Highlights
- Shia LaBeouf's relationship with his dad, Jeffrey Craig LaBeouf, was far from smooth sailing.
- LaBeouf portrayed his dad as a hardcore substance addict with tough love in his autobiographical film Honey Boy.
- Their strained relationship and exaggerated portrayal in the film has been the source of conflict.
Before his illustrious career was eclipsed by a relentless storm of scandals, Shia LaBeouf was one of the fastest-rising stars on Disney's Even Stevens. Back then, LaBeouf was often in the company of his dad, Jeffrey Craig LaBeouf. However, as it would later come to light, the Disney alum's relationship with his dad was far from smooth sailing.
Decades after Even Stevens closed its final chapter, LaBeouf, through his 2019 autobiographical film Honey Boy, dropped some shockingly dark truths about his relationship with his dad.
The film, which premiered to overwhelming critical acclaim, depicted Jeffrey Craig as a hardcore drug addict with a penchant for tough love. With their deeply dysfunction relationship now public knowledge, is Shia on good terms with his dad?
Shia LaBeouf And His Dad Have A Pretty Complicated Relationship
Shia LaBeouf may have skyrocketed to fame playing a middle schooler from a seemingly perfect suburban family, but his real-life upbringing was anything but idyllic.
Before he clinched his breakthrough role on Disney's Even Stevens, LaBeouf was stuck living with his father, Jeffrey Craig LaBeouf, a hardcore drug addict who, according to The Sun, had already earned a spot on the sexual offenders' registry a solid five years before LaBeouf came into this world.
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"When you're 10-years-old and watch your father going through heroin withdrawals, you grow up real fast,” the Even Stevens alum said of his upbringing in a 2007 interview with The Orange County Register. “You become the parent in the relationship. But I must give him credit because he always told me that he didn't want me to be like him."
Despite his many troubles, Jeffrey Craig was aggressively supportive of Shia's career, morphing into an ever-present, albeit incredibly toxic force on the Even Stevens set. However, as LaBeouf's career continued to skyrocket, their relationship spiraled even further into dysfunction.
“We have an unspoken agreement, a secret,” the Nymphomaniac star told Interview Magazine of his relationship with his dad in 2014. “We can't really tell each other that we're manipulating each other, but we both know it. And I love my dad. I'd love to be closer to my dad. But we've got something going on between us that's really valuable to me right now, more valuable to me than having a father.”
Shia LaBeouf Made A Wildly Controversial Film About His Relationship With Dad, Jeffrey LaBeouf
It’s no secret that, like his dad, Shia LaBeouf has had his fair share of run-ins with the law. However, none of the Wall Street star’s many brushes with justice benefited his career quite like his 2017 arrest for public intoxication in Georgia.
During the court-ordered rehab stint that followed, LaBeouf conjured up one of the highest-rated films of his career: Honey Boy. In the film, LaBeouf portrays James Lort, a manic-aggressive drug addict unmistakably inspired by the notorious Jeffrey Craig LaBeouf.
However, about three years after the film’s debut, LaBeouf admitted that he’d exaggerated some aspects of his relationship with his dad to fit his preferred narrative.
“I wrote this narrative, which was just f***ing nonsense,” he admitted on Jon Bernthal’s Real One’s podcast. “My dad was so loving to me my whole life. Fractured, sure. Crooked, sure. Wonky, for sure. But never was not loving, never was not there. He was always there.”
The acclaimed actor went on to admit that his dad was never nearly as abusive as he came off in the film. “I turned the knob up on certain s*** that wasn’t real,” he said. “My dad never hit me, never. He spanked me once, one time. And the story that gets painted in Honey Boy is this dude is abusing his kid all the time.”
Despite their longstanding strained relationship, LaBeouf regretted painting such a grim and unseemly picture of his dad. "Here's a man who I've done vilified on a grand scale," he said. "I put all his s**t in the street and used him…as like, 'This is the reason why I'm f***ing foul out here. I come from this wayward upbringing. My dad is the reason I'm such a f**k up. He's a biker and a wildman and a criminal and abusive.'"
Does Shia LaBeouf Have A Relationship With His Dad, Jeffrey LaBeouf?
Before writing Honey Boy’s highly controversial script, Shia LaBeouf hadn’t spoken to his dad for about seven years. However, with the project’s production hinged on Jeffrey Craig's approval, Shia had to rely on some underhanded tactics to get the green light.
"I remember getting on the phone with him and him being like, 'You know, I never read this stuff in the script you sent.' Because I didn't put that s**t in there," he shared with Jon Bernthal’s Real One’s podcast. "I was bulls***ing him. I was just trying to get him to sign this piece of paper."
Despite their longstanding history of manipulating each other, the Wall Street star felt he’d gone too far with the Honey Boy depiction, and promptly apologized to his father.
“So, when I got on the phone with him, I took accountability for all of that and knew very clearly that I couldn’t take it back,” he said, “and my dad was gonna live with this certain narrative about him on a public scale for a very long time, probably the rest of his life.”
With the record set straight, Shia’s relationship with his dad finally began to flourish. Jeffrey Craig even gushed about Shia in a 2019 interview with Gen’s Aaron Gell. “He's my honey boy, my money honey! You betcha. He's been a light in my life,” he said. “Shia can be a bada**. He has that ability. But he is the sweetest, kindest soul. He's a wonderful person who went through some s***.”
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