Zo? Kravitz Opens Up About Life with Her Very Famous Parents
Ever wonder what it’s like to grow up as the child of famous parents? That’s the world that Zo? Kravitz entered in 1988, right before the separation of her megastar parents, Lenny Kravitz and Lisa Bonet. For the first decade of her life, Kravitz lived with her mother in Santa Monica, California, where she was raised in a highly creative environment with no TV, no Internet, and a strict, home-cooked vegan diet. But as Kravitz tells Esquire in our latest cover story, living with her rockstar father “was this whirlwind of a completely different universe.”
Life with dad was Kravitz's first taste of fame, and while it came with its perks—like TV access and sweets—it was also a bit overwhelming. Naturally, Kravitz was forced to grow up fast. As the Blink Twice director tells Esquire, she could “smell it out pretty quickly” if someone had less than good intentions, while her father could never tell anyone no. “I had to when I was a kid, because he didn’t,” she reveals. “He’s really trusting, and it’s sweet, but I can tell exactly what someone wants.”
But growing up with her father in Miami was difficult as well. Her family is half Black and half Jewish, which is something kids at school often couldn’t grasp. “People were confused,” she says. “How are you Jewish if you’re Black? If both of your parents are Black, how are you half white?” Often it led to Kravitz minimizing her own Blackness. So she asked her father if they could relocate to New York City. There she felt safe. “It was weirdos like me,” she says.
After the move, her father embarked on a long tour. “I think it was very hurtful that I moved away from [my mother] to be with my dad and my dad wasn’t even there,” Kravitz admits. “I just wish I had been able to appreciate what she was doing for me. She was so focused on preserving my innocence. My creativity. Because she knew what the world is—that you don’t get that back.... You want to grow up so fast, and then you get out there and you realize, Oh, shit.”
You’ll have that “Oh, shit” feeling if you see Kravitz’s new thriller, Blink Twice, in theaters on August 23. In her directorial debut, a cocktail waitress is whisked away to a billionaire’s private island, only to find that there is something very wrong about her new situation when her friend disappears. But Kravitz doesn’t want to give too much away. “I feel like my brain is being exposed to the world,” she tells Esquire. “I should just be quiet and let people experience the movie.”
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