Young Carrie Henn won awards for her portrayal of Newt, a child orphaned by a Xenomorph infestation at a mining community on a remote exomoon in the 1986 sequel to Alien – but she had bigger dreams than Hollywood
One of the most promising young stars of the 1980s quit fame after one hit movie to follow her dreams of being a school teacher.
Carrie Henn was just 12 when she starred as Newt in 1986 sci-fi horror Aliens. It was the sequel to Ridley Scott’s 1979 hit Alien, and told the story of what happened after Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley escaped the Xenomorph infestation on the Nostromo spaceship.
The plot saw Ripley, who had been in stasis for 57 years, and a crew of Colonial Marines go on a mission to LV-426, where she believes there is a batch of Xenomorph eggs.
Upon arrival on the exomoon, they find the colony ravaged by the face-hugging beasts – apart from one child, Newt – played by Carrie, now 47.