Celebrity
Over the years, a bunch of famous parents have shared the big screen with their kids.
It’s not what you’d call a typical take-your-kid-to-work day, but a number of celebrity parents have worked with their kids on the big screen over the years, creating blockbuster hits and timeless classics for audiences to enjoy. And in many cases, these cameos have launched the careers of some of our favorite young actors. Indeed, Hollywood has its fair share of famous offspring but the moments to see these young stars share camera time with their talented parents are truly special.
Blame it on their shared DNA or natural chemistry, but as it turns out, many famous actors work surprisingly well with their children. Perhaps it’s because many of these kids are simply unaware of their parents’ dopeness or, in the case of Beyoncé and JAY-Z’s daughter, Blue Ivy, simply unfazed by it all. So no need to worry about nervous jitters there. And, of course, many celebrity kids, such as Jaden Smith, were simply born with the acting bug like mom and dad and their parents decided to let them explore it.
From voice acting to comedies, musicals, and dramas, below are some of the most memorable moments in recent history of celebrity parent and their kids working together on screen.
Beyoncé & Blue Ivy
Beyoncé and Blue Ivy have not acted in an actual movie together, but they have done some big-screen quality work. Over the years, the 10-year-old has made several appearances with her mother and at nearly every one she steals the show.
Blue Ivy has been in campaigns for Beyoncé’s Ivy Park line and shared screentime with both of her parents for their recent Tiffany & Co. campaign. But one of her more iconic appearances was in 2019 in her mother’s “Brown Skin Girl” music video, which she won a Grammy for and became the youngest person ever to win a BET Award.
Blue Ivy also recently made an appearance at the 2022 Oscars alongside her mother during Beyoncé’s “Be Alive” performance.
Andie MacDowell & Margaret Qualley
Margaret Qualley co-starred with her mother, Andie MacDowell, in the Netflix drama series, Maid. Qualley plays a young mother named Alex escaping an abusive relationship who learns “her self-worth and learns how to stand up for herself,” while MacDowell, plays her complicated mother, Paula, with an undiagnosed bipolar disorder.
“Every moment was precious for me,” MacDowell told USA Today about working with her daughter. “I really wanted to do a good job because it meant everything to me because I was scared it would never happen again.”
In the same interview, Qualley called the moment “the biggest cheat in the world.” “That goes all the way from the inherent eye rolls that are built-in when your mom says something,” she explained. Qualley also said the series felt personal to her. “There's a moment [in Maid] where Paula tells Alex that she's proud of her,” she told USA Today. “It felt like my mom was telling me that she was proud of me, and it was just one of the coolest things that's ever happened to me.”
Will Smith & Jaden Smith
In 2006, Will Smith starred alongside his son Jaden Smith in The Pursuit of Happyness. Based on a true story, the drama is about a struggling single father, who is trying to make a life for himself and his young son. Jaden was 8 years old when he starred in his first acting gig.
In his memoir, Will, Smith wrote about the casting process of Jaden and said his son was interested in acting, so he and Jada decided to let him audition for the role. But there were “conflict of interests everywhere.” Smith wrote, as reported by Insider, “It was such a touchy subject at the studio that Jada and I removed ourselves from the decision-making process.”
The two later got together and starred in After Earth, a 2013 post-apocalyptic movie about a father and his teenage son who crash land on a hostile planet — Earth. The two must depend on one another to survive.
Jada Pinkett-Smith & Willow Smith
Just like Will and Jaden Smith had their father and son moment, so did Jada and Willow. Before the conscious 21-year-old was whipping her hair, the two had the opportunity to work together in 2008 on Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa. Jada Pinkett-Smith voiced Gloria the elephant and Willow played Baby Gloria.
“Oh, that was so cute,” Jada Pinkett-Smith told Blackfilm about the 2008 film at the time. “Because she'd been asking. She was like, ‘So, how does that work? How does the animation thing work? Mommy, what happens?’ I'm like, ‘Oh, boy.’ So, it was great when I got the phone call sayin', ‘Would Willow like to play, you know, little Gloria?’ And so she got to come in and do some lines.”
These days, the two are still working together. Both women are co-hosts of Red Table Talk, along with Jada’s mother, Adrienne Banfield-Norris. Willow also had a cameo role with her dad in the 2007 film, I Am Legend.
