Lily Allen took a moment this week to interrogate the “nepo baby” terminology that has become widespread in its use to denote Hollywood professionals whose parents are also famous.
“Nepo babies, I think it’s quite like ‘Karen’, in the sense that it’s just a word that is basically used for women who are taking up space, and we’d rather they didn’t, and they should just go away,” the “Fuck You” singer said on her Miss Me podcast.
Allen, 39, is the daughter of British actor Keith Allen. Her brother Alfie is also an actor, best known for his work on Game of Thrones. “My brother, for instance, doesn’t get called nepo baby, and I do,” Allen continued this week.
“I actually don’t really mind the nepotism thing, it’s the ‘baby’ that annoys me,” she said. “It’s like, I’m 40 years old nearly!”
Allen elaborated that the “infantilizing nature” of the term “baby” is “something that is almost exclusively used for women,” adding, “I don’t think I can even really name any male nepo babies.”
The singer-actress admitted, “There’s an element of truth” to the classification, ceding that “I grew up in a certain class bracket, I grew up in and amongst people that worked in media, and I don’t think I’ve ever really disputed that.”
Nevertheless, she said, it’s her observed male-female difference that is most annoying. “I feel like a lot of the time over the past 15, 20 years when I’ve been written about it will always say ‘Lily Allen, daughter of Keith Allen’ and I don’t see that happening with boys as often as it does with girls,” she said.
Allen added that she thinks the dissonance comes from audiences seeking an explanation for “what it really was that put” famous women on the map, whereas male fame seems already acceptable.
When “nepo baby” discourse hit the mainstream following a 2022 New York Magazine story, Allen spoke about the issue on X, formerly Twitter, writing, “The nepo babies y’all should be worrying about are the ones working for legal firms,the ones working for banks,and the ones working in politics, If we’re talking about real world consequences and robbing people of opportunity. BUT that’s none of my business.”
Later, she added: “And before you come at me for being a nepo baby myself, I will be the first to tell you that I literally deserve nothing.”
