For six seasons, Erin Murphy was the little girl who could wiggle her nose and make trouble for everyone on Bewitched. Millions of families watched Tabitha Stephens grow from a toddler in a high chair into a seven year old with her own spells. Then the show ended, and most viewers lost track of the real girl behind the role.
Erin Murphy turned 62 on June 17, 2026. Her life since the show has included cheerleading pom poms, a makeup kit, an alpaca ranch and six sons. It also includes one television job so unexpected that her own Bewitched fans still do a double take when they hear about it. That detail comes last, because it is the best one.
Why Did It Take Two Babies To Play Tabitha?
Erin Margaret Murphy was born in Encino, California, on June 17, 1964, along with her fraternal twin sister, Diane. When the producers of Bewitched went looking for a new Tabitha, they only wanted twins. California’s child labor laws limited how long a small child could be on set, so two babies meant twice the working hours.
“They were only casting twins for the part of Tabitha because the hours were so crazy,” Erin explained to PopEntertainment in 2013. The trouble was that the girls never looked much alike. “We don’t look enough alike to really be interchangeable,” she said.
The twins also had very different feelings about show business. “If we would bring Diane on set, she would start to cry,” Erin recalled in the same interview. She, on the other hand, loved the lights and the crew. “I was happy to be there,” she said.
According to Parade, Erin made her debut in the Season 3 episode “Nobody’s Perfect” in 1966 and went on to appear in 103 episodes. Diane appeared in 21, per IMDb figures cited by Parade, and she stopped playing Tabitha in Season 5.
Diane did not vanish from the show completely. Parade reports that she later played Raggedy Ann in the Season 7 episode “Samantha and the Troll.” She also slipped into the 1969 Halloween episode as a costumed kid. “My sister Diane played a trick-or-treater,” Erin wrote on Facebook in 2024.
The sisters are still close. On Feb. 16, 2026, Erin posted a rare photo of the two of them together on Facebook with a one word caption: “Sisters!” According to Parade, fans were split on whether the grown twins look alike today.
With Diane happier off camera, the job of growing up as Tabitha fell to Erin alone.
What Was It Like Growing Up On The Bewitched Set?
Erin spent most of her early childhood on a soundstage with Elizabeth Montgomery. “She really was like another mother to me, because we spent so much time together,” she told PopEntertainment. In a 2016 interview with Fox News, she called Montgomery a role model who was beautiful, smart and funny. Montgomery’s own children were close to Erin’s age, so she also knew her TV mom as a friend’s mother. (You can meet Elizabeth Montgomery’s three children here.)
She also had two TV dads. “I worked with each of them for three years,” she said of Dick York and Dick Sargent, who both played Darrin Stephens.
The ending came without warning. On Billy Corgan’s podcast The Magnificent Others in May 2026, Erin explained that the cast left for a normal break in 1972. “We had contracts to do two more years of the show,” she said, as quoted by Parade. Instead, everyone got telegrams and letters. “So there was no goodbye,” she said. Closer Weekly also reported her account. Montgomery was divorcing producer William Asher at the time, and she decided not to go on. Erin says she is still dear friends with Montgomery and Asher’s kids.
She was not quite eight years old when the show went dark. What she did next surprised Hollywood.
What Did Tabitha Do After The Magic Ended?
She went to camp. Erin told Fox News in 2019 that she turned down a part on The Waltons so she could go to Girl Scout camp. Her family moved to Orange County, and she “stopped doing the crazy auditions,” though she still took guaranteed jobs in Los Angeles.
Those jobs were mostly commercials. Remind Magazine and Wikipedia both credit her with more than 100 of them. She went to El Toro High School in Lake Forest, California, where she was a cheerleader and homecoming queen before graduating in 1981.
As an adult she stayed in the business, mostly behind the camera. Remind and Wikipedia list her work as a makeup artist, a casting director and a stunt double.
“I always said that when my kids were older, I would get back into acting, because I love it,” she told PopEntertainment. Those kids were the main reason she stepped back in the first place.
How Did Six Sons Shape Erin Murphy’s Life?
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Erin has been married three times and is the mother of six boys, according to Wikipedia and Fox News. In May 1998 she married Darren Dunckel, and they had three sons together. A 1999 profile on the fan site Bewitched.net said the two met in a bar on St. Patrick’s Day and married about two months later. “It’s a crazy but fun lifestyle,” she told Fox News about raising six boys.
