As a child, Liv Tyler’s nightly routine included tucking in her teddy bears and talking to the poster of Steven Tyler, the Aerosmith frontman, that hung over her bed.
She didn’t know Tyler was her father, but she still felt deeply connected to him. When she was about nine, Liv learned shocking news that would change her world. As an accomplished actress, Liv Tyler has captivated audiences with her versatility and emotive performances, bringing complex characters to life on both the big screen and television.
The New York native, now 45, broke into the scene in the 1990s with starring roles in films like Stealing Beauty (1996), Empire Records (1995), 1998’s Armageddon—featuring Aerosmith’s hit “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing”—and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Alongside Clueless star Alicia Silverstone, she also appears in the music video for Aerosmith’s “Crazy.”
But before earning her own fame, the singer, model, and actor spent her childhood piecing together the puzzling paternity of her father, whom she initially believed was singer‑songwriter Todd Rundgren of the band Utopia. Born on July 1, 1977, at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, Liv Tyler entered the world as Liv Rundgren. Her mother, Bebe Buell—Playboy’s Playmate of the Month in November 1974—was living with Rundgren in their New York City apartment and was often left alone while he toured.
Buell, crediting the wave of non‑monogamy in the 1970s for her multiple affairs, said in an interview, “I think every little girl would like exclusivity, but that wasn’t how it was. If you had a jealous streak, the seventies wasn’t your era. And I figured if he (Rundgren) was going to date, I would date, too. I had lovely boyfriends.”
An archetypal groupie, Buell dated music legends like Elvis Costello, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Jimmy Page, and Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler, whom she met while Rundgren was touring.
It was in 1976 that her fling with Tyler left Buell with a lifelong reminder. Liv Rundgren was born in July 1977, and though Rundgren knew she was likely Tyler’s child, he said he and Buell made a pact that he would be Liv’s father, and “if it ever became an issue, we’d tell her at 18.” The decision was made to avoid exposing young Liv to Tyler’s out‑of‑control addictions.
Rundgren signed her birth certificate, gave her his last name, and raised her as his own.
Liv said of Rundgren, “I’m so grateful to Todd for choosing to be a father figure to me. It’s a big thing for a man to say, ‘I know this kid might not be mine, but I still want to be her father.’ Although he and my mom weren’t together, he was always a very stable, loving force in my life.”
Immersed in the music world, the Jersey Girl star was often around her parents’ friends. At one of Rundgren’s concerts, when she was about eight or nine, she met Tyler, who she said bought her a Shirley Temple at the bar. She had no idea who he was, but the meeting stirred something inside her.
“Strangely enough, when I first met my dad, I didn’t know he was my dad and I fell in love with him. I put his poster on my wall. I would talk to him on the wall. And he would give me stuffed animals, and I would tuck them into bed before I would get in. I loved him so deeply,” Liv said. “My mom has a diary entry or something where I wrote, ‘I think Steven is my father.’”
The mystery was beginning to unravel.
At an Aerosmith concert, she saw Mia, Tyler’s daughter with Cyrinda Foxe, born one year after Liv.
“I saw her standing at the side of the stage at a concert and I was literally like looking at my twin,” Liv said.
The striking resemblance to both Tyler and Mia was impossible to ignore, and Buell and Rundgren finally told her the truth.
“When I realized that Steven was my father, it was a moment that was bigger than me, it was almost spiritual. When you meet kin, there is an energy and sparkle between your bodies. It must be chemical somehow — DNA and genes. I felt a connection in a very strong way when I met him as a little girl and I didn’t know why at first, but I figured it out rather quickly,” Liv told The Guardian.
“Steven and I look so alike, and we do things in the same way. It was fun getting to know his side of the family. My sister Mia will just move her hand in a certain way and the mannerism is so like mine, it’s crazy.”
Liv, who previously dated her Inventing the Abbotts co‑star Joaquin Phoenix, shares a son, Milo William, with ex‑husband Royston Langdon of the glam‑rock band Spacehog. Since 2014, she has been with David Gardner, and together they have two children: son Sailor Gene and daughter Lula Rose.
The Goodwill Ambassador remains close with both fathers, whom she says “are like unicorns or wizards. They are musicians through and through. The way they think is just different. Their eccentricities have made me more practical and more normal, in a way.”
When Sailor was born six weeks early, Tyler and Mia were in the room with her. Speaking of Tyler, Liv said, “He walked into the room moments before Sailor was born and cut his umbilical cord. It was wild.”
Liv Tyler today
Though she may not appear in blockbuster films as often as before, Liv Tyler remains active in the acting world. Her career has taken a steady path, and she has earned praise for her notable television performances.
In recent years, she has also devoted significant time to motherhood. She has made a personal commitment to prioritize her children over her career, vowing never to place professional pursuits above her family.
“I didn’t see how I could go away for three months to make a film and be the mother I wanted to be,” she says.
Motherhood has strengthened and enriched her life. Like many parents, Liv has discovered new aspects of herself and gained valuable self‑knowledge.
“My favorite thing about being a parent is that I learn so much from the push‑and‑pull dynamic of mother and child,” she told More in 2020. “Having children, I learned about my own strength.”
Liv Tyler lived in New York City for many years and had a deep connection to the West Village, her home for two decades — but in 2019, she sold her house.
According to The New York Times, she bought a townhouse in London and relocated across the Atlantic. In recent years, she has also made her home in Malibu, California, expanding her horizons.
Liv Tyler is often described as kind, genuine, and approachable, earning admiration from colleagues and fans alike.
And we couldn’t agree more.
What would you do if you found out you had a celebrity parent?
