Barry Keoghan is not here for anyone coming for his relationship with his son. In a recent appearance on The Louis Theroux Podcast, Keoghan got candid about his childhood, Sabrina Carpenter, and online trolls who question his relationship with his two-year-old son Brando.
Speaking to Theroux, Keoghan admitted that he's aware that people online are talking about his parenting and denounced their criticism without knowing the full story. “People kind of have a judgment on me as a parent, and I’m like, ‘Well, until you’ve walked a day in my shoes growing up as a kid… then you can comment,’" Keoghan, who has opened up about growing up without a father figure, said.
The Irish actor continued by saying that though he is aware of the chatter online, he doesn't let it get to him or his family, but it does affect him. “If I didn’t have tough skin or the strength, I wouldn’t be sitting here,” he said. “[But], of course, it’s going to affect me. Being a father when I had no blueprint to take from, people just read that as laziness and go, ‘Oh, that’s no excuse to be an absent father.’ But I am not an absent father,” he added.
Keoghan continued by saying that the fact that the internet does not see his child is not a sign of absence but rather his own conscious decision to protect his privacy.
“The more attention I’ve gotten lately and the more in the public I’ve become, the less I’ve posted about my child because I don’t think it’s fair to put my child online,” Keoghan explained. "There are sick people out there. Because I reigned that in, people draw a narrative and go, ‘Absent father, sh*t, deadbeat dad,’ and more disgusting things I wouldn’t even repeat. Just the audacity of some people, man, it sickens me. It makes me furious.”
Keoghan and former girlfriend Alyson Sandro welcomed baby Brando in August 2022 while he was in the middle of shooting Saltburn. Speaking to GQ in January 2024, Keoghan revealed he got a day off filming to be with his newborn.
In the same interview, Keoghan praised Sandro for doing “a great job” with Brando, calling her “an incredible mother.” He also admitted Brando is on his mind 24/7. “I feel a responsibility. I feel an enormous amount of pressure, which is good. And I can’t get the little boy off my mind. It’s beautiful. Y’know, it’s crazy, but when he looks at you, you feel like the most important person in the world. That’s the effect he has on me," he said.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly in September 2024, Keoghan further opened up about his and Brando's rapport, admitting that though theirs “isn't quite of the normal father-son relationship” because he doesn't have a father figure to base it on, love trumps all. "Love, you don't need anything to draw from. Love is pure, and so I'm not on about that, but I'm on about stuff like teaching your son this or teaching your daughter that," he said.