One of her sons is on the autism spectrum, and that changed her life’s work. Fox News reported that she volunteers, sits in on board meetings and speaks at events for autism charities. “I think it’s important to be there for other parents who have questions,” she said. Nicki Swift reported that she also made a PSA for Actors for Autism and joined charity walks.
“Our family first got involved with alpacas as a form of pet therapy for our little boy with autism,” Erin wrote on her blog, as quoted by Nicki Swift. Wikipedia notes that OK! magazine photographed her with two of her alpacas at her ranch in Bell Canyon, California, in 2012. The animals turned into a business called Erin Murphy Knits, which sold hand knit alpaca clothing, according to Remind and Wikipedia.
Her boys are grown now, and she is a grandmother as well. She told Fox News in 2019 that most of her career choices came from being a parent, including being home for school drop offs and pickups.
What Is Erin Murphy Doing Now, Decades After Bewitched?
She is busy. Since 2014 she has been a co-owner of Slim Chillers, a company that makes low calorie frozen vodka martini pops, according to Wikipedia and Remind Magazine. In 2018, Variety reported that she bought a beachfront home in Malibu. She told Fox News in 2019 that she “had a house on the beach in Malibu” thanks to the chances her career gave her.
In March 2026 she posted a photo with Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan. Woman’s World reported that she called him “one of the coolest, smartest, most interesting people ever!” and teased “future collaborations.” Their conversation became the May episode of his podcast.
Then came bigger news. On June 9, 2026, she shared a selfie on Instagram with the caption, “A new adventure begins this fall! I’m thrilled to announce that I’ll be on a brand-new TV show.” Parade reported the post, and Wikipedia also notes the fall project. She has not named the show yet.
Fans also keep asking her about a new Bewitched. Deadline reported in November 2025 that Fox and Sony Pictures Television are developing an hourlong reimagining of the series. It has not been picked up yet. In February 2026, Erin told the Australian magazine New Idea, “If they asked me to appear on the show, absolutely I would!” HELLO! and Woman’s World both repeated the quote. She later told fans not to read too much into it. “Definitely shouldn’t be in quotes that ‘I’ll star in the reboot!'” she wrote, according to Parade. She also had some thoughts on said reboot.
Back in 2019 she told Fox News where she pictures Tabitha today. “I think she would be a mom maybe living by the beach,” she said, “probably using her magic a little more than her mom did.” That sounds a lot like Erin herself. Still, no version of Tabitha would have seen the next chapter coming.
How Did Tabitha End Up In A Wrestling Ring For Hulk Hogan?
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In 2008, the grown up Tabitha signed on for Hulk Hogan’s Celebrity Championship Wrestling on CMT. The show premiered Oct. 18, 2008, and ran eight episodes. Hogan’s friends Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake and Brian Knobbs trained a cast of celebrities to wrestle, according to Remind Magazine and Wikipedia.
She never auditioned for it. Erin told Slam Wrestling in October 2008 that co producer Jason Hervey wanted her on the show. When she heard the pitch, she laughed for about ten minutes and then said yes. “Hulk Hogan is one the reasons I immediately said ‘Yes’ to the show,” she said.
Producers first offered her a cheeky ring name she turned down, she told WrestleZone. She picked “Mistress of Mayhem” instead, which shortens to M.O.M. She landed on Team Nasty alongside Dennis Rodman, Frank Stallone, Dustin Diamond and Nikki Ziering. At 5 foot 4 and 115 pounds, she was one of the smallest people on her team. She also had almost no time to prepare. She told Slam Wrestling she got about two hours of instruction on moves, and her first match was the very next day.
Her sons helped coach her. She told WrestleZone that her kids advised her to study WWE stars Trish Stratus and Lita, so she watched their matches. She also defended the sport she had just joined. “It is choreographed; there’s nothing fake about it,” she told Slam Wrestling.
Erin was eliminated in the third week, according to Wikipedia, and Remind Magazine ranks her eighth of the ten celebrities. Dennis Rodman won the championship in the Dec. 6 finale. She didn’t walk away from the ring right away, though. She told WrestleZone she kept training with the UPW wrestling school afterward and would happily come back for a second season.
Looking back, she summed it up for The Tolucan Times, as quoted by Nicki Swift. “It was scary and wonderful and awful and kind of everything you would imagine and I’m really glad I did it,” she said. For the girl who once picked Girl Scout camp over The Waltons, it was quite a leap. Slam Wrestling noted that her two oldest sons were already going to wrestling matches with her husband. For a mom of six boys, the M.O.M. name fit perfectly.
