Here are Top 8 Nepo Babies You Didn’t Know Were Born to Celebrity Parents

Celebrities With Successful Celebrity Parents

The industry has many nepo babies who are massively successful, but fans don't often know they are nepo babies. These not-so-secret celebrity descendants have been making their mark beyond the paparazzi flash, surprising us with their talents. From Riley Keough, channeling her legendary grandfather's charisma, to Jamie Lee Curtis' stealthily talented kin, and Matty Healy, the British musical progeny you didn't see coming. These are the lesser-known offspring of Hollywood royalty, such as the multitalented Riley Keough, the granddaughter of Elvis Presley & daughter of Lisa Marie Presley, the daughter of Law & Order's Mariska Hargitay, Matty Healy, the son of two British entertainment icons, and the soulful singer Elle King. Here are 8 such nepo baby celebs:

1. Matty Healy

Fans of The 1975 may be unaware that Matty Healy, the band's vocalist and lyricist, is the child of two well-known British actors. Denise Welch, his mother, is a television personality and performer featured in Britain's longest-running soap opera, Coronation Street, per Nicki Swift. She also co-hosts the popular chat show Loose Women. The singer's father, Tim Healy, is a British actor best known for playing Dennis Patterson in the television series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. Controversy has enveloped Matty's music career. He's talked openly about growing up in a nepotistic household, but he frequently does so in defense of it, denying his privileges and labeling his detractors as "jealous."

2. Elle King

Elle King aspired to set herself apart from her renowned father, the actor Rob Schneider. While Tanner Elle Schneider is her birth name, the Ex's & Oh's singer takes her mother, former model Lond King, as her last name. King revealed that she put a lot of effort into building her music career even though her father was in the entertainment business in a February 2023 interview with PEOPLE. "I wanted to be my person. I never wanted to borrow money from anybody, and I've worked hard for my family and me. I want to have a life built for myself, and I want to know that I did it," she shared.

3. Jamie Lee Curtis

Curtis has been employed in Hollywood since the late 1970s, however, there have been discussions on the possibility that her parents' fame helped launch her career. Curtis is the youngest child of Janet Leigh and actor Tony Curtis. Her parents are from Hollywood's golden era, a significant period in the history of filmmaking. Curtis, who made fun of her birth into Hollywood aristocracy, called herself the "OG Nepo Baby." However, Curtis also defended herself and performers from renowned backgrounds in an Instagram post. "The current conversation about nepo babies is just designed to try to diminish and denigrate and hurt. For the record I have navigated 44 years with the advantages my associated and reflected fame brought me, I don't pretend there aren't any, that try to tell me that I have no value on my own," she wrote. 

4. Mariska Hargitay

Actor Mariska Hargitay's breakthrough performance came from her part in "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit." Her mother, actress and sex icon Jayne Mansfield from the 1950s, may have passed on her acting DNA. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Mansfield became an international sensation, appearing in iconic movies such as Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? and The Girl Can't Help It, among others. Mickey Hargitay, Hargitay's father, was Mr. Universe in 1955 in addition to being an actor. Mariska shared with The Sydney Morning Herald. "It's not an accident that she was an actress and I am an actress. She has had so much influence on me, in ways that, in my unconscious mind, I am not even fully aware of."

5. Riley Keough

As Daisy Jones, a fictitious singer and composer on the Amazon Prime series Daisy Jones & The Six, Riley Keough showcased her amazing vocal abilities. Keough is the legendary rock and roll star Elvis Presley's granddaughter. Lisa Marie Presley, her mother, carried on her father's legacy. Danny Keough, Keough's father, is a musician who was a bassist in Lisa Marie's group.

6. Phoebe Dynevor

Although Phoebe Dynevor, the Bridgerton star, was born to well-known parents, she isn't always the first performer who springs to mind when talking about nepo babies in Hollywood. Sally Dynevor, her mother, is a well-known British actress who has been in Coronation Street for more than thirty years. Screenwriter Tim Dynevor, her father, wrote the television show Emmerdale Farm. Phoebe was also influenced by her parents' career in the field. She had the opportunity to become well-versed in this extremely hard field. "I was always really interested in what was going on, watching the cameraman and stuff," she told Express.

7. Nico Parker

Despite never having performed on screen before Dumbo, Parker was used to film locations. Actor Thandiwe Newton, winner of many Emmy awards, is her mother. She has acted in films such as Westworld, Mission: Impossible II, and The Pursuit of Happyness. Ol Parker, a producer and filmmaker, is Parker's father. Films like Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again and Ticket to Paradise have been directed by him. "I was very fortunate enough because both my parents are in the industry, I could visit sets," she shared in an appearance on The Jennifer Hudson Show, expressing that she felt acting was mundane and "not work" at first. "They would just wait around all day. To me, acting was 90% of the time waiting around drinking coffee. I was like, 'You guys don't work,'" she joked.

8. Zosie Mamet

Although Zosia Mamet has been in Hollywood for a while, her most well-known role is that of Shoshanna Shapiro in the popular HBO series Girls. The reason for this might be that her father, renowned playwright and director David Mamet, starred his daughter in some of her initial endeavors, such as the 2004 film Spartan and the TV show The Unit, both of which were written by her father. Zosia told The Guardian that while her father might have played a major role in launching her acting career, things weren't always easy. "A lot of people gave me a much harder time because they didn't want me to have it easy," she shared.