Suddenly everyone is obsessed with “nepo babies,” i.e., the famous children of celebrity parents. And we’re here to say we’ve been obsessed with several of them long before it was cool. That’s right: We’re nepo-hipsters.
But seriously. these queer celebs are stars in their own rights; their parentage just goes to show that star power is a genetic trait.
Here are some famous kids we’re proud to call family.
Chaz Salvatore Bono is a transgender writer, musician and actor who initially came out as a lesbian in a cover story with The Advocate back in 1995 before ultimately enduring a gender reconstruction between 2008 and 2010. In 2009, Entertainment Tonight featured a two-part documentary on the transition, and the Becoming Chaz documentary premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival after Bono legally changed his name in May of 2010.
He is the son of Cher and Sonny Bono.
Lily-Rose Depp went public with her relationship with rapper 070 Shake, whose real name is Danielle Balbuena, in a post on her Instagram story initially reported by Page Six in May 2023. Depp captioned the post "4 MONTHS W MY CRUSH" with a snap of a passionate kiss shared between the two after they started dating each other in January.
Lily-Rose is the daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis.
Angelina Jolie confirmed she was bisexual back in 2003 when Barbara Walters asked her flat out, answering, "Of course. If I fell in love with a woman tomorrow, would I feel that it's okay to want to kiss and touch her? If I fell in love with her? Absolutely! Yes!" The world, however, already had a feeling she swung both ways, especially considering her passionate affair with fellow Foxfire actress Jenny Shimizu back in 1996, whom she admitted she would have married if she hadn't married her husband.
Angelina Jolie is the daughter of Jon Voight.
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Ruby Guest is a transgender video editor who works for a YouTube gaming personality who discussed her transition with People Magazine back in 2021. In the interview, she noted that a friend had inquired about her gender when she was 16, and although she answered male, it sent her into an internal debate because it didn't feel authentic to who she actually was, though it took her another seven years before she fully came out.
She is the daughter of Jamie Lee Curtis and Christopher Guest.
Willow came out as bisexual during an episode of Red Table Talk in 2019. “I love men and women equally and so I would definitely want one man, one woman,” said the 18-year-old. “I feel like I could be polyfidelitous with those two people. I’m not the kind of person that is constantly looking for new sexual experiences. I focus a lot on the emotional connection and I feel like if I were to find two people of the different genders that I really connected with and we had a romantic and sexual connection, I don’t feel like I would feel the need to try to go find more,” she explained at the time.
While Jaden has intentionally kept his sexuality ambiguous, many believe he came out in 2018 when he shared that “Tyler [the Creator] doesn’t want to say, but Tyler’s my mother f***ing boyfriend and he’s been my mother f***ing boyfriend my whole f***ing life!”
Willow and Jaden are the children of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith.
Maya Hawke came out as queer during an interview with Vogue in September. “I’m queer,” she told the publication.” I’ve identified queerly for a long time. I’m coming out.” She explained that she held off on sharing her sexuality publicly because she feared being pigeonholed in her career. “There’s something about the word ‘queer’ that feels good to me,” she said. “I feel like the word ‘queer’ has a lot of cultural baggage that comes with it, but it also has a lot of power.”
Maya is the daughter of actors Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke.
Actor and talk show host Drew Barrymore confirmed that she’s bisexual in an interview with Contact Magazine in 2003. “Do I like women sexually? Yeah, I do. Totally. I have always considered myself bisexual,” she affirmed. “I love a woman’s body. I think a woman and a woman together are beautiful, just as a man and a woman together are beautiful. Being with a woman is like exploring your own body, but through someone else.
“When I was younger I used to go with lots of women. Totally – I love it.”
Drew is the daughter of actors John Drew Barrymore and Jaid Barrymore.
Singer and actor Paris Jackson first came out as LGBTQ+ at age 14, but struggled because of the backlash she faced from her religious family. “My family is very religious and a lot of, like homosexuality, is very taboo, so we don’t talk about it, and it’s not really accepted. I’ve gotten to a point where I respect them and I have love for them. I respect their beliefs. I respect their religion,” Jackson said during an episode of Red Table Talk.
Paris is the daughter of singer Michael Jackson.
2021. “I am bisexual and I didn’t really come out to anybody when I was in school... I went to an all-girls school. So it wasn’t like I was the only one. I just never really came out to people and not necessarily because I was scared or nervous to because you shouldn’t be. I just, for some reason, never felt the need to tell people,” she said at the time. “It was never something I was ever really inclined to do. I don’t think I’ve ever said it directly to my parents and knew I was bi from a super young age.”
Harley Quinn is the daughter of director Kevin Smith.
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Dan Levy opened up about his difficult coming out process during an interview with Bustle in 2020, saying that being queer initially caused him a great deal of anxiety. “I think that came from a deep-rooted fear of knowing that I was gay and not being able to be free,” he said. “By the time I got to high school when your brain is starting to catch up to your physical impulses, it led to a very confusing time.” Being in theater helped him to deal with his fear. “I was starting to develop a sense of confidence by way of being able to entertain people. It was like a decoy version of myself that I was putting out there to not have to live with the reality that when the bullying was happening — if someone was calling me a f****t or whatever it was — they were speaking the truth,” he says. At 18, with the help of his mother, he finally was able to come out.
Dan is the son of Eugene Levy and Deborah Divine.
Hannah Einbinder opened up to The Advocate about how her breakout role on (the excellent) Hackshelped her further accept her identity. “As someone who exists in a [kind of] middle in terms of sexuality and gender, I have at times, especially in my early days of attempting to accept myself, felt really out of place. I was never fully one thing, so I never fully belonged anywhere,” Einbinder told The Advocate. “I think if I had seen more images of bisexual characters, it would have been easier. It would have been more clear. My journey wouldn’t have taken me so long to accept that I had been kind of brainwashed by the binary in a lot of ways.”
Hanna is the daughter of original Saturday Night Live cast member Laraine Newman and Chad EinbinderBen Platt officially came out in 2019 when he dropped the queer music video “Ease My Mind,” starring fellow out actor Charlie Carver. But as he told People at the time, he had been out privately for a very long time. “I’ve been out since I was 12 years old to my family and anyone in my life,” he pointed out. “I’ve never sort of hidden that or been ashamed by it. It’s just part of me.”
Ben is the son of producer Marc Platt.
Singer, actor, and all-around icon Miley Cyrus had been hinting at her queerness for a while before confirming her pansexuality in 2015 in Elle U.K. “I’m pansexual. But I’m not in a relationship. I’m 22, I’m going on dates, but I change my style every two weeks, let alone who I’m with,” she said at the time.
Miley is the daughter of singer Billy Ray Cyrus and producer Tish Cyrus.
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While Dakota Johnson has never put a specific label on her sexuality, her interview with Vogue in 2017 has led many to believe she’s family. “I’ve been in a phase of my life where I’m fascinated by young women coming to terms with their sexuality,” she told the fashion mag. “I guess, by proxy, I have been experiencing that in my own life, and it’s very interesting to me.”
“Can we make things really juicy?” she continued. “Can we say that I’m taking this time to explore my bisexuality?”
Dakota is the daughter of actors Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson.