Angelina Jolie & Vivienne Jolie-Pitt
Angelina Jolie and her daughter Vivienne Jolie-Pitt had a touching screen moment in the 2014 fantasy film, Maleficent. Vivienne, now 13, was a toddler at the time played the young Aurora who comes across Jolie as the evil fairy in the woods.
Jolie told Vanity Fair that the other 3- and 4-year-old kid actors would not come near her. “It had to be a child that liked me and wasn’t afraid of my horns and my eyes and my claws,” she said in the 2014 interview. “So it had to be Viv.”
Vivienne is one of five kids Jolie shares with her ex-husband Brad Pitt and the two reportedly share a very close bond.
Robin Williams & Zelda Williams
In 2004, Robin Williams and his daughter, Zelda Williams, were co-stars in House of D. Zelda, now 32, was about 14 years old when she starred alongside her late father in the coming-of-age drama set in the early 1970s.
“It was great to watch her,” Williams told MovieWeb in a 2005 interview. “It was all so good, because being this character; I could just sit back and watch her. She was so possessed and poised, very aware and knowing what the character would and wouldn't do.”
The late actor added, “People ask me if I was worried, not at all. She's 13. People who have a 13-year-old daughter know that stage. When she's acting she's concentrating and very nice. She treats people with dignity and respect. That's the other part of this business that you want her to have.”
John Travolta & Ella Bleu Travolta
Ella Bleu Travolta co-starred with dad John Travolta and Robin Williams in 2009’s Old Dogs. Ella, who was 7 years old at the time, actually played the daughter of Williams’ character in the comedy.
“It was very natural I mean it seemed I had that history in my family with my mother introducing me to the arts and to acting,” Travolta said in a 2009 interview with ScreenSlam about exposing his daughter to the big screen, “and so it didn't seem unusual or it just seemed that the way it should be.”
The movie was Ella’s first movie role. She and her dad later had screen time together in 2019’s Poison with Morgan Freeman
Billy Ray Cyrus & Miley Cyrus
Country music star Billy Ray and Miley Cyrus have had two on-screen cameos together. The first was in the early 2000s, when Miley appeared alongside her father in the drama Doc. And then later, Billy Ray co-starred on his daughter’s Disney’s show, Hannah Montana. It was Miley’s mother, Leticia “Tish” Cyrus, who suggested that Billy Ray be cast as her father.
“The casting people joked about my dad being a hunk. And my mom joked about how they should bring him out here to play my dad on the show,” Miley said, as reported by Cheatsheet. “And then (as my mom tells it) everyone was like, ‘Wait, seriously?’”
The show went on to become a huge hit!
Johnny Depp & Lily Rose-Depp
In 2006, Lily-Rose Depp worked with her father, Johnny Depp in the comedy, horror movie, Yoga Hosers. Depp shares Lily-Rose with his ex-wife and French singer and actress, Vanessa Paradis.
Since then, the 22-year-old has gone on to make a name for herself as a French actress and model, working for brands such as Chanel. Lily-Rose spoke with Interview Magazine about what’s like growing up with a famous American dad and a French mother, sharing that she identifies with both cultures. “My dad is very American and my mom is very French, and I grew up in both places,” Lily-Rose shared with actress Keira Knightley in the Sept. 2021 interview. “I don’t know if I feel like I have different personalities. But I think that I’m able to tap into a more American sense of humor than a French sense of humor, depending on where I’m at. What I’ve heard, more than the personality thing, is that my voice is deeper in English and higher in French.”
Tom Hanks & Colin Hanks
Colin Hanks has racked up quite the acting résumé over the past 20 years. But his first-ever acting role was with his superstar father in the 1996 music dramedy That Thing You Do! Written and directed by Tom Hanks, he cameoed as Colin’s character’s father. Like most celebrity kids, Hanks was oblivious to his father’s fame. But when Forrest Gump premiered, things changed. “It became a totally different animal,” Colin Hanks told Dan Patrick in a 2017 interview. He later shared the difficulties of being compared to his father’s career.
“When I was starting off,” Colin told Dax Shepard in a 2019 episode of The Armchair Expert, “I was sort of lovingly naive, thinking that [being the son of Tom Hanks] wasn’t as big a deal as it is … that I would get the benefit of the doubt that I was my own person … and that doesn’t happen.”
Colin, who is also a father now, recently shared some of the best advice his father gave him. “It was the idea that you can’t be great at the start,” he told Hollywood Life, “but you got to start to be great.”