Opening up about the double-edged sword of growing up as the son of the Oscar-winning actor, the 'Empire' star says he's often perceived as 'arrogant, entitled and spoiled' by his peers.
- Feb 17, 2022
AceShowbiz - Growing up as the son of a famous person isn't always rainbows and butterflies. In fact, Chet Hanks has seemingly blamed his father Tom Hanks for his difficult upbringing in a video on his new YouTube channel.
In the approximately 13-minute video titled "The Truth About Growing Up as a Hanks" which was uploaded on Tuesday, February 15, Chet talks about the double-edged sword of living as the Oscar-winning's son. He recalls the time former President George W. Bush asked him during a family trip to the White House what it's like being the son of Tom Hanks.
"The answer I gave him then is the same answer I give people now," he says, while going shirtless in the video, "and it's, I said, 'Well, Mr. President, there's a lot of advantages, but sometimes it can be pretty weird.' "
While his privileged background allowed him to "travel the world, stay in nice hotels, fly in private planes" which he would not change, he notes that growing up famous can be "a double-edged sword." Chet claims, "It's a lot more complicated" than people realize.
"You've got to keep in mind that fame is the most powerful drug known to man," the 31-year-old actor explains. "It can also be the most destructive. People are infatuated with fame: They put famous people on a pedestal."
He goes on elaborating, "Everybody wants to be famous. It creates a lot of jealousy, a lot of envy. Everyone is doing whatever they can to become famous." He shares that he's often perceived as "really arrogant, entitled, spoiled brat," but at the time "I didn't have a strong male role model to tell me … 'Bro, f**k these people. They are just jealous of you.' "
" 'You have all these things that they want, so they are trying to f**king throw their shade at you so you can feel s**tty about yourself because they are jealous.' I needed to hear that," he continues. "I didn't have anyone to tell me that. This is me now telling the younger version of myself what I needed to hear then."
The "White Boy Summer" rapper says people used to "make up their minds" about him before even getting to know him. "It was extremely hard to break down their walls," he laments. "So, I encountered a lot of disdain, a lot of animosity and negativity because everybody was just prepared to hate my guts."
Chet, born Chester Marlon Hanks, goes on detailing how people's perception of his life couldn't be further from the truth. "I'm very privileged, but I wasn't spoiled," he says. "My parents didn't spoil me; I was never just given money or an allowance. I had to work and earn everything that I've made, and it's been that way for my entire life."
The 31-year-old has since realized that other people's perceptions of him are a "reflection of themselves." When addressing his past struggles with substance abuse as a teenager, he claims he's "changed" his life as saying, "I no longer have gone down that self-destructive road of dealing with my anger and my resentment by self-destructing, by pleasure-seeking through partying, drugs, alcohol, substances, everything."
