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Emma Roberts has recently spoken about being a nepo baby and said that the label is just used to criticise people in the film industry, especially young people and especially women. She has said that having family members who are actors has never helped her get a role and it has even lost her a few parts on one or two occasions. The term ‘nepo baby, was popularised in 2022 in a tweet about Judd Apatow and Leslie Mann’s daughter Maude Apatow and was then picked up in an article in New York Magazine which really cemented it in popular culture.

I certainly don’t have an issue with the children of famous parents becoming successful. It’s certainly not a new thing and not so long ago, perhaps notably before the internet started spreading negativity, acting dynasties like the Redgraves and the Fondas were a celebrated thing. I’m sure being born into Hollywood helps you get seen by casting directors but I’m not sure it helps you get work. People benefit from who they know in all types of work but you’ve still got to be talented and if you look at the latest group of young actors who fit into this category; Maya Hawke, Billie Lourd, John David Washington, Jack Quaid and Margaret Qualley, they all have great screen presence and star quality of their own. Some of them might even be better performers than their parents.

To be honest Emma Roberts’ Dad Eric isn’t even that big a celebrity. He was good in The Dark Knight and Inherent Vice but he himself is probably best known because of his famous sister. Emma as well probably gets more attention for being Emma Roberts’ niece which is not a relationship that seems to open doors quite so much. No one ever said Ewan McGregor was only successful because his uncle was Denis Lawson.

Yet I think it is fair to say that Emma Roberts’ status, if not her success, is down to these family connections. A lot of people have heard of her but she has only very occasionally done big movies. She is a talented and hard working actor but other than We’re the Millers, Scream 4, Nancy Drew and Madame Web most of her films have gone under the radar. I know she was in American Horror Story and Scream Queens on TV but she is not a common feature on the big screen.

I’m not sure where her latest movie Space Cadet will land in terms of her lasting filmography. It certainly isn’t the best thing she has done but I suspect like Wild Child sixteen years ago, it might find its way into the affections of a younger, predominantly female, audience and stick with them. What is odd about this is that Roberts is thirty three now, not seventeen and I’m not entirely sure who Space Cadet is aimed at. Nonetheless the feminist, any girl can message should appeal to those who don’t need their themes and subtext to be overly sophisticated in what they watch.

Emma Roberts first big hit was in the Nickelodeon show Unfabulous and it feels a bit like she has returned to a similar world of undemanding teen comedy with this. The budget is a bit bigger, although you might not think so in a space walk scene toward the end of the film, but the characterisation, script and story feel more akin to the types of thing the Disney Channel and the like were turning out in the early 2000s. To be honest, I’m not really sure what she, along with Gabrielle Union and Umbrella Academy’s Tom Hooper are all doing in this. Their careers should have got them past it. The trailer promised Legally Blonde meets Apollo 13 but it’s more Mean Girls 2 meets Airplane 2.

Ultimately it is carried by Emma Roberts’ performance. She brings a huge amount of energy and likeability to the movie and with someone else in the lead this may not have worked at all. I guess in the end that, more than any family or movie pedigree, is why she’s a star.