Grace Van Dien in Stranger Things: the actress behind Chrissy, the season 4 cheerleader

Who is Grace Van Dien

Grace Van Dien was born on October 15, 1996, in Los Angeles. Her full name is Caroline Dorothy Grace Van Dien. Her father, Casper Van Dien, broke out in 1997 as Johnny Rico in Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers. Her mother, Carrie Mitchum, is an actress too.

On her mother's side, the family goes back to Hollywood's golden age. Carrie Mitchum is Robert Mitchum's granddaughter, which makes Grace his great-granddaughter. Her parents divorced in 1997. She has an older brother, Casper, born in 1993. Catherine Oxenberg, daughter of Princess Elizabeth of Yugoslavia, later became her stepmother.

As a child, she followed her father onto film sets. He sometimes put her in the background or gave her a line. At first, she wanted to be a writer. She caught the acting bug on the set of Sleeping Beauty (2014), the first film her father directed, where she had her first real role. The season 4 cast introduces the season's other newcomers, from Eddie to Vecna.

1. October 1996 Los Angeles

   Born on October 15. Her parents are actors, and her great-grandfather is Robert Mitchum.

2. 2014 First real role

   Sleeping Beauty, directed by her father. She caught the acting bug on that set.

3. 2018 Charlie Says

   Sharon Tate, in Mary Harron's film. It premieres in Venice on September 2.

4. June 2021 Chrissy

   On June 9, her arrival is announced, in a recurring role, alongside Amybeth McNulty and Myles Truitt.

5. May 2022 The first episode

   “Chapter One: The Hellfire Club” is released on May 27. Chrissy dies at the end.

6. March 2023 Choosing streaming

   On Twitch, she says she turned down four film roles to stream more.

Before Hawkins: TV movies, Greenhouse Academy, and Sharon Tate

In 2005, she appeared with her family in a reality show, I Married a Princess. Her first acting credit dates from 2010: a Christmas TV movie, The Dog Who Saved Christmas Vacation, under the name Caroline Grace Van Dien. Between 2015 and 2017, she racked up TV movies, independent films, and guest spots on the series Code Black and White Famous.

In 2016, she played a double role in the TV movie The Bad Twin: Olivia and Quinn, twin sisters. The same year saw the release of Patient Seven and of Storage Locker 181, directed by her father. Then came her first big TV role: Brooke Osmond, in the teen series Greenhouse Academy, where she was one of the leads for the first two seasons, starting in 2017.

In 2018, she played Sharon Tate in Mary Harron's Charlie Says, a film about the women of the Manson “Family.” The film had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on September 2, 2018. In 2019, she played Katie Campbell, one of the leads in The Village, an NBC drama series canceled after one season, and appeared in an episode of The Rookie.

In 2020, she directed a short film, Monsters and Muses, in which she played Persephone. Three films came out the same year: Riding Faith, Lady Driver, and The Binge. In 2021, she appeared in an episode of the series Immoral Compass. That was the year Hawkins called.

Chrissy on screen: a high school, a forest, a trailer

Chrissy Cunningham is the head cheerleader at Hawkins High, and the girlfriend of Jason Carver, the captain of the basketball team. Alive, she gets just one day on screen: March 21, 1986, in “Chapter One: The Hellfire Club.” Beneath the smile, the show reveals an eating disorder and a mother who keeps a close eye on her.

In the school bathroom, she throws up, then hears her mother's voice mocking her. In the woods, a clock appears to her in a tree trunk, just before Eddie Munson arrives. She has come to buy something from him to help her cope. Eddie remembers her from a talent show in middle school. She laughs. It is their only real conversation.

That night, she follows him to his trailer, at Forest Hills, the town's trailer park. While Eddie looks for the drugs, she falls into a trance. He sees her rise to the ceiling, her limbs snap, her eyes sink in. He runs. The full sequence of events is in the season 4 episode 1 recap.

Chrissy is the first victim of the curse of Vecna, the killer of season 4. A gate to the Upside Down then opens in the trailer's ceiling, where she was flung. What the character hides, and what her death sets in motion, are covered in the Chrissy Cunningham profile.

The shoot: the woods scene, filmed after Chrissy's death

The role was announced on June 9, 2021, along with those of Amybeth McNulty, Myles Truitt, and Regina Ting Chen, all of them recurring. The announcement described Chrissy as the high school's head cheerleader and the most popular girl in school. Grace Van Dien was 24 at the time. Shooting on the season, which began in February 2020 and was halted by the pandemic, wrapped in September 2021.

The woods scene was shot late, and out of story order. The Duffer Brothers told TVLine on June 5, 2022: when they filmed it, Chrissy's death was already in the can. Two cameras were rolling at once on the two actors. Joseph Quinn, who plays Eddie, improvised a lot, and Grace Van Dien played off him.

Matt Duffer says the scene came alive thanks to the two of them. He finds it remarkable what the actress achieved with very few scenes: getting the audience to care. He adds that they will find something else for her, as with Sean Astin, whose character, Bob, they had killed off in season 2.

She has described the effect on her career herself. In September 2022, at the Toronto film festival, she told Collider that her goals had not changed: they were just more within reach. She wants to tell stories that audiences, and she herself, can relate to.

After the show: Twitch, Toronto, and some choices

Grace Van Dien also streams live on Twitch: chats and rounds of Valorant. Her channel passed 200,000 followers less than three months after it launched. In August 2022, she signed with the UTA agency.

On September 15, 2022, Amy Redford's Roost had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. In it, she plays Anna, a teenager who falls in love with a man of nearly thirty she met online. The film was released in the United States on August 4, 2023, under another title, What Comes Around. She also told Collider that her favorite film, since she was 11, has been Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, starring Robert Redford, the director's father.

In March 2023, on Twitch, she explained that she had turned down four film roles in two and a half weeks, to focus more on streaming. She mentioned bad experiences on her latest shoots, including a producer's advances, as reported by Variety on March 9. She said she was developing her own projects, so that one day she could run her own set. In May 2023, she told IGN that with streaming, she likes being in control of her own voice.

Her film work carries on, though. In September 2023, she signed with the WME agency. Then came The Fix in 2024, Redux Redux in 2025, and Silver Star. In May 2026, she was announced at the Cannes film market as part of the cast of Beg the Devil.

What remains of Chrissy, through season 5

Grace Van Dien is credited in only one episode. Yet Chrissy hangs over all of season 4. Her body is found in the trailer, and the town blames Eddie. Jason Carver, her boyfriend, believes it was a sacrifice and leads a hunt for the Hellfire Club, Eddie's role-playing group.

The next day, Fred dies in turn, on the road near the trailer park; Patrick will follow. Those two other deaths are covered in the article on Patrick and Fred, Vecna's victims.

On the last night, on the roof of his trailer, in the Upside Down, Eddie dedicates his Master of Puppets solo to her. He dies soon after. Running away on that first night, in front of Chrissy, is what he refuses to do again.

The fifth season, set in the fall of 1987, does not credit Grace Van Dien in any episode. Her role fits into a single chapter, the one set on March 21, 1986. The actress, for her part, has carried on elsewhere.

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