Kevin Costner

Kevin Costner 1991 (c) HFPA

Born January 18, 1955.  Has three older children with first wife Cindy: Annie, born April 15, 1985, Lily, born August 4, 1986, Joe, born January 13, 1988.  Three younger children with second wife Christine: Cayden, born May 7, 2007, Hayes, born February 12, 2009, Grace, born June 2, 2010.

Q: How have your children adjusted to this different kind of family relationship, so prevalent in our society today, where the mother and father don’t live together?
A.  We never know how we bruise our children when we live that way, when we’re divorced; we don’t know the psychological scar that they’re running around with, based on what happened to them.  But our children are strong, and they know they’re loved, they know they’re cared for, and they know that their parents respect each other. 1997

Q: How different is for you to be a father the second time around, with your three young children?
A:  It’s not different for me and I’m really thankful for that.  I’ve known men that have had a second family and they say, “It’s so different this second time, so beautiful, because I missed it the first time.”  But I am happy to say that, even early in my career, my children were everything to me; so I have no regrets with my first three.  2010

Shirley MacLaine

Shirley MacLaine 1988 (c) HFPA

Born April 24, 1934.  Has one daughter, Sachi, born September 1, 1956, with ex husband Steve Parker.

Q:  What is your relationship with your daughter, now that she’s older and has her own life?
A:  A problem we all face is the fact that communication between parents and children, and mothers and daughters in particular, is not that great.  My own daughter has slowly gone her way to do different things, as I went my own way; it took me a long time, but I finally got to the point where I could say to her:  “I honor the fact that you’ve got problems, but really they’re not mine, and I can’t solve them”.  My mother never got to that point with me, she was always trying to be this wonderful good mother; well, the truth is that we’re people too and maybe we should change our expectations of ourselves.  What happens to you may be your parents’ fault, but that doesn’t mean that you should visit your problems on them; you’d better take responsibility for your own life.  1993

Q: Are you a devoted aunt to the children of Annette Bening and your brother Warren Beatty?
A:  How can my relationship with Warren Beatty be traditional?  Our relationship is basically based on the children, there’s four of them and that’s quite swamping; they’re not babies anymore, they go from 11 something to 18.  My brother and I, we talk about business, we talk about politics, we talk about the fate of the world, we talk about children being on the Internet a lot. Have you noticed that a lot of kids are talking to you while they’re playing games?  This Internet is running our lives.  2010

Jack Lemmon

Jack Lemmon 1988 (c) HFPA

Born February 8, 1925, died June 27, 2001.  Has a son, Chris, born January 22 1954, with first wife Cynthia, a daughter, Courtney, born in 1966, with second wife Felicia.

Q:  Was it difficult for your son Chris, who’s also an actor, to have a famous father?
A:  I wanted to make sure that he didn’t have to go through that.  It’s difficult enough to have a relationship with your father, when you’re a young man trying to prove yourself, and when he’s famous the problem gets doubled.  I was trepidatious when he said that he wanted to get into acting; until his early twenties he was primarily interested in music and composing, and he’s awful good, he has a fertile musical mind.  But Chris has a very healthy attitude about that, he says: “I will never try to be the actor that my father is; he’s a great actor and I love him.  All I want to be is the best I can”.  1990

Q:  Aren’t you a bit disappointed that he hasn’t done better with his career, since at his age you were already famous?
A: No, because I don’t care what he does, whether he’s a movie star or anything else.  I absolutely adore him one hundred per cent, and I’m filled with respect for him as a human being, and that’s a lot more important than how famous he is.  We see each other constantly, we play golf together all the time. 1990

Jamie Lee Curtis

Jamie Lee Curtis 1988 (c) HFPA

Born November 22, 1958.  Has a daughter, Annie, born in 1986, and a son, Thomas (Tom), born in 1996, with husband Christopher Guest.

Q:  How did you arrive at the decision of adopting a second child, a boy, after adopting a girl ten years before?
A:  It wasn’t like I made a phone call and the next day I had a baby in my arms, this was a 6 month process; the reality is that, if I could have had a natural child, I would have.  It was my husband’s father’s illness that started making us think about what’s important; we realized that we’ve built and sacrificed a lot to get to a certain point, and now we have this wonderful life.  But our child is almost 10-year-old, she’s very mature and pretty soon she’ll be gone.  So we just looked at each other and said, “Why not enjoy another child?”  And it did not have to be a boy, obviously any parent’s only concern is that a baby be healthy; but my boy is so sweet, he’s delicious.  1996

