FAME IS CH
by Tanya Sweeney Forget joining your parents in the family business, these mams and dads are flipping tradition and following in the footsteps – and earning stakes – of their celebrity offspring
WE ALL know that it pays in spades to be the child of a celebrity — just ask Brooklyn Beckham, Anais Gallagher or Rocco Ritchie. Yet for a growing number of ordinary people, giving birth and raising someone who will eventually become a celebrity has many upsides, too.
Proving that there are fringe benefits galore in having a famous offspring, stylish Howth native Sandra Wilson, right, has become a serious social media force to be reckoned with, mainly due to her daughter Vogue Williams.
Sandra, who now lives in Spain, joined Instagram a couple of weeks ago and is proving a huge hit on the platform. Thanks to some comments and likes from her Insta-famous daughter, as well as the odd picture of her famous son-in-law Spencer Matthews, she has amassed more than 6,000 followers already. And her keen sense of style has not gone unnoticed (well, she did call her daughter Vogue). Mixing up high street looks from Zara and Marks & Spencer along with Louis Vuitton and Ralph Lauren, it’s fair to say that style influencer status is very much hers for the taking. And Sandra’s not the only one to have found that having a famous son and daughter is helpful — just look at these proud parents...
AISLING QUINN AND HER DAD NIALL
GRANTED, Irish footballing legend Niall has long been a famous figure in his own right, but now that his model daughter Aisling has been anointed ‘style queen’ status, it looks like a whole new career path might just have opened up for him. As of late last year, Aisling has joined her dad’s new business venture Fanzfirst. The business is a tech company that enables social media influencers to link their followers to retail benefits, and is due to go live soon. It’s safe to say that stunning Aisling can offer a pointer or two on how to make a splash on social media.
CONOR MCGREGOR AND HIS DAD TONY
THE MMA fighter’s sisters Erin and Aoife have long lapped up the social media spotlight, posting about their fabulous and designer-packed lives on Instagram. And Conor’s dad Tony McGregor has now amassed a 21kstrong following on the site. He, too, is wont to showing off the spoils of an extravagant lifestyle, and dropping the odd designer name.
He’s also particularly fond of posting video diaries. In fact, it’s fair to say that sometimes Tony likes a good old rant: five months ago, he was famously ‘none-tooplussed’ after an experience on the DART. ‘When I got to Lansdowne Road station I tendered a brand new crisp €20 note into the automatic machine looking for a single ticket to Dun Laoghaire,’ he revealed in a post that eventually went viral. ‘They had the bloody cheek to give me back coinage. €17.30 and a miserable little one-way ticket. I have no room to put those coins anywhere. I wear a slim-fit, hand-fitted Hugo Boss suit.’
Hilarity naturally ensued, but proving that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, Tony saw his social media following soon swell.
SAOIRSE RONAN AND HER DAD PAUL
THE Oscar-nominated star’s dad was always known as something of a workhorse in acting circles, and Paul has long been credited as instrumental in his daughter’s earliest successes. It was only a few short years ago that Paul would chaperone his thenadolescent daughter to film sets, shoots and interviews. And from the start of her career, Saoirse has been very carefully protected by her parents, with Paul acting as her de facto manager. The father and daughter team appeared on an episode of The Clinic together when Saoirse was eight and later, in 2013, they both starred in How I Live Now. He has worked steadily as an actor in his own right since, most recently landing a gig as a cast regular on Fair City. It’s fair to say that when it comes to landing high-profile roles, his association with one of Ireland’s biggest acting exports is likely to have been more help than hindrance. Saoirse’s mum Monica, meanwhile, has been enjoying the A-list lifestyle by proxy. She has been a regular presence on the red carpet with her daughter during awards season: the two famously went for a few cheeky drinks in the middle of the Oscars ceremony in 2016.