- Lily-Rose Depp is an actress, who stars in the HBO show The Idol.
- Lily-Rose’s dad is Johnny Depp.
- Lily-Rose’s mom is Vanessa Paradis.
Lily-Rose Depp has not one, but two, famous parents. The 24-year-old star is the daughter of Johnny Depp, 60, and Vanessa Paradis, 50, and she’s successfully followed in their footsteps as an actor, starring in the HBO series The Idol with The Weeknd (real name Abel Tesfaye). Lily-Rose has always been known for who her parents are, but now she’s really making a name for herself in Hollywood.
Lily-Rose’s mom and dad were together from 1998 to 2012, and while they never got married, they did have two children together: Lily-Rose and her younger brother, Jack Depp, 21. Johnny and Vanessa are both huge stars, and Lily-Rose has been open over the years about what it’s like being their daughter. Here’s everything you need to know about Lily-Rose’s parents.
Lily-Rose Depp’s Dad, Johnny Depp
Johnny Depp is arguably one of the most famous actors in the world. He’s a three-time Oscar nominee who has starred in some of the biggest movies ever. He started acting as a child and made his film debut in A Nightmare on Elm Street, before starring in the 21 Jump Street television series. Johnny blew up in the 1990s with films like Edward Scissorhands, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Donnie Brasco, and Sleepy Hallow. Johnny became a worldwide star thanks to his role as Captain Jack Sparrow in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. Johnny’s also starred in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Finding Neverland, and Alice in Wonderland. Talk about an impressive resume!
Johnny met Vanessa in 1998 while they were filming the movie The Ninth Gate. They fell in love and welcomed Lily-Rose the following year. Johnny and Vanessa separated in 2012. He went on to marry actress Amber Heard in 2015, but they split two years later. Amber obtained a temporary restraining order against her ex in 2016, after alleging he had been physically and verbally abusive during their relationship. Then, in 2019, Johnny sued Amber for defamation after she wrote an op-ed in The Washington Post in 2018 about leaving an abusive relationship. Amber never named Johnny in the article, but he still sued her anyway, and he ended up winning the 2022 defamation trial that became nationwide news. Johnny was awarded $5 million in punitive damages, as well as $10 million in compensatory damages. The judge capped his punitive damages at $350,000. Amber was awarded $2 million after the court ruled that a statement made by Johnny’s lawyer Adam Waldman was defamatory.
Johnny’s career took a hit because of the allegations made by Amber. The actor previously lost a 2020 libel case against the UK Sun, which famously labeled the actor a “wife beater.” The verdict resulted in the loss of his role in the Fantastic Beasts franchise. But ever since he won the 2022 defamation trial against Amber, Johnny’s gotten back in the mix as an actor and musician. He’s been on tour with his band, Hollywood Vampires, and completed his first movie after the trial, Jeanne du Barry, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival on May 16. Johnny and his castmates got a seven-minute standing ovation at the screening of the French film.
Johnny has a close relationship with Lily-Rose, though they’ve kept that out of the spotlight. Lily-Rose actually defended her dad in a since-deleted post back in 2016 when the abuse accusations by Amber began to make headlines.
“My dad is the sweetest, most loving person I know, he’s been nothing but a wonderful father to my little brother and [me], and everyone who knows him would say the same,” she wrote.
Lily-Rose spoke to Elle in November 2022 about why she stayed silent during her dad’s defamation trial. “When it’s something that’s so private and so personal that all of a sudden becomes not so personal,” she explained. “I feel really entitled to my secret garden of thoughts. I also think that I’m not here to answer for anybody, and I feel like, for a lot of my career, people have really wanted to define me by the men in my life, whether that’s my family members or my boyfriends, whatever. And I’m really ready to be defined for the things that I put out there.”
In that same interview, Lily-Rose explained how she was raised with two very famous parents. “My parents protected my brother [Jack] and me from it as much as possible,” she said. “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 added, “I’ve just been raised in a manner that has taught me that privacy is something that’s important to protect.”
Lily-Rose was also at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival for the premiere of her show The Idol. In an interview with Entertainment Tonight, she was asked about Johnny getting a long-standing ovation for his performance in Jeanne du Barry. “I’m super happy for him,” Lily-Rose said. “I’m super excited. And it’s so awesome that we get to do projects that we’re super proud of.”
Lily-Rose Depp’s Mom, Vanessa Paradis
Lily-Rose is also close with her look-alike mom Vanessa Paradis. Vanessa is a French singer, model, and actress who, like Johnny, found fame at a young age. She’s been in a plethora of popular French films and has released seven studio albums. As a model, Vanessa’s been on hundreds of magazine covers like Vogue, Vanity Fair, and Harper’s Bazaar. She’s been a spokesperson for Chanel since 1991, chosen by the late Karl Lagerfeld.
Vanessa’s relationship with Johnny began in 1998 after she and singer Lenny Kravitz ended a five-year relationship. Vanessa and Johnny’s romance ran its course by 2012, and after the pair weren’t seen together for some time, Johnny’s publicist told Entertainment Tonight that he and Vanessa were “amicably” going their separate ways.
“Please respect their privacy and, more importantly, the privacy of their children,” the short public statement read. Vanessa reportedly got a massive sum of $150 million in the divorce settlement, according to The Sun.
A few years after Johnny and Vanessa’s 2012 split, Vanessa got married to French film director Samuel Benchetrit. Their nuptials took place in June 2018, at which point Johnny already got married and then divorced from Amber Heard. When Amber originally accused Johnny of abuse, Vanessa backed the Pirates of the Caribbean actor and said the allegations were “nothing like the true Johnny I have known.” She also confirmed that Johnny was never “violent or abusive” during their 14-year relationship. Vanessa did not speak out while Johnny and Amber’s defamation trial was going on in 2022.
Over the years, Lily-Rose has talked about her love for her mom. “When I was little, I wanted to be a singer, just because I wanted to be like Mum. Every little girl wants to be like her mum,” Lily-Rose Depp told The Sun in 2019. “I would try on all of her dresses and shoes, even though I was in diapers at the time,” she also said. Lily-Rose told The Face in 2019 that Vanessa “taught me a lot about self-confidence.”
Being that she’s Johnny and Vanessa’s daughter, Lily-Rose has become one of the faces of nepotism. She blasted the “nepo baby” label in her 2022 interview with Elle, saying, “I just hear it a lot more about women, and I don’t think that it’s a coincidence. 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. If somebody’s mom or dad is a doctor, and then the kid becomes a doctor, you’re not going to be like, ‘Well, you’re only a doctor because your parent is a doctor.’ It’s like, ‘No, I went to medical school and trained.’ ”
Lily-Rose later told i-D that she’s “so careful now” regarding conversations about nepotism. “I feel like my parents did the best job that they possibly could at giving me the most ‘normal childhood’ that they could. And obviously, that still was not a normal childhood,” she said. “I’m super aware of the fact that my childhood did not look like everybody’s.”