Q:  You have written quite a few children’s books, does that fulfill you in a different way than your acting career?
A: As an actor I don’t think I’ve ever felt connected to what I do, that I ever really felt the success; but with my writing of children books I feel that they come from me, directly from my head, from my heart and from my soul, they represent my sensibility, the way I look at the world, my sense of humor.  And to have them be very successful, I actually feel, maybe for the first time, that I’m seen and heard as an artist in a way that I’ll never be seen and heard as an actor.  So this has been a wonderful venue for me.  1998

Robin Williams

Robin Williams 1998 (c) HFPA

Born July 21, 1951. Has a son, Zachary, born April 11, 1983, with first wife Valerie, a daughter, Zelda, born July 31, 1989, and a son, Cody, born November 17, 1991, with second wife Marsha.

Q: In what ways did you change your lifestyle when you became a father for the first time?
A:  Fatherhood was pretty sobering, it made me clean my act; six month before Zach was born I stopped everything, drugs and alcohol.  When you actually become a role model, and there is a tiny person imitating you, it kind of forces you to have a different perspective.  I had led a pretty wild life for a while, but you can’t come home and say to your kid: “Now daddy is going to throw up on you”.  You have this creature who looks up at you for some kind of security, and if you’re feeling massively insecure, which drugs and alcohol make you feel, you can’t be of any help to him.  And besides, all the money which isn’t going up my nose now goes to pay for his college.  1990

Q: Now that your children are older, what do you teach them about love and relationships?
A: My daughter met a young man recently, who was terrified of me, so I told him, “It’s okay, I won’t hurt you.” You know, she’s sixteen and quite beautiful, but she’s also really bright, which helps. That’s the best birth control in the whole world: intelligence.  She’s very discerning and has a great deal of integrity, which she gets from her mother, because she also has a mother who is very honest and very sweet with her.  I have a son who is twenty-three and another son who’s fourteen, so it’s pretty interesting times in our family.  2006

Meryl Streep

Meryl Streep 1988 (c) HFPA

Born June 22, 1949.  Has a son, Henry, born November 13 1979, and three daughters, Mamie, born August 3, 1983, Grace, born May 9, 1986, Louisa, born June 12, 1991, with husband Donald Gummer.

Q:  Are you raising your children differently than the way you’ve been raised?
A:  When I was little my parents schooled me on the depression theory of child raising:  “We didn’t have anything, and that could happen again, to you!”  So I always had a sense that I should make it on my own and not be dependent on anyone, take pride in whatever I chose to do; they encouraged me to do that, from the time that I was fifteen, they made me get a job after school every day.  So I had to work and scramble, and I think that paid off.  I would like to do the same with my children, but I don’t want to pontificate on parenting before my proof is in.  1990

Q:  What kind of advice do you give your grown-up children on how to handle the media circus and lead a normal family life, as you have managed to do?
A:  By now all of four of my children have grown up, and the youngest one has just left home to go to college. It was easier for me when I was coming up, there was no such thing as the 24/7 news cycle; today the scrutiny on young actresses is very hard, in the blogosphere, where people comment on their weight and their appearance, and are endlessly tearing them down. I always say to my daughters: “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, and don’t read about yourself in the blogs.” It is really hard not to Google yourself and get into that horrible vortex, but it is much better for your mental health and everything else.  You should try to lessen the self-awareness and the self-consciousness.  2010

Richard Gere

Richard Gere 1988 (c) HFPA

Born August 31, 1949.  Has a son, Homer, born February 6, 2000, with wife Carey.

Q:  What was your experience of watching your son being born?
A:  lt was a Cesarean section, but, as every parent knows, that is truly the most extraordinary thing that can happen to a human being, there’s no question about that.  When my son arrived and I looked into his eyes, I felt that the universe was complete.  2000

Q: Does being a father yourself make you reflect on your own father, your relationship with him as a child growing up?
A: I didn’t understand it as a kid, but my father, who’s still alive, had that genuine quality of being able to serve selflessly, of helping people and expecting nothing in return; it just flowed openly like water from him.  Of course, now, as a grown man, I value that quality more than anything else; and I would hope that there’s maybe a touch of that that’s being passed onto my own son.  2008

Sigourney Weaver

Sigourney Weaver 1988 (c) HFPA

Born October 8, 1949.  Has one daughter, Charlotte, born April 13, 1990, with husband Jim Simpson.

