Why Lily-Rose Depp Won’t Address Dad Johnny’s Controversies

Lily-Rose Depp, the daughter of Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, has avoided speaking about her famous father’s recent legal troubles and controversies. According to a recent interview with Elle, she plans to keep it that way. “When it’s something that’s so private and so personal that all of a sudden becomes not so personal… I feel really entitled to my secret garden of thoughts,” the 23-year-old actress told the outlet. She added, “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.”

After ex-wife Amber Heard wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post in 2018 describing herself as a victim of domestic abuse, Johnny Depp sued her for defamation. The op-ed was not attributed to Depp by name, but he argued that it significantly damaged his career and reputation. In a $100 million countersuit, Heard claimed Depp and his attorneys defamed her by calling her claims a hoax. A jury awarded Depp more than $10 million in damages for defamation. Heard also achieved a partial victory in her counterclaim, where she was awarded $2 million in damages. Depp and Heard both filed appeals.

Depp has since mounted a public comeback, appearing at the 2022 MTV Video Music Awards in August and Rihanna’s Savage X Fenty Show Vol. 4. Heard stands by her allegations that Depp abused her. During her Elle interview, Lily-Rose Depp also addressed critics claiming she benefited from Hollywood nepotism. “The internet seems to care a lot about that kind of stuff,” she said. “People are going to have preconceived ideas about you or how you got there, and I can definitely say that nothing is going to get you the part except for being right for the part. The internet cares a lot more about who your family is than the people who are casting you in things. Maybe you get your foot in the door, but you still just have your foot in the door. There’s a lot of work that comes after that.” 

She has spent a lifetime contending with fame as the progeny of prominent individuals, so her preference for privacy makes sense. As a child, “my parents protected my brother [Jack] and me from it as much as possible.” “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.”