Spooks and scares are a Kevin Bacon family affair.
The Flatliners actor recently shared his thoughts on watching daughter Sosie follow in his footsteps in the film industry, praising her "fantastic" performance in horror movie Smile, released Sept. 30. However, Sosie's choice of career was something that had initially surprised Kevin and wife Kyra Sedgwick, with whom he also shares son Travis, 33.
"We didn't know she was really interested after that in pursuing any kind of an acting career," Kevin told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview published Oct. 28. "But when she finally, in her early 20s, decided that this is what she wanted to do, she dropped out of college and moved to L.A. and really started doing all the right stuff. Pounding the pavement, doing self-tape after self-tape, and studying."
Kevin—who has tackled various horror projects throughout his decades-long career—revealed how he felt watching Sosie performance in Smile, which spent three weeks at number one at the box office.
"Even knowing how hard she had worked, and knowing she was good, when I saw the movie I was just really taken aback with, not only with how great she was but also how hard that role was, because it's one of those parts where there is no break," Kevin shared. "Usually, you start out and the character's pretty happy for at least, you know, 15 minutes or 20 minutes before everything becomes horrible. But that's a movie where the stress level is [insane]."
He added, "I was very proud of her."
Reflecting on his daughter's breakout performance, Kevin drew up some similarities on how his own career started.
"In a weird kind of way, we have a horror tradition in our family," Kevin said. "One of my earliest movies was the very first Friday the 13th."
When Sosie was around 19 years old, left Brown University after two years to start acting, she told Harper's Bazaar in an interview published earlier this month.
"I ended up doing a play in New York, and then I was like, 'Well, if I am to wake up in the morning for a job, it's likely got to be this,'" Sosie said. "Then I drove out to L.A. and started auditioning and working."
Her parents didn't encourage or discourage her from pursing acting, with Sosie noting, "They tried to just stay out of it."
"Having parents that are in this, you see a lot of the negative sides of it, not just the flashy, fun side of it," she said. "But that being said, as soon as I made the choice, it was like, 'Amazing. That's exciting. Now we can talk about it.' It wasn't like, 'Oh, no.'"
Sosie, now 30, has gone on to play roles in television shows such as 13 Reasons Why, Narcos: Mexico and Mare of Easttown before landing her protagonist role in Smile. As to what else is next for her, the actress does have a fondness for horror.
"I also love the way that horror can work out things that are difficult in our society, because it almost tends towards the ridiculous and sort of comedy, but it can also have a lot of weight, more weight than comedy," she shared. "It's got a dramatic edge, so you can have those moments, and then you can have the ridiculously funny, over-the-top moments."