The nepo co-star who blew Liam Neeson away: “She’s an extraordinary young actress”
Nepotism runs Hollywood, but in some cases, you can’t imagine an actor doing anything else other than following in their parents’ footsteps.
Some stars try to hide their connections, but it’s futile because people are always going to find out, so if you’ve got the talent, all you can do is embrace it. Look at Nicolas Cage, who changed his surname to avoid nepotism allegations, whereas his cousin Sofia Coppola, who’d go on to win an Oscar for Lost in Translation, could only embrace her nepotistic ties.
It certainly worked out for her, and her cousin’s real family connections were soon exposed, anyway. Why else would he keep starring in small roles in Francis Ford Coppola’s films during the 1980s?
These days, it feels like the young actors we’re seeing emerge on our screens are increasingly all the children of some established star, and that, seemingly, nepo kids flock to one another. A great example is the 2014 film Palo Alto, directed by Coppola’s granddaughter, Gia, which starred Val Kilmer’s son, Jack, Julia Roberts’ niece (and Eric’s daughter), Emma, Andie MacDowell’s daughter Margaret Qualley, and Polly Draper’s son, Nat Wolff. Essentially, every scene featured the kid of someone already famous.
But when Liam Neeson ended up working alongside a nepo-baby who was being directed by her own father, he couldn’t deny the talent he was faced with. Neeson was cast in Wildcat, released in 2024, which Ethan Hawke wrote and directed, about writer Flannery O’Connor, and in the film, Maya Hawke, who was born to Ethan and his then-partner, Kill Bill star Uma Thurman, took on the leading role, having already risen to fame following her performance in Stranger Things.
“I just did a day’s work on a film that Ethan Hawke is directing, with his daughter Maya playing the extraordinary American writer Flannery O’Connor,” he told IndieWire. Neeson didn’t have much screen time with the actor, but he knew he was in the presence of someone special.
“I was just in one scene with his daughter. I was playing an Irish priest, a stretch, I know. Maya, my gosh, what a talent. She’s an extraordinary young actress, let me tell you. It was just Maya and myself, and Maya is sick, and she’s in a bed, and I’m sitting at the side, and between takes, Ethan would come over and give her little notes. I tried not to listen. It’s a father and daughter, at the end of the day. But a couple of things I did hear, I thought, ‘That’s a great note. That’s a really good piece of direction’.”
Some nepo-babies just seem to possess the talent their parents have running through their blood, too; just look at the likes of Judy Garland and her daughter, Liza Minnelli. Of course, access to the best schools, acting teachers, and connections is always going to help, and it’s a shame that so many genuinely talented ‘normal’ budding actors miss out on opportunities because of those who practically grew up in Hollywood.
But with the way that the industry works, it seems like we won’t be seeing the end of nepo-babies any time soon, so the least we can hope for is that the ones who are actually talented and dedicated, like Hawke, are made famous.
