Drew Barrymore’s Daughter Frankie Gives Us Major Gertie Vibes
Drew Barrymore’s younger daughter, Frankie, made her red-carpet debut on Tuesday, and all we can think of is … Gertie!
The Santa Clarita Diet star, 42, brought her youngest child to the Society of Memorial Sloan Kettering’s Bunny Hop in New York City on Tuesday. Frankie Kopelman, 2, was mom’s cutest date ever as they held hands on the red carpet at the charity event, posed with the Easter bunny, and were generally adorable.
The little blonde with the big eyes and sweet smile brought us straight back to the ’80s — to Drew during the E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial era. While Drew was several years older when she played Gertie — and taught E.T. to “be good” (she was 6) — we see so much of that little girl in Frankie, including an identical nose.
Drew, whose divorce from Will Kopelman was finalized in August, told Ellen DeGeneres last month that her plan was to raise her children (including Olive, 4) “in this ultra-traditional way and do everything so the polar opposite of my experience.” Her experience, of course, was being the child of actor John Barrymore and aspiring actress Jaid Barrymore, who split when she was a baby. Drew was famous at 7, on the club scene and smoking cigarettes at 9, drinking at 11, smoking pot at 12, snorting coke at 13, and in rehab (for the second time) at 14 after a suicide attempt.
Young Barrymore in E.T. reminds us so much of young Frankie IRL:
Drew’s relationships with her parents, from whom she was emancipated at 14, were famously troubled. In her 2015 autobiography Wildflower, she said Jaid — who raised her and was her manager — offered “zero protection, zero consistency.” Her relationship with her mom, who she would go clubbing with at age 9, is still troubled. (They’ve had long stretches of being estranged.) Her father, who was a violent alcoholic, remained absent for most of her life and died in 2004.
Barrymore’s approach to parenthood is quite different from what was offered to her. She told Hello in 2015, “I felt that my life started the day my kids were born.” She’s a hands-on mom and is navigating co-parenting with Kopelman in a friendly and positive way. (They are often back together to support each other, and Drew remains very close to his family.)
While Barrymore had a troubled childhood, she’s so far from there now — proudly.
“When people are like, ‘Aren’t you worried your daughters are gonna end up like you?’, I’m like, A) thanks; [and] B) I, in some ways, hope they do, now, in the later years,” she said on the Today show in 2015. “And in the younger years, like, they’re not gonna have my life, you know. Not going to Studio 54 at 7 years old will probably make them a lot more normal than I was.”
And a bunny hop with mom — even if it includes a red carpet and photographers — is in the normal(ish) range.
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