Hooray for dads: Documentary looks at fatherhood.
Actress Bryce Dallas Howard directs Dads, a documentary which celebrates fatherhood and features interviews with ordinary parents and celebrities, like her actor-turned-director father Ron Howard. Sarah Nealon reports.
Asking famous people questions about their children can be tricky. While some are more than happy to chat about their offspring, others don’t like talking about their personal lives.
However, on a new Apple TV+ documentary, simply titled Dads, celebrity fathers such as film star Will Smith, talk-show host Jimmy Fallon, actor Neil Patrick Harris and movie producer Judd Apatow open up about parenting.
There are anecdotes about caring for newborn babies, the challenges of dealing with teenagers and the joys of savouring precious family time.
But just how easy was it to persuade these celebrity fathers to open up? “Not as difficult as you might think,” says actress and Dads director Bryce Dallas Howard. “A lot of dads are softies when it comes to their kids. We started joking around with one another during post production, saying that we should call this movie Dads Cry.”
Howard, who has two children (Theo, 13, and Beatrice, eight) with her actor husband Seth Gable, may be recognisable from films such as The Help, Jurassic World and Pete’s Dragon.
She is also the daughter of former Happy Days actor Ron Howard, who is now a Hollywood film director with a CV including blockbusters Apollo 13, The Da Vinci Code and Splash.
On Dads, a misty-eyed Ron Howard, 66, who has four children including Bryce Dallas, talks about his family and the pressure he put on himself to be as good a father as his own dad.
“Him getting emotional was really moving for me,” says Bryce Dallas Howard of her father. “He’s super sweet but he’s quiet and emoting in
that way that is a big deal. He said to me afterwards, ‘I’ve never cried for real on camera’.”
Dads also showcases old home movies of the Howards when Bryce Dallas was a little girl and Ron had a moustache.
In the present day, there is an interview with Ron Howard’s son Reed (Bryce Dallas’ younger brother) who is gearing up for the arrival of his first child.
Other fathers profiled in Dads include a Japanese stay-at-home dad, two US gay dads who have four adopted children, and a Brazilian dad who grew up without his father.
Bryce Dallas Howard directed the celebrity dads but wasn’t there for the filming of some of the lesser-known dads and their families.
“I didn’t go there physically,” she says. “It’s kind of an obnoxious reason. It’s because Jurassic World had just come out and there was a real concern that the kids (would) potentially recognise me and then not be able to be themselves – you know, asking questions about dinosaurs and such. It was so important that these families were depicted in a way where they were not self-aware or trying to perform.”
Just like the celebrity dads, these fathers discuss the trials and tribulations of parenting and how it has changed them for the better.
After watching men share their parenting experiences, what does Bryce Dallas Howard think children want from their fathers?
“Being there and being there in a way that feels memorable,” she says. “Not necessarily memorable like, ‘Oh my gosh, it’s a party and it’s an amazing thing and (Dad) is doing cartwheels’ and all of that. But just that there’s a connection ...
“I know that’s the case in my household. My kids just want Seth and I to be there physically with them as much as possible. That’s what they crave and I know that’s what I crave of my parents still to this day, age 39.”
As a child Bryce Dallas Howard remembers being on film sets with her father and recalls coming to New Zealand for the first time at the age of five when her father was directing the fantasy film Willow.
She has returned to our shores multiple times including filming her role on Pete’s Dragon and for a tourism campaign to encourage Americans to travel to New Zealand.
Her most recent visit was in March when she was on holiday with her husband for her birthday.
“We went to Waiheke Island which was beautiful – and Auckland,” says Bryce Dallas Howard.
“We just drove around so much. We went to Hawke’s Bay, it was perfect. It was the end of summer.” Streams on AppleTV+