Celebs Who Discovered Parents Later in Life: Mariska Hargitay, More

Mariska Hargitay, Jack Nicholson, Orlando Bloom and Liv Tyler are among the most notable stars who discovered major revelations about their parents later in life.

In the case of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit star Hargitay, she learned as an adult that her late mother, Jayne Mansfield, had a secret fling that resulted in her birth. In another astounding story, Jackie Chan was abandoned by his parents as a young boy when they fled persecution from the Chinese government.

Some of these celebrities and their biological parents were able to find catharsis when they finally reunited, though there are notable instances where families have been torn apart entirely. Nickelodeon star Jennette McCurdy conceded on The Drew Barrymore Show that a startling discovery about her biological dad damaged her relationship with the man who raised her.

“That was a relationship I sort of let dissolve [and] disintegrate,” McCurdy said in 2022. “There wasn’t really much there to begin with.”

Related: Looking Back at Mariska Hargitay’s Mom Jayne Mansfield’s Untimely Death

Mariska Hargitay revisited the life and legacy of her mom Jayne Mansfield with her directorial debut, My Mom Jayne, which premiered at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. “The fact that I get to take her back and to tell her story there, I just don’t have the words,” Hargitay told Vanity Fair in a May […]

Keep scrolling for a look back at the compelling stories of stars with shocking parental revelations:

Mariska Hargitay and father Mickey Hargitay in 2004 Evan Agostini/Getty Images

In the 2025 documentary My Mom Jayne, Mariska revealed for the first time that the man who’d raised her — bodybuilder Mickey Hargitay — wasn’t her biological dad.

Her mother, Hollywood icon Mansfield, split from husband Mickey — with whom she had two other children — and engaged in a brief affair with Italian singer Nelson Sardelli. The fling was short-lived, and Mansfield soon returned to Mickey once she learned she was pregnant. They raised the child together until Mansfield was tragically killed in a car accident that also severely injured 3-year-old Mariska in 1967.

Mariska found out Sardelli was her biological father in her 20s, though Mickey denied it all in his one and only conversation about the topic with the Law & Order star. Nonetheless, Mariska forged a relationship with Sardelli and his family that continues to this day.

“I do know that everyone made the best choice for me,” she told Vanity Fair. “I’m Mickey Hargitay’s daughter — that is not a lie.”

Orlando Bloom and his mother Sonia Bloom in 2011. Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

The Pirates of the Caribbean star grew up believing that his mother Sonia Bloom’s husband, the novelist Harry Bloom, was his biological dad. Harry died at age 68 in 1981 when Orlando was just 4 years old.

At age 13, Orlando’s mother told him that his biological father was actually family friend Colin Stone. Colin had taken an active role in helping Sonia raise Orlando even before the future Lord of the Rings star learned the truth.

“We would always spend weekends with [Colin],” Orlando told The Times in 2020. “He was trying to be there for me in his own way, but he was busy. When I first found out, I was like, ‘Great, when can I move in with you?’ But that didn’t happen. He was married. And that was quite hard for me.”

His mother, Sonia, insisted to Hello! Magazine in 2003 that her son grew up with “a very happy background” despite the family secret.

“Orlando is not sad,” she insisted. “It was marvelous when he learned that Colin was his father. He was brought up surrounded by a loving family.”

Liv Tyler with Steven Tyler and Bebe Buell. Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic

The Lord of the Rings actress grew up with mother Bebe Buell and her on-off rocker boyfriend Todd Rundgren. While Todd signed Liv’s birth certificate as her father, Buell kept hidden that Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler was actually Liv’s biological dad.

Steven wrote in his memoir, Does the Noise in My Head Bother You?: A Rock ‘n’ Roll Memoir, that he first learned about Liv’s existence in 1980. Liv noticed her own physical similarities to Steven as she grew up and finally put the pieces together when she spotted her half-sister Mia Tyler at one of Rundgren’s concerts.

