Since the term “nepo baby” was popularized in 2022, celebrities with famous families have taken different approaches to being labeled by it. Jamie Lee Curtis embraced the designation in her leadup to winning an Oscar. Gwyneth Paltrow disavowed its implications for her own children. Hailey Bieber simply worn it on a T-shirt. Now, while promoting her new album and upcoming role in Pixar’s Inside Out 2, Maya Hawke—daughter of Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman—has candidly addressed how industry nepotism has furthered her own career.
During a recent interview with The Times Of London, Hawke acknowledged that being the offspring of Thurman, frequent muse to Quentin Tarantino, undoubtedly helped her secure a breakout role in 2019’s Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood. “I’ve been wildly made fun of for this clip when I said, on the red carpet, that I auditioned,” explained the 25-year-old Stranger Things star. “I never meant to imply that I didn’t get the part for nepotistic reasons— I think I totally did.”
Hawke, who has since starred in films like Do Revenge, Asteroid City, and Maestro, was then asked if she “deserved” her industry success. “‘Deserves’ is a complicated word,” she said. “There are so many people who deserve to have this kind of life who don’t, but I think I’m comfortable with not deserving it and doing it anyway. And I know that my not doing it wouldn’t help anyone.”
When she first started in Hollywood, Hawke said she “saw two paths. . .and one of them was: change your name, get a nose job and go to open casting roles.” She instead opted to publicly recognize her privilege. Throughout her career, Hawke has even worked with her parents—appearing alongside Thurman in 2023’s The Kill Room and portraying American novelist Flannery O’Connor in that year’s Wildcat, which was directed by her father. “It’s okay to be made fun of when you’re in rarefied air. It’s a lucky place to be,” said Hawke. “My relationships with my parents are really honest and positive, and that supersedes anything anyone can say about it.”
As she recently told Vanity Fair, some of this background has even inspired her musical career. Her song “Give up / Be loved,” Hawke said, is “me trying to figure out how to take what you got as a child and use it as an adult for good.”