Baby, it's nepotism
Beating the proverbial "nepo baby" dead horse.
As a pop culture sponge and Wikipedia fanatic, I am acutely familiar with the interconnected family trees of Hollywood. Thus, I have taken the liberty of creating a graph to explain my opinions on so-called “nepo babies.”
It is worth noting that the lens of criticism around nepotism is often skewed toward people in the entertainment industry, specifically women. many have argued that time would be better spent addressing nepotism in areas such as politics (i.e. President(s) Bush, Prime Minister(s) Trudeau, hereditary monarchies), but the shiny appeal of overanalyzing Hollywood celebrities and their spawn is undeniable.
Far from being a new topic, nepotism is having a moment in popular culture. The issue has been percolating on social media like TikTok and Twitter for a while, but has now gone fully mainstream with a cover story from New York Magazine proclaiming “The Year of the Nepo Baby.” Bolstered by a dozen other pieces on the topic by subsidiary comedic website Vulture and a print cover featuring photoshopped nepo baby heads on actual babies, NYMag’s take on nepotism has quickly gone viral.
This attention has elicited many angry nepo baby responses, such as Jamie Lee Curtis proclaiming to Instagram that the nepo baby debate is “designed to try to diminish and denigrate and hurt.” Curtis rails against “assumptions and snide remarks that someone related to someone else who is famous in their field for their art, would somehow have no talent whatsoever.”
While Curtis acknowledges her privilege as the daughter of movie stars, she seems to think that criticism of nepotism equates to disregard for her talent and that of other nepo babies. Nepo babies can certainly be talented, and many are, but they have the glaring advantage of successful familial connections.
Curtis herself is a perfect example of this, as she is an indisputable talent who got her big break in “Halloween” (1978) because her mother was famous for starring in Hitchcock’s “psycho” (1960). “Halloween” co-writer and producer Debra Hill explained that she knew Curtis would provide great publicity for the film through the connection to her mother’s career, adding that “At least I knew she had the genes to scream well.”
Privilege can be difficult to reconcile with, but it is far better to acknowledge it than pretend it does not exist. Some nepo babies are talented and some are not (see Brooklyn Beckham’s photo book for proof), but regardless they have a leg up in joining the family business of fame and fortune.