“I kind of figured it out [that Steven is my father] because he looks exactly like me and I have sister, named Mia, who is a year younger than me,” Liv recalled on The Jonathan Ross Show. “I saw her, standing on the side of the stage at a concert, and literally, it was like looking at a twin. She looked exactly like me. I looked at my mom and she had tears in her eyes. I kind of put it all together.”

Related: A Guide to Liv and Steven Tyler’s Family Controversy

Steven Tyler’s relationship with daughter Liv Tyler has taken some serious twists and turns over the years. Initially, Liv’s mother, model Bebe Buell, led her to believe that another rock legend, Todd Rundgren, was her biological father because of her fear over Steven’s admitted drug use in the late 1970s. Liv eventually learned the truth […]

Liv went on to star in Aerosmith’s “Crazy” and “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” music videos. However, she admitted on the “Sibling Revelry” podcast in April 2025 that her relationship with Rundgren suffered once she reconnected with Steven.

“I think it’s probably still very hard and painful,” Liv reflected. “I don’t speak to him enough, I love him and I have brothers from him and I had a whole family with them. But I was a kid, so it was really hard because he was mad at my mom, and then suddenly Steven was there and we did a paternity test and it was positive and so we moved to New York. I think I was 11 or 12.”

Rundgren discussed the awkward situation with WXPN in April 2019, admitting that Steven’s involvement impacted his own relationship with Liv for many years.

“Fortunately, there is a happy ending there,” he said. “Just talking about the way everything came about, what happened during the relationship. It was always the one subject in my life that I was most sensitive about; my relationship with Bebe, and such. For years, I was very upset about the fact that [Liv] essentially forgot that I was her father. Things turned out to be a lot of fun for her. I got completely sidelined for a while, and I got bent out of shape about it.”

Jack Nicholson in 2023 Allen Berezovsky/Getty Images

The Batman actor learned in a truly shocking way that the woman who raised him was not his biological mother. A Time reporter broke the news to Nicholson in 1974 that the woman he’d always thought was his mother, Ethel May, was actually his grandmother, and his “sister,” June Nicholson, was actually his biological mom. Because June got pregnant at age 17, her parents agreed to bring up Jack as their own child.

Jack was informed by the magazine’s researchers that his biological father was alive and living in New Jersey. This revelation was particularly difficult for Jack because he couldn’t discuss it with his mother or grandmother — they died in 1963 and 1970, respectively.

“Both grandmother and mother were deceased before this particular group of facts came to my attention,” Jack told Rolling Stone in 1986. “I was very impressed by their ability to keep the secret, if nothing else. It’s done great things for me.”

He went on, “I mean, I don’t have to question the abortion issue in my mind. It’s an open-and-shut case where I’m concerned. As an illegitimate child born in 1937, during the Depression, to a broken lower-middle-class family, you are a candidate for — you’re an automatic abortion with most people today. So it’s very easy for me. I don’t have to get into the debate of when does the thing come alive. And I’m very pleased to be out of it, ’cause it’s not an easy issue.”

Gavin Rossdale and Daisy Lowe in 2016. Ray Crowder/GC Images

Daisy discovered as a teenager that her mother, fashion designer Pearl Lowe, hid the truth about her father being Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale. Until she was 15, the model believed her mom Pearl’s ex-lover Bronner Handwerger was her dad and that Rossdale was her godfather.

The revelation had huge repercussions on the lives of everyone involved. Pearl wrote in her memoir All That Glitters that Rossdale — who was married to Gwen Stefani at the time — was furious when a DNA test confirmed he was indeed Daisy’s dad.

“Daisy beamed when I told her the result. … Later that day I emailed Gavin,” Pearl wrote. “There was no response. When Daisy eventually succeeded in speaking to him, Gavin appeared more concerned with venting his anger about my behavior than engaging with his daughter. All this was very hard on Daisy. She spent most days in tears but it is a testimony to her maturity and strength of character that after she overcame her initial hurt she got on with her life.”

Father and daughter eventually mended fences, with Daisy telling The Guardian in 2015 that it was a long and difficult process to forge a relationship with the rocker.

