Sophie von Haselberg Says Being Called a ‘Nepo Baby’ Is A ‘Justified’ Fear—She Doesn’t Want to Be Compared to Her Mom Bette Midler

Sophie von Haselberg was very aware of being called a “nepo baby” long before New York Magazine invented the now-ubiquitous term for the children of famous people. It’s why she was initially resistant to becoming an actor. Her mother, Bette Midler, to whom she bares a striking resemblance, is an icon of stage and screen and von Haselberg says there’s “a lot of fear around being compared to her… now, with all the ‘nepo baby’ stuff, those fears are, I think, justified for all people who decide to go into any field that’s the same as their parent who’s had success,” she tells StyleCaster. “Like, ‘How can I possibly hold my own if my mom has already made such an impact?’”

It’s also true that her mom tried to discourage her daughter from pursuing a notoriously “heartbreaking” business. “It’s so hard to allow the work itself to be enough,” von Haselberg reflects, “and when you’re not working, it’s hard to be an actor who’s out of work, which 99 percent of the time 99 percent of us are. So, I think the heartbreak of that is what she really wanted to spare me.”

Though she spent time with her mom on set and was always interested in storytelling, von Haselberg’s B.A. was in sociology…

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Jacqueline Persaud