Actress Riley Keough is getting candid about motherhood, months after the “Daisy Jones & The Six” star revealed she and her husband had secretly welcomed a daughter, whose name is in part a tribute to her late brother and grandfather.
The 34-year-old eldest grandchild of Elvis Presley revealed in the cover story for Vanity Fair’s September issue, that she and husband Ben Smith-Petersen welcomed Tupelo Storm Smith-Petersen via surrogate last August.
The profile, published Tuesday, marked the first time Keough publicly shared her baby’s name. She also explained how it pays homage both to the “Hound Dog” singer, who died in 1977, and her younger brother, Benjamin Storm Keough, who died by suicide in July 2020 at 27 years old.
“It’s funny because we picked her name before the Elvis movie,” Keough said of the Mississippi city in which the “Hound Dog” singer was born. “I was like, ‘This is great because it’s not really a well-known word or name in relation to my family — it’s not like Memphis or something.”
Upon the release last summer of Baz Luhrmann’s soon-to-be Best Picture nominee, “Elvis,” Keough recalled thinking, “like, ‘Oh, no.’ But it’s fine.”
The “Zola” star, who discussed her experience with Lyme disease, says she “can carry children” herself, but surrogacy “felt like the best choice for what I had going on physically with the autoimmune stuff.”
She praised surrogacy as “a very cool, selfless, and incredible act that these women do to help other people.”
Following a legal battle with grandmother Priscilla Presley, Keough in recent days was named the sole trustee of mom Lisa Marie Presley’s estate, following the sudden death of Elvis’ only child. It was during the singer-songwriter’s funeral in January that Keough’s child first made headlines, earning a mention in a eulogy Keough penned.