“I was so happy the day I found out Gavin was my dad,” she said. “I’d always looked up to him. But it was still a s***show trying to get over it. There’s no handbook. As a 15-year-old you have to pull yourself together anyway.”

Daisy confirmed on “That Gaby Roslin Podcast” in 2022 that she’d become close to Gavin and Gwen’s three children — Kingston, born in 2006, Zuma, born in 2008, and Apollo, born in 2014. (Rossdale and Stefani split in 2015.)

Related: Gavin Rossdale Gives Rare Insight Into Former Life With Ex Gwen Stefani

Gavin Rossdale and Gwen Stefani have been divorced nearly 10 years, but he still has fond memories of their time together. Rossdale, 59, reflected on his and Stefani’s shared home in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles while sitting down with Jesse Tyler Ferguson for the Tuesday, March 18, episode of the “Dinner’s on […]

“I love them all so dearly,” she said. “I FaceTime with my brothers over in L.A. at least once a week. Kingston is the same age as [my sister] Betty actually. Zuma and Apollo are a bit younger, a bit less into FaceTime understandably. Whenever I go to L.A. I always have the best time with those boys. They’re such brilliant kids.”

Gavin made a rare public comment about his relationship with Daisy after she got engaged to real estate agent Jordan Saul in 2022. (Daisy and Jordan welcomed daughter Ivy Love in April 2023.)

“Daisy has just got engaged. I played some music to her fiancé, my future son-in-law, when they were with me in L.A. and he wrote to me that he loved the new tracks,” he revealed to Metro in 2022. “He’s a budding amateur fighter, so I think he just likes the strength.
I don’t know what else he likes but he’s a really good person so I’m super excited about him.”

Jennette McCurdy with Debra and Mark McCurdy. Mike Guastella/WireImage

Jennette wrote the powerful memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died about her troubled childhood and abuse she endured from her mother, Debra McCurdy, who died in 2013.

Following Debra’s death, her husband, Mark McCurdy, began dating one of Debra’s closest friends, a woman referred to as Karen in I’m Glad My Mom Died. With Karen’s encouragement, Mark told Jennette that he wasn’t her biological father.

“I remember feeling like I got the wind knocked out of me. My mouth was really dry,” she recalled on The Drew Barrymore Show in 2022. “I think I hugged him and his then-girlfriend sort of, like, joined the hug, and she was well-meaning, but I was like, OK, this is just a hug between us two.’”

The Nickelodeon actress said she was ultimately disappointed in the way Mark revealed the shocking news.

“[He said,] ‘It’s not your fault you were born.’ Then he repeated it, he doubled down and then tripled down,” she said. “I thought, ‘This is the weirdest thing to say to somebody after you’ve just told them you’re not their biological father.’”

Jennette recalled feeling equally stunned to learn her biological dad was a local jazz musician, whom she referred to in the book as Andrew. The iCarly actress went with costar Miranda Cosgrove and other friends to introduce herself to Andrew at one of his concerts.

Andrew confirmed to Jennette that he’d known he was her father all along but never reached out because he wasn’t sure whether Debra ever told Mark the truth.

During her appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show, Jennette said that the revelation made sense in hindsight because she “always felt” Mark was “pretty disengaged and disconnected” throughout her childhood.

“That was a relationship I sort of let dissolve [and] disintegrate,” she said. “There wasn’t really much there to begin with.”

Tug McGraw and son Tim McGraw in 1994 Thomas S. England/Getty Images

Tim opened up on Q With Tom Power about meeting his father, legendary New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies baseball player Tug McGraw, at age 18.

Tug had a brief fling with Tim’s mother, Betty Ann D’Agostino, when they lived in the same Florida apartment building. Once D’Agostino became pregnant, her family sent her away to Louisiana and later led Tim to believe D’Agostino’s first husband, Horace Smith, was his father. Tim finally learned the truth at age 11 when he found his birth certificate.

