North West loves being a nepo baby. Others should too
In this column, we deliver hot (and cold) takes on pop culture, judging whether a subject is overrated or underrated.
By Nell Geraets
When Disney asked Kim Kardashian’s 10-year-old daughter, North West, to sing I Just Can’t Wait to be King at the Hollywood Bowl for The Lion King’s 30th anniversary, they were basically inviting the masses to troll her. A nepo baby of mega proportions performing a number from one of the most famous musicals in history? She needed to channel Simba as though there were no tomorrow.
But channel Simba she did not. West sauntered across the stage, looking as uninspired about being there as she was by her mother’s Met Gala looks, and wearing what could only be described as “lion streetwear”. Meanwhile, exquisitely costumed backup dancers leapt and pranced around her, clearly compensating for the astounding lack of energy centre-stage. And her final note, replete with a juicy octave jump, has since become a go-to meme on TikTok.
If I were West, I’d be mortified. After all, I still have nightmares about a tap dance I messed up during a school performance of Anything Goes, and no one cared who my parents were. But that is why I’m awed by this 10-year-old. Not because of the SKIMS empire she’ll eventually inherit, or the fact her wardrobe is probably 15 times the size of mine, but because she doesn’t seem to care what others think of her.
Sure, she doesn’t have great singing chops, and plenty of other professionally trained performers could have taken her place. But do these doubts seem to haunt her on stage? Absolutely not, she’s too busy enjoying being a kid who happens to be a readymade celebrity.
Some may call this arrogance, but I just see it as making lemonade out of lemons. West was born into endless privilege, nothing could change that. Instead of merely bathing in the attention that naturally comes with being the child of famous parents, West is using it to feed her wildly creative mind, which has been evident since she began drawing those creepy pictures for her parents a few years back.
Since then, she has rocked step-and-repeats with killer fashion, performed in one of her father’s (who happens to be another famous person, Kanye West) rap tracks and during his tour, and announced an upcoming studio album, Elementary School Dropout. She may not be wonderful at everything, but she’s giving it a red-hot go.
Granted, it’s safe to assume she doesn’t entirely understand what being a “nepo baby” means yet. She probably thinks every kid could sit front row at Paris Fashion Week runways. She’ll eventually learn that this is laughably far from the truth, and her extreme privilege comes with certain responsibilities that the Twitter (now X) army will hold her to. Hopefully, she’ll maintain the total lack of shame that seems to define her childhood, transforming privilege into creativity while mimicking the refreshing “zero f---s given” attitude some nepo babies before her have mastered.
For example, Maya Hawke, the daughter of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke, told the Times of London she’s fairly certain she was cast in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood because of her family ties. Does she feel bad? Not at all.
“‘Deserves’ is a complicated word … 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,” Hawke said.
Similarly, Ishana Night Shyamalan (daughter of M. Night Shyamalan) acknowledges that her father’s fame opened opportunities that led to her major film The Watchers. Instead of denying that, she just makes sure her privilege isn’t squandered. “It’s really about meeting that privilege and honouring that with as hard a work ethic as we can,” she recently told The New York Times.
North West is the epitome of “nepo baby”. It doesn’t seem to bother her in the slightest.Credit: AP
As infuriating as it can be to know that some people have things handed to them on a silver platter, would we reject this treatment if the roles were reversed? I wouldn’t, so who am I to judge?
And many nepo babies are good at what they do. Hawke’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood co-star Margaret Qualley’s Southern drawl in Drive Away Dolls was enough to convince me of her star power, even though her mum is Andie MacDowell. Jane Fonda created such a successful film (and aerobics) empire that most people forget she’s even a nepo baby in the first place (her father, Henry Fonda, was an actor).
What a loss it would’ve been if Sofia Coppola had just said, “you know what, papa Francis was a director, so I’ll give The Virgin Suicides a miss”. Nepo baby parents may be able to buy or name-drop their kid into roles, but they can’t buy them talent. That’s developed over time.
Lily-Rose Depp is an example of a nepo baby.Credit: Dominique Charriau
The whole nepo baby thing only really becomes an issue when their privilege goes unchecked. Last year, Gwyneth Paltrow called the label an “ugly moniker” after her daughter received some backlash for modelling with Chanel.
Similarly, Kaia Gerber (daughter of model Cindy Crawford) and Lily-Rose Depp (daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis) have both essentially said being a nepo baby may get your foot in the door, but then requires you to work almost twice as hard to stay there. It’s safe to say that none of these arguments have gone down particularly well with the “pleb” public, merely coming across as ludicrously out of touch.
On the other hand, there are people like Hawke and West. Yes, they’ve ridden many coattails to get to where they are today, and they’ll probably continue to. But instead of concealing their “nepo babyness”, they’re creating something with it. Even better, they’re upfront about it. And fair enough because, let’s face it, if I had parents as famous as West’s, I’d network my way to Broadway.
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