PASADENA, Calif. — Tyler James Williams isn't exactly a household name — at least not yet. But he does, apparently, have a household face.

"I definitely get a strong reaction from kids in the stores, at the mall," he said. "I have a new name now — That Kid From 'Everybody Hates Chris.'

"That's officially my new name. I mean, I'll be walking down the street — "'Hey, are you That Kid From 'Everybody Hates Chris'?"

The fame brought by starring in the UPN sitcom, which airs tonight at 7 on Ch. 24, has changed Williams at least a bit.

"People are looking at me, so I get dressed really well," he said.

Of course, "dressed really well" means a better grade of T-shirt than he used to wear.

You can't help but notice that, TV star or not, Williams remains a kid. He sounds like a kid and acts like a kid. Which is certainly not always the case with child stars.

"Kids like Tyler come along only once in a generation," said Terry Crews, who plays Williams' TV father. "I mean, he's just that special. And we know what we have. I'm telling you, I thank God every day that there's a little kid being on our show because some kids have it, some kids don't.

"And it's not about being a little adult. But it's about being a kid and portraying a kid. And I think that America gets it when he does it."

Williams wasn't the most experienced kid who auditioned, just the best for the part.

"He's not portraying an awkward 13-year-old kid. Look at him — he is an awkward 13-year-old kid," said executive producer Ali LeRoi.

Williams said all the kids on the show (Williams, Tequan Richmond, Imani Hakim and Vincent Martella) "all have what we were looking for when we were casting the show — they're guileless. None of them had Hollywood polish on them. They're not cheeky and real big and broad, and they didn't really try to sell themselves to the camera. They look and feel like kids. The idea was to try and not mess with that."

Originally, Richmond was under consideration for the role of young Chris Rock in this series. But he was "too cool," LeRoi said. "He wasn't acting as a 13-year-old kid. He's just got this swagger, man. He's just got it. And it's like he can't play (Chris), but he could be the brother."

For Williams, awkward works.

"The characters that we kids play are actually the people that we are," he said. "What you see is what you get."

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E-mail: pierce@desnews.com