“I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form,” said one star.
Growing up in the spotlight with a famous parent can be difficult and it only becomes more challenging when these famous children don’t have a great relationship with their mom or dad.
Over time, some of these celebrity offspring have chosen to completely cut ties with one or both of their parents — or made moves to drop their famous last name. While not all of them have made the change legal, they also made it clear they don’t intend to use their parent’s surname.
Here’s why some celebrity offspring changed their names.
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1. Shiloh Jolie
When Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s daughter Shiloh was born, they gave her the hyphenated last name Jolie-Pitt. She used the name for much of her life but since her parent’s tumultuous split in 2016, Shiloh decided to drop his last name. On her 18th birthday, filing the paperwork seems to be one of the first things she did.
According to TMZ, she’ll be known as just Shiloh Jolie, although the legal process is still underway.
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2. Zahara Jolie
Shiloh’s older sister Zahara has also dropped her dad’s last name. While she hasn’t seemingly made the legal change just yet, she publicly referred to herself as Zahara Jolie at a sorority event at her university, Spelman College.
“My name is Zahara Marley Jolie. And I landed all the way from the Golden State in the city full of angels: Los Angeles, California,” she said on stage, in a video from her initiation to the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority.
4. Vivienne Jolie
Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s daughter Vivienne has also seemingly chosen to drop her dad’s last name. In the Playbill for the musical The Outsiders, which Vivienne helped her mom produce, she was credited solely as Vivienne Jolie.
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5. Vivian Jenna Wilson
In 2022, one of Elon Musk and ex-wife Justine Wilson’s children made a request to change her name on her 18th birthday. Not only did she request to change her surname, but she also requested to change her first name in order to reflect her gender identity, now going by Vivian Jenna Wilson.
According to documents acquired by TMZ, Vivian cited that she wanted to make the change due to “Gender Identity and the fact that I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form.”
6. Angelina Jolie
When Jon Voight and Marcheline Bertrand welcomed their daughter Angelina back in 1975, she was given her father’s last name. But from a young age, Angelina had a rocky relationship with her famous father. By the time she began her rise to fame, she decided to legally drop the name Voight in favor of using her middle name.
While her relationship with her father has been complicated through the years, around the time of the name change, she didn’t want to go into detail about their issues.
“I do not want to make public the reasons for my bad relationship with my father. I have determined that it is not healthy for me to be around my father,” Angelina said at the time.
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7. Norah Jones
Fans may not know that Norah Jones is the daughter of famed Indian musician Ravi Shankar. When she was born, she was given her father’s last name but didn’t get to know him for many years. When she was 16, she decided to legally change her last name to that of her mother, Sue Jones.
While Norah hasn’t shared her exact motivations for the change, it did come after a period of estrangement from her father. Although she did start to get to know her father after she turned 18, she says she stuck with her new name because as she entered the music industry, she wanted to be known for her own merits.
“Before, I was still working out my own issues with my dad. We only started our relationship when I was 18, even though I saw him when I was little. And also, I’d lived my whole life without having to be known as the daughter of somebody. So I didn’t want to start with music! I didn’t think it was fair to my music to label me as the daughter of somebody — I didn’t think it described me very well and I didn’t think it had anything to do with my music,” she told The Independent.
8. Jennifer Jason Leigh
As the daughter of actor Vic Morrow and Barbara Turner, Jennifer Jason Leigh was given her father’s name at birth. As a teenager, Jennifer was estranged from her father and chose to change her name to “avoid being publicly associated with her dad,” according to AnOther Magazine.
Instead, she opted to use her middle name Leigh as her surname and the name Jason as her middle name as a tribute to a family friend.
