Ben Stiller just shared his personal take on what it’s like to have famous parents, as well as the term “nepo baby” that follows many child stars throughout their lives.
The conversation itself took place on the Howard Stern Show and showed the star being candid.
What’s also relevant to mention is that Stiller just recently released a documentary about his famous parents, titled Stiller & Meara: Nothing Is Lost.
In this conversation, he began by welcoming the term, rather than belittling it, because to Stiller, the nickname seems more like a “selling point” than anything else.
“I think it’s kind of like that Brat Pack thing, right?” he also noted. “New York Magazine coined a phrase, and then it became a thing.”
“But it’s always been what it is, in humanity and in life. It’s like if you buy a violin, a Stradivarius or something, it’s been in the family for hundreds of years. It’s a selling point.”
However, he was careful to point out that there were “other arguments to be made about access and all these things”, even though he also saw the less glamorous, sometimes bad, sides of this scene growing up.
“For me, I think growing up around it, we talk about all these things that I saw with my parents, actually, as a kid, you see the dark side of it. The stress, the effects that it has on relationships. You see that up close as a kid, and then you always want to get in there,” he also admitted during this conversation.
During this conversation, he also recalled how his mother’s influence also affected his very first acting job, which was an off-Broadway production called House of Blue Leaves.
He explained that he didn’t make it on his own and that he “couldn’t get in because the casting director didn’t want to see me”, but the final callback came as “a favor” from his mother.
Regardless, before concluding, he made it a point to add: “If you have the passion, you do it.
