Barack Obama says his daughters are trying to pave their own path to success without using their prominent last name -- especially Malia, who went so far as to change her credit in her directorial film debut.
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00:00Former President Obama talking about his family, about his kids, and the Nepo Baby label that some people want to give them.
00:09We've told you Malia has been working in Hollywood. She was a PA, she's been a producer.
00:16Now she's a writer-director.
00:17She's a writer and director now of her own film. So this is what former President Obama said when he was on the pivot.
00:23Well, we should explain that Malia has said she's not going to go by Obama.
00:27She does not want people to give her jobs based on her family.
00:32And she's taken some steps, she thinks, to get around that.
00:36But the former president isn't necessarily agreeing with her. Here's what he said on the pivot.
00:42Malia, she's making movies. So she made her first movie.
00:46And, you know, I'll be a dad, I'll brag a little bit.
00:50Dawn Glover.
00:51Right. She's working with Dawn. And her first film went to Sundance and all these fancy film festivals.
00:59And she didn't use Obama as director on the credits. It said Malia Ann.
01:04She used her middle name. Didn't put Obama on there.
01:07I was all like, you do know they'll know who you are.
01:11And she's all like, you know what, I want them to watch it that first time and not in any way have that association.
01:20So I think our daughters go out of their way to not try to leverage that.
01:27And this is kind of a new generation, right, where like nepotism.
01:32It's kind of like a curse word now in Hollywood where, you know, all these Nepo babies,
01:37they don't want to be associated with their parents because people start saying like,
01:41oh, you only got that gig because of your dad or, you know, or because of your mom.
01:46So now Nepo babies are desperately trying to separate themselves from their famous parents.
01:51But here's the thing. Everybody knows who Malia Ann is. Like, there's no getting around that.
01:56Well, if she were just a producer or maybe a PA, nobody's looking it up.
02:03But when you're the when you are the director of the film and they see the name Malia Ann,
02:07everyone, especially at a film festival, if they didn't know, they'd look it up.
02:13Oh, who's Malia Ann? And by the way, I looked it up this morning on IMDB.
02:17Right. Obama's in there. And it says Malia Obama.
02:20But so I get that on the film when people sat down to watch it,
02:24she didn't want to have her name blared out there, Obama.
02:28But by the way, you guys, Whoopi Goldberg is coming to Malia's defense.
02:33And she said if she knows she's an Obama, why do you care?
02:36Why do you care what she calls herself?
02:38So some people are coming to her defense saying, like, look, if she wants to have her own identity, like, let her have it.
02:45Yeah, it's fine. But everybody knows. Yeah, everybody knows your name. Cheers.