It's one thing having two successful siblings in Hollywood, but when there's only one sibling
that succeeds and outshines the other one, it can cause more than just a little bad blood.
You might not know this, but Julia Roberts had a brother.
Yep, his name is Eric Roberts.
He's earned himself almost 500 IMBD credits, and yet some people still have no idea who
he is.
When it comes to his relationship with his sister, well, it's safe to say that Julia
is not her brother's biggest fan.
Why?
Well, let's just say it involved a few stints with the law and some bad habits.
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It's impossible to keep your dirty laundry out of the public eye when you're a celebrity.
The Roberts family had to learn that the hard way, when Julia had a nasty fall out with
her brother.
And like most celebrity clashes, it was all a matter of the heart.
Back in the early '90s, Julia "sided with Eric's ex-girlfriend" in a custody battle
over niece Emma Roberts.
There's no doubt that fans were shocked to hear that Julia hadn't sided with her brother
during the custody battle.
You would think that family would stick together in messy situations like this.
However, when it came to Julia, her niece was the one she was sticking up for.
So what happened between the siblings that caused Julia to abandon her brother's side?
At the time, tabloid headlines were ablaze with Eric Roberts' ugly split from his then-girlfriend
and Emma's mother, Kelly Cunningham.
While suing Roberts for custody of their only child together, Cunningham reportedly got
assistance from Julia Roberts.
It was a move that apparently served as a final straw in the brother and sister's already
strained relationship.
Eric felt betrayed that his sister would have taken his ex's side over his own.
Eric had claimed in an interview that he and Julia were actually quite close growing up.
However, the trio was split up when their parents got divorced.
Julia and their sister Lisa moved in with their mom, while Eric moved to Atlanta with
his father.
Years later, the siblings reconnected when Julia moved to New York to find work as an
actress.
At the time, Eric was already making a name for himself as an up-and-coming actor.
With her brother's help, Julia signed with her first agent and quickly began her rise
to fame.
In fact, Eric credits his sister's success to himself, saying, "If it wasn't for me,
there would be no Julia Roberts and no Emma Roberts as celebrities, as actresses, and
I'm very proud
of that."
Julia went on to star in the romantic classic, Pretty Woman, and Eric became an Academy Award-nominated
actor.
However, while Julia's stock continued to climb, Eric's career stagnated.
So, while his sister's career was soaring above the clouds and she became Hollywood's
sweetheart … Eric's title of an up-and-coming actor slowly changed to "Julia Rober's Brother."
Eric Roberts opened up about his rocky relationship with his sisters, Julia and Lisa Roberts.
"They were precious to me, and we had times of great closeness,"
However, he admitted that his addiction to drugs started to take its toll on his relationship
with his family.
He confessed that he was exhausting for others to be around, and he alienated his family.
Eric also revealed that his drug use might have affected his career.
"I would go to meetings with people that mattered ... and I would go stoned."
He would constantly complain, blame others for his lack of success, and he was unable
to enjoy himself in the moment.
It seemed that Eric's downward spiral was tough for those close to him, and they needed
to take a step back.
Julia was one of those people.
Eric did his best to turn his life around and get back on the right track.
Over the years, he worked to overcome his addictions before landing on Celebrity Rehab
in 2010.
His time with Dr. Drew seemingly did the trick.
"Some of the best shows he's done, he's done since Celebrity Rehab," Eric's wife, Eliza,
told Vanity Fair.
Following his recovery from his addiction and living a life of sobriety, Eric was able
to look back at his mistakes.
He took all of the blame for the fractured family relations, saying he brought both of
his younger sisters "into a drug addict's life" and that they just grew tired of it
"and decided I was more trouble than I was worth."
It wasn't just his family that he had hurt during his downward spiral.
The actor had a couple of altercations with the law, along with allegations of physical
abuse against his wife that could have also been the reason his career was stunted.
Back in 1985, Roberts opened up to People about the traumatic 1981 car accident that
left him "in a coma for three days" and in the hospital for a month.
The story he told back then was that he was driving a doorless Jeep with his girlfriend's
dog in the passenger seat.
When the dog "leaned out too far," he reached for it by letting go of the wheel and slammed
into a tree.
Decades later, however, Roberts admitted that he hadn't told the full story.
An important detail he'd left out was that he was high on cocaine at the time.
The rehabilitation following the accident was also incredibly difficult.
The actor told Vanity Fair he had to "learn how to walk again and talk again," but this
wasn't the only time Roberts' substance abuse introduced violence into his life and the
lives of others close to him.
In 1987, he was arrested for drug possession, harassing a woman, and assaulting a cop, as
a result of an incident in which he was intoxicated.
In another incident, the cops had found Eric banging on the door at the home of a woman
that he'd met at a party a year before.
The woman had been so frightened that she had called the police to get him away from
her home.
The arresting officers also claimed Roberts "threw a punch" at one of them but missed
and "hit another policeman in the shoulder" while they were taking him into custody.
Unfortunately, this wasn't the actor's last altercation with the law.
Eight years later, Eric was arrested yet again in connection with violence against a woman
— this time it was his wife, Eliza — who called 911 after an argument.
Police told the New York Daily News that Roberts had "pushed the victim, causing her to hit
her head against the wall," but both he and his wife later denied any physical abuse.
Taking a look back at the actor's reputation of violent behavior, it makes sense as to
why Julia would have taken the side of his ex, Kelly Cunningham, during their custody
battle.
The actress knew that her brother wasn't fit to be a father and hadn't dealt with his drug
addiction.
So, she did what was best for her niece Emma and took her mother's side.
Perhaps it was what Eric needed to understand that he needed his life to change in order
for him to have a relationship with his daughter.
His addiction had already derailed his career, he knew he needed to get sober in order to
get his family back.
And that's exactly what he did.
While he and his daughter, Emma, don't have the closest relationship, he is incredibly
proud of what she's achieved as an actress.
However, it might surprise you to know that he doesn't really speak to his daughter about
acting.
In December of 2020, the actor's life was changed once again when he became a grandfather.
Emma and her boyfriend, Garrett Hedlund, welcomed their first child together.
A beautiful baby boy named Rhodes Robert Hedlund.
Eric could not have been more excited about the news, and has embraced his new role as
a grandfather very happily.
As for his relationship with Julia, it turns out that the sibling bond was strong enough
to facilitate a reconciliation.
The siblings were able to put the past behind them, when Julia gave birth to twins in 2004.
Eric told Vanity Fair that when he visited Julia in the hospital, he was "ushered into
their room and was immediately awash in brotherly and uncle-ly love."
These days, the siblings spend holidays together and are "email buddies," per the outlet.
While it wasn't an easy journey to recovery, Eric did what he needed to do to mend the
rift that his addiction had caused between his loved ones.
For now, the siblings may just be email-buddies, but that is one step further from where they
were before.
It seems the actors were able to put the past behind them, and move on from the chaos.
We only hope that their family continues to grow closer.