Ireland Baldwin Pushes Back On Lily-Rose Depp's 'Nepotism Baby' Comments

Ireland Baldwin is taking time to acknowledge her privilege in the wake of Lily-Rose Depp ’s headline-making stance on nepotism in Hollywood. 

Depp, the daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, stirred controversy earlier this month after shrugging off the implication that she received preferential treatment from film casting and modeling agencies because of her famous parents.  

“I know my childhood didn’t look like everybody’s childhood, and it’s a very particular thing to deal with, but it’s also the only thing that I know,” she told Elle magazine . “It’s weird to me to reduce somebody to the idea that they’re only there because it’s a generational thing. It just doesn’t make any sense.”  

Not surprisingly, Depp’s thoughts on so-called “nepotism” or “nepo babies” a term condescendingly applied to children born into celebrity families  drew a blistering response from others in the modeling and acting industries as well as online.

Baldwin, the daughter of actors Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger, offered a more tempered view in a series of short videos posted to her TikTok account last week. After acknowledging that Depp is “very capable of being a model” and has “proven herself in a lot of ways,” she added, “I would never have become a model if it weren’t for who my parents were.” 

“I wouldn’t be where I am, I wouldn’t have gotten where I am and been able to do what I can do if it weren’t for my parents,” Baldwin added in a follow-up video . “I think really where you go wrong is denying that.”

Still, she urged viewers to ease up on the criticisms of Depp, noting that the comments were likely “coming out of a defensive place.”

“You get a place where you get really tired of answering questions about your parents because you so desperately want to be someone separate from all of that, especially when you choose a career that is in the public eye,” she explained. 

Though it’s difficult to argue that having famous parents doesn’t come with major professional (and financial) benefits when making your way in show business, Depp isn’t the first celebrity offspring to publicly recoil at being branded a “nepo baby.” 

In an interview with The Cut published last week, Lourdes Leon took a similarly defensive stance when asked whether being the eldest daughter of pop superstar Madonna  was an advantage when recording her first EP. 

“I want to feel like I deserve things and not just like I’ve been given things,” she said. “And, yes, there’s undeniable privilege that I’d be stupid to not realize. Nepotism babies are pretty awful usually, and my mom and my father raised me to be so much smarter than that.”