Tug denied being Tim’s father for seven years but eventually agreed to meet him. In his 2023 interview, Tim recalled being presented with a legal letter by Tug when they met.

“We sat there in silence for about five minutes just looking at each other,” Tim remembered. “And I finally said, ‘Look, I’m happy to sign this [legal agreement] and I’ll get out of your hair. It’s not about the money. I’ll work three jobs if I have to. It’s not a big deal. I just want to know, do you think you’re my father?’ And he said [to me], ‘Yeah, I think so. I know so.’”

According to Tim, Tug then offered to tear up the legal agreement so they could forge a relationship.

“He said, ‘I want you to be part of my family,’” Tim said, before revealing with a laugh: “I didn’t hear from him for a year.”

Tug died at age 59 in January 2004 after being diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor. Tim honored his father by spreading his ashes on the pitcher’s mound at the Phillies’ home stadium Citizens Bank Park during the 2008 World Series.

Jackie Chan in 20, 2025 Stuart C. Wilson/Getty Images for Sony Pictures

The 2003 documentary Traces of the Dragon: Jackie Chan and His Lost Family delves into the action star’s extraordinary background as the son of a Shanghai gambler (his mother, Lee-lee Chan) and a clandestine political operative (his father, Charles Chan). Under political pressure, Jackie’s parents fled China in 1949 and later left 6-year-old Jackie behind to attend school in Hong Kong when they moved to Australia in 1962.

“The fact that his mother was an opium smuggler, a gambler and a ‘Big Sister’ in the underworld was a big shock to Jackie and also to us,” Traces of a Dragon director Mabel Cheung told The Guardian in 2003. “Everybody in Hong Kong knew that his mother was like a common housewife, very kind, very gentle.”

Jackie reconnected with his parents a few years later. In the 1990s, Jackie learned his real name was actually Fang Shilong, as his father had changed their family’s surname from Fang to Chan to avoid scrutiny from the Chinese government. He was told his parents each had two other children from previous marriages, whom Jackie had never known of.

The entire family was eventually reunited in Australia in the late 1990s.

Patty Duke and son Sean Astin in 2004. David S. Holloway/Getty Images

The Stranger Things actor’s mother, Hollywood icon Patty Duke, was involved in three romances around the same period in 1970 with then-17-year-old Desi Arnaz Jr., Addams Family star John Astin (who was married to Suzanne Hahn at the time) and rock music promoter Michael Tell.

Duke quickly married Tell when she got pregnant, but their union only lasted 13 days. She raised her son Sean to believe John was his father since they eventually got together following John’s 1972 divorce.

Duke confessed to Sean when he was 14 that Arnaz was actually his biological father — though Sean eventually learned this was not true. Sean underwent a DNA test to confirm that Tell was his biological father all along, despite Duke’s insistence that she’d never consummated her 13-day marriage.

Sean told People in 2001 that he was able to develop “a good relationship” with Tell, though he would always think of John as a father.

“I don’t fault anybody, I don’t fault myself or with Desi, who is like my godfather, I have such a powerful love bond with this man, he’s a gorgeous human being,” Sean said.

Duke remained skeptical about the possibility of Tell being her son’s father, telling People in 2001 that she simply “didn’t buy the [DNA] test.”

“I can support [Sean’s] truth as long as my truth, if not supported, is respected. I have told him I know what I know to be true,” she insisted. “When God looks me in the eye and says, ‘Anna Marie [her real name], you have been mistaken all these years,’ then I will consider [Tell’s paternity].”

Duke died at age 69 in 2016 from sepsis caused by a ruptured intestine.

Wynonna Judd and Naomi Judd of The Judds in 2022. Jason Kempin/Getty Images for CMT

In the 2025 docuseries The Judd Family: Truth Be Told, Wynonna opened up about her famously complicated relationship with late mother Naomi Judd. The country music icon grew up believing her mother’s first husband, Michael Ciminella, was her biological father but learned in her 30s that she was conceived during Naomi’s brief fling with another man, Charles Jordan.

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