The actress, who rose to fame on the hit sitcom Family Ties and once appeared alongside screen legends Diane Keaton and Albert Finney, was recently spotted tackling some decidedly unglamorous yard work outside her Los Angeles home.
Now 52, she first stepped into the spotlight as a child before landing the role that made her a household name: Jennifer Keaton, the spirited younger sister to Michael J. Fox’s Alex P. Keaton.
While she has largely embraced a quieter, more private life in adulthood, she has popped up occasionally on reality television, including appearances on Celebrity Fit Club and Celebrity Wife Swap.
Dressed in an all-black athletic outfit — complete with dramatic eye makeup — the former sitcom star looked focused as she spruced up her property. She used a leaf blower and hose to clear the sidewalk and even brought out a weed wacker to tame overgrown patches.
If you guessed Tina Yothers, you’d be right.
Best known for playing the lovable Jennifer on Family Ties, Yothers was just a child when she began building her résumé. She started in television commercials at age three before moving into larger roles, including a part in the 1981 TV movie The Cherokee Trail.
In 1982, she appeared in the drama Shoot the Moon, directed by Alan Parker and starring Keaton and Finney. The film explored the painful unraveling of a marriage and its impact on the couple’s children, with Yothers playing one of the daughters caught in the emotional fallout.
But it was her run on Family Ties from 1982 to 1989 that cemented her place in pop culture. The beloved NBC series followed the Keaton family, with a cast that included Fox, Meredith Baxter, Michael Gross, Justine Bateman and Brian Bonsall. The show became one of the defining sitcoms of the decade, earning multiple awards — including three consecutive Emmys for Fox.
After the series wrapped, Yothers surprised fans with a dramatic image change, cutting off her signature blonde hair, dyeing it dark, and launching a music project with her brother Cory in a band called Jaded. She also appeared in stage productions, including a musical based on the life of Linda Lovelace.
Though she eventually stepped back from mainstream fame, she resurfaced briefly in the 2000s and 2010s with reality TV appearances and a memorable turn on What Not to Wear in 2013.
Yothers has been married to Robert Kaiser since 2002, and the couple share two children, Jake and Lilly.
From primetime sitcom sweetheart to hands-on homeowner, Tina Yothers proves that even former child stars aren’t above a little yard work.
