According to Ethan Hawke, it’s not easy being a celebrity dad and that’s why he’s trying his best to raise his four children out of the Hollywood spotlight. The actor opens up to Prestige Hong Kong magazine about how it’s like to raise his four kids, Maya, 14, Levon, 10, Clementine, 4, Indiana, 1. Here are some snippets:
On raising his four children: “I try not to be desperate at all with anything with the kids. Having four of them you see how little control you have. When I had my first [with ex-wife Uma Thurman], I thought my parenting was so important but when you have four of them you realize human beings are so completely themselves, they are so unique unto themselves, that it doesn’t have that much to do with you. I mean obviously you want to create a situation where they’re healthy and have a good education. But apart from that you don’t have any control really about whether they’re literary or whether they’re interested in sports.”
On a YouTube clip of Maya playing in a cafe: “She’s super-talented. She writes her own music and we went and played eight of her songs. She’s only 13, so I don’t know if its going to be an interest she sustains over a lifetime, but I was happy to see her have this creative outlet.”
On how his kids deal with having a famous father: “They don’t care who I am. They get annoyed that I get recognized. We live in a culture where people think it’s such a great thing, to be LeBron James or to be Leonardo DiCaprio or Whitney Houston or Elvis. People think an amazing level of success is exciting but the truth is that it’s so destructive – celebrity, fame, power. A little bit of it is a wonderful thing, but it ruins lives. In some strange way I always knew I didn’t want to be Tom Cruise. It’s not that I didn’t want the work. I would love to get every director wanting to work with me because I could get the green light for their projects. But the price is too high. It’s just too high.”
Photos by Prestige