Q: What do you teach your daughter about morality and religion?
A: We do take our daughter to a non-denominational church, it’s more of a spiritual church; but she doesn’t seem very interested in it at this point.  As far as morality goes, children need to learn to think of others first, and you have to be there constantly to encourage them to do so; it’s a constant repetition. It’s amazing what a powerful position a parent is in, because you are the hander-over of all these sort of ideals; and I take that quite seriously. 1999

Q:  What is your relationship with your daughter, now that she’s moved away from home to attend college?
A:  Not to sound too corny, but I miss the little sunbeam that I used to have running around with me, and I know that that’s not who my daughter is anymore. She still has that in her, but I’m thrilled for her that she’s off to college doing what she’s supposed to be doing, like starting a poetry house, having her own radio show. I mean, she’s doing all these great things, but I’ll always miss that little person that used to be so mischievous and full of fun. 2009

Kevin Kline

Kevin Kline 1987 (c) HFPA

Born October 24, 1947.  Has a son, Owen Joseph, born October 14, 1991, and a daughter, Greta Simone, born March 21, 1994, with wife Phoebe Cates.

Q: How differently do you see that we parent our children today as opposed to earlier generations?
A: As enlightened and informed as we are now about children and parenting -which is now a verb, but when I was growing up it was only a noun, parent- I think that, especially now that both parents work, children are neglected in a different way.  In the early 70s, as the sexual revolution of the late 60s hit the suburbs, parents neglected their children, because they were so absorbed in their own second adolescence.  1997

Q; As a creative person, how do you help your children to maintain a childlike sense of wonderment about life as they grow up?
A:  Children have a natural sense of the magical, they have no problem with it; the tricky part probably is convincing them later in life that what they thought was magic is, in fact, something else and there are certain hard realities. Like the fact that the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus don’t really exist.  My children have wonderful imaginations, and if we can just keep them away from the television long enough, those will continue to grow and flourish.  My son is always doing magic tricks and it’s beautiful to see.  In a way it’s very easy, if you have young children, to realize how childlike what actors do as a profession is.  It’s make-believe, it’s playing roles and telling stories.  1999

Bette Midler

Bette Midler 1988 (c) HFPA

Born on December 1, 1945. She has one daughter, Sophie, born November 14, 1986, with husband Martin Von Haselberg aka Harry Kipper.

Q: You had your share of sex, drugs and rock-n-roll in the 60s and 70s.  Now that you are the mother of a 10-year-old daughter, what do you teach her?
A: I tell her: “Don’t get near it, don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t eat red meat.   Beware!”  I think the best thing a mother can do for a child is to caution them.  I mean, you don’t want to kill the child’s spirit, but at the same time there are so many dangers that were never around 20 years ago, that you have to tell them to be careful.  1997

Q: How do you and husband deal with the fact that your only daughter has grown up  and moved out of the house?
A: You what they say. When does life begin? When the dog dies and the children leave home (jokes).  We eat and we travel and we amuse ourselves in ways that we never amused ourselves before; since my daughter left home, we take serious vacations and we’re enjoying it. The nice thing is that we feel that she really likes us. She didn’t run away from us, she calls us or she stays in touch and it’s been great. 2010

Cher

Cher 1987 (c) HFPA

Born May 20, 1946.  Has a daughter, Chastity, now Chaz, born March 4, 1969, with Sonny Bono, and a son, Elijah Blue, born July 1o, 1976, with Greg Allman.

Q:  What are your children like at this age, are they giving you a hard time?
A:  Chastity, who’s 22, is moving back from New York to Los Angeles, which I’m really glad about, and she just signed with Geffen, my record company.  Elijah, who’s 14,  has been on the road with me during the summer, and now he’s back in school.  Interestingly enough I’m going through a teenage period with my son, but it never happened with my daughter; she’s like a freak of nature, she’s the nicest person that ever lived, we only had about 45 minutes of dissent.  She’s finding out who she is right now more than when she was younger, but she was always so good that we always got along; she’s much more understanding and reasonable than I am. I know that, being a single mother, you try to do the best you can, but sometimes you’re not equipped; from my own experience I now that it’s hard, when you’re not really skilled.  Being a parent is one of the many things that you need to know, but you don’t learn in school.  1991

Q:  Was it more difficult to raise your son, since his father was not involved?
A: Yes, it was easier with Chaz because I understood her more, and also because she had her father, Sonny, while my son’s father was not active in his life.  And I had men friends and boyfriends that helped him, but I think boys are so much more fragile than girls.  I mean, I believe that women are stronger than men, truthfully, we’re so much tougher, and I’m so glad to be a woman.  So I think that young boys really could use their fathers, because it’s something to role model themselves after.  I mean, my son is strapping and big, but boys are very vulnerable emotionally, much less strong than we are. 2010