little to ease her mother’s concerns. Anissa turned eighteen on March 11, 1976, which meant she was finally legally entitled to all the money she had earned during her years on Family Affair, which had been held in a savings account on her behalf. This one-time payout was massive, and she immediately began putting the funds toward her new, destructive hobby: intense partying. Naturally, this meant that her substance use worsened, and her life began to spiral out of control with even greater velocity. She had received a payout of just under $200,000, and after only four or five months, she had already exhausted most of it.
On August 27, 1976, Jones took a trip with her boyfriend and several friends to party in the beachside town of Oceanside, California. The excursion would end at the home of the father of one of Jones’s fourteen-year-old friends. The following morning, August 28, Anissa Jones was found dead from an overdose. The extent of her substance consumption was so significant that even the coroner was reportedly shocked at how such a young girl had managed to ingest such a large amount. He characterized it as one of the most severe overdoses he had ever witnessed in his career. Anissa Jones had always loved the seaside; after holding a small, private service, her family had her body cremated and scattered her ashes over the Pacific Ocean.
Among the items discovered at the scene of Jones’s death was an envelope containing the business address of a Dr. Don Carlos Moshos. This envelope held a detailed, handwritten description of the type and quantity of one of the substances that later appeared on Jones’s toxicology report. Moshos had allegedly been playing the role of Jones’s “Doctor Feelgood,” prescribing the young woman illicit substances on demand. Indeed, prior to her death, Moshos was already under investigation for his highly suspicious professional practices.
The evidence began to mount quickly. Upon the news of Moshos’s potential involvement in Jones’s demise, the media began to swarm with reports, digging up any and all damning information they could find. Many of the tenants in the office building where Moshos practiced reported on the immense popularity of the doctor’s services, speaking of the long, winding lines they would often see outside his office. The numbers were truly astounding. Jones’s doctor appeared to work tirelessly to supply anyone who would provide him with business. A report released around the time of his investigation revealed that Moshos would write over 100 prescriptions a day.
He had no qualms about who he sold to, either. Even though she was only eighteen at the time of her death, Anissa Jones nonetheless fit the profile for Moshos’s average client. When a local news team visited his office, they found it filled with young people, most of whom appeared to be around Jones’s age. It became clear why she was able to procure the lethal dose that ended her life; Moshos made it remarkably easy for troubled young people to obtain dangerous quantities of substances. The report released by the local news team alleged that Moshos only required a patient to present a valid ID, after which he would sell them a prescription for whatever they requested for the low price of just $5.
Armed with all the evidence they had gathered, the authorities moved in. Just six days after Jones’s body was discovered, Moshos was apprehended at his office in Torrance, California. He was charged with the illegal prescription of Seconal to the young actress, but he was also hit with multiple charges of prescribing for profit in a separate undercover investigation. His total charges amounted to eleven separate offenses. However, the man whom many considered to be responsible for the circumstances of Jones’s death would never see a courtroom verdict.
Despite his profession as a healer, Moshos was a very unhealthy individual himself; he suffered from diabetes, hepatitis, and high blood pressure. On December 6, 1976, he was admitted to a hospital, where he passed away three weeks later, only four months after his most famous patient. Jones’s family still sought some form of justice and closure; they sued the doctor’s estate for $400,000. A 1979 verdict eventually found the doctor only 30% liable for the young actress’s passing, which resulted in a $79,500 payout to her family.
In 1984, Jones’s mother, Mary, experienced yet another unimaginable tragedy. She lost another of her children to substance abuse. Anissa’s cherished brother, Paul, overdosed on March 15, 1984, just days after what would have been his sister’s twenty-sixth birthday. He was only twenty-four years old.
Anissa Jones was not the only cast member of Family Affair to suffer an untimely demise. Her co-star, Sebastian Cabot, died from a stroke in 1977 at the age of fifty-nine, and another castmate, Brian Keith, took his own life in 1997. These recurring tragedies, and the short, turbulent life of Anissa Jones, serve as a damning indictment of the physical and mental toll that the entertainment industry can exact upon some of its most vulnerable and impressionable talents. The story of Anissa Jones remains a somber reminder of the fleeting nature of childhood stardom and the profound darkness that can exist behind the bright lights of fame.
