Jennifer Aniston has opened up about how her late father, actor John Aniston, once tried to stop her from following him into show business.
Speaking on the “Armchair Expert” podcast, she recalled him warning her about the rejection that comes with acting and urging her to find a more practical career.
“My dad was telling me, ‘Please don’t do this, you’re just going to suffer rejection,'” Jennifer Aniston said.
“‘Just go get a job. Like, get a real job.’ All the cliché things.”
“‘[But] whatever drives you, if you find passion in something and you love it, go do it.'”
John Aniston starred for nearly four decades on “Days of Our Lives.”
Despite his success, Jennifer Aniston said it felt natural to follow the same profession and dismissed the idea that her achievements were simply the result of family connections.
“I mean, look at all the law firms. Blanky Blank Blanky and Blanky Blank. I mean, all right, isn’t that a version of it’s all in the family?” she said.
“So maybe you got into a door because you’re so-and-so’s kid, but if you suck, guess what? You’re not going to continue to do it.”
In an earlier interview with Vanity Fair, Jennifer Aniston said she spent much of her career trying to earn her father’s approval.
“Always wanting to get Pop’s approval — it was the thing that drove me,” she said.
Jennifer Aniston was 10 years old when her father packed his things and left.
She previously opened up about that day in 1979, recalling how she came back from a birthday party to find out from her mother that her father was “not going to be around” for a little while, according to the Daily Mail.
“She didn’t say he was gone forever. I don’t know if I blocked it, but I just remember sitting there, crying, not understanding that he was gone,” she said.
“I don’t know what I did later that night or the next day. I don’t remember anything other than it being odd that, all of a sudden, my father wasn’t there.”
The two eventually reconnected later in life. A source told the Daily Mail at the time that their relationship improved during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Jennifer didn’t speak to him for ages. But since the coronavirus crisis, she has been on the phone almost every day and not just brief conversations,” the source said. “It’s like she has realized life is very short, and she wants her relationship with John to be the best it can be.”
“He’s thrilled that they have reconciled.”
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