When Wizards of Waverly Place premiered on Disney Channel in October 2007, no one predicted that a sitcom about wizard siblings living in Greenwich Village would become a cultural touchstone. Over four seasons and two Emmy wins, the series turned Selena Gomez into a household name and gave a generation of viewers catchphrases like “What’s the wiz-ard?” Fifteen-plus years later, the story isn’t over—Selena has already stepped back into Alex Russo’s boots for the sequel series Wizards Beyond Waverly Place, whose third season will wrap the newest chapter. So how have the original spell-casters changed since the closing credits rolled in 2012? Let’s catch up.
Selena Gomez: From Teen Wizard to Beauty Mogul and Emmy Darling
Selena was only 15 when she first portrayed mischievous middle-child Alex. Rather than get trapped in the child-star box, she used the show’s end as a launchpad. Her first post-Wizards move shocked the Disney set: a gritty role in Harmony Korine’s 2013 film Spring Breakers. The pivot worked. Movie offers rolled in—The Fundamentals of Caring, The Dead Don’t Die, and A Rainy Day in New York—while she quietly began producing content for Netflix. The result, 13 Reasons Why, became one of the streamer’s most talked-about originals and cemented her reputation as a hit-maker behind the camera.
Music was never far behind. After fronting Selena Gomez & The Scene, she released three solo LPs—Stars Dance (2013), Revival (2015) and Rare (2020)—each debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. Touring schedules paused in 2017 when she underwent a kidney transplant due to lupus complications. The health battle inspired her to co-found Rare Beauty in 2020, a cosmetics line that has since surpassed $500 million in cumulative sales and funnels 1 % of revenue into mental-health services.
Acting accolades followed. As Mabel Mora in Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building, Selena earned her first Emmy nomination and became the most-followed Latina actress on television. Off-screen, she finally closed the highly publicized chapter with Justin Bieber, marrying record producer Benny Blanco in an intimate 2025 ceremony. With a third season of Wizards Beyond on the horizon and new music rumored for late 2025, the 33-year-old shows no signs of slowing.
David Henrie: From Responsible Big Brother to Director and Sitcom Dad
David Henrie’s Justin Russo was the rule-following foil to Alex’s chaos, so fans were curious where the actor would head once the wand was hung up. He kept audiences laughing with bit parts in Grown Ups 2 and Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, but his longest post-Wizards gig was voicing Future Ted’s son Luke on How I Met Your Mother through the series finale in 2014. Determined to move behind the camera, Henrie enrolled in production classes and crowd-funded This Is the Year, a coming-of-age film that became a 2020 drive-in darling and proved he could juggle directing, producing and screenwriting.
Family life soon took center stage. Henrie married former Miss Universe contestant Maria Cahill in 2017; the couple now has three children. In 2023 he returned to network television as the lead of NBC’s multi-cam comedy Dad vs. Kids, playing a widowed father juggling parenting and a gaming start-up. When Wizards Beyond Waverly Place was green-lit, Henrie signed on as both executive producer and recurring star, giving Justin Russo a grown-up arc that mirrors his own journey into fatherhood.
Jake T. Austin, Jennifer Stone and the Rest of the Magic-Makers
No Russo family reunion would be complete mentioning the extended ensemble who kept the sub-shop—and the laughs—running.
- Jake T. Austin (Max Russo): After playing the dim but lovable youngest sibling, Jake voiced the lead in Nickelodeon’s The Emoji Movie and starred on Freeform’s The Fosters for three seasons. He now splits time between indie films and environmental activism, sitting on the board of the nonprofit Global Green.
- Jennifer Stone (Harper Finkle): Jennifer left Hollywood for higher education, earning a nursing degree in 2019. She worked on the front lines during the early waves of COVID-19 and still acts occasionally, appearing in Wizards Beyond to reprise her colorful best-friend role.
- David DeLuise (Jerry Russo): The family patriarch continues steady work in voice-over and guest spots
InfluencerBlogger
