‘Tell Me Lies’ Star Grace Van Patten Opens Up About Star-Studded Childhood—and Friendship with Timothee Chalamet

"Tell Me Lies" star Grace Van Patten has shot to superstardom while taking center stage in the hit Hulu series—but far from being a newcomer to the starry heights of fame, the actress spent much of her childhood being prepped for such a moment.

Van Patten, 29, who stars as Lucy Albright in the popular thriller alongside her real-life boyfriend, Jackson White, got her first introduction to the dizzying world of Hollywood fame as a young child growing up in New York City, where she was raised by her mother, Wendy Rossmeyer, and director father, Timothy Van Patten.

The actress got her on-screen start featuring in one of her father's most well-known projects, "The Sopranos," making her debut in the series at the tender age of 8, playing the daughter of a gangster in one episode that her dad directed.

But even at home, the screen star—who was raised in New York City's Tribeca neighborhood—admitted she was surrounded by stars on a regular basis, telling Nylon in a new interview: "The actors my dad had around that became really close to our family—like Edie Falco and James Gandolfini."

Seeing how these famous faced balanced their stardom with their personal lives was, Van Patten said, one of the most important lessons she learned early on.

"These people who were very mega-famous, their number one priority was life and family first," she added. "So I do think being exposed to those types of people and artists made me want that. I saw all these people who were only in it for the art and not anything else."

Luckily, Van Patten's parents were more than happy to support her own dreams of becoming an actress, enrolling her at the famed Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and Performing Arts, where she counted the likes of Timothee Chalamet and Madonna's daughter, Lourdes Leon, among her classmates.

Despite each student's drive for success in the industry, Van Patten insisted that there was no bad blood between her and her classmates—and said their success is nothing but a positive thing as far as she is concerned.

"Timmy is a good friend of mine. I was in the audience for all of his rap performances, which were incredible," she went on. "I feel like such a proud mom for every person from LaGuardia that’s doing well. It gets me so pumped up."

Her father has also helped to teach her how to maintain her cool even when she's handling a hectic schedule on-set, leading largely by example.

"I’ve seen my dad on set recently with a million extras, the most chaotic day you could ever imagine, and he was so cool, calm, and collected," she shared.

"Then when he got home, he was like, ‘That was crazy.’ But he held it together for the people around him."

The actress—who has two sisters—is not the only member of the family to have launched an on-screen career, with her younger sibling, Anna Van Patten, featuring alongside her a recent biographical drama about accused murderer Amanda Knox.

While Van Patten portrayed Knox in "The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox," her younger sibling played her sister on-screen, too.

Images taken at the premiere of the series revealed the Van Patten siblings being supported by their family, with mom Wendy grinning proudly as she posed alongside all three of her daughters.

A tight-knit family bond is something that Van Patten has enjoyed for much of her life, continuing to reside in the family home even after she launched her own career.

By the time Van Patten hit the big time, as it were, landing a major role in the popular Hulu series "Nine Perfect Strangers," which also featured Nicole Kidman and Melissa McCarthy, her family had relocated to Brooklyn, moving into a stunning brownstone in Cobble Hill, which Timothy and Wendy bought for $2.87 million in 2011, according to records.

Despite work pulling her to Los Angeles on a regular basis, Van Patten admitted to the New York Times in 2021 that she wasn't quite ready to commit to living on the West Coast full time, revealing that she was still happily ensconced in the family home.

"I’ve been all over the place for the past few years and I’m definitely craving a place of my own, but I just don’t know where yet," she said. "I love it here [in New York], it’ll always be home."

In the four years since then, Van Patten appears to have laid down more permanent roots in L.A.—where, Nylon reported, she has already grown very accustomed to being stopped in the street by "Tell Me Lies" fans.

But, she insisted, fame was never the end goal for her—and the very concept of being in the spotlight nearly made her want to quit acting altogether.

"The slim chance of being famous has almost pushed me to stop," she said. "It terrifies me to be under the spotlight like that. It’s probably my own insecurities and fear of people knowing too much about me. My main focus is just to act."

When the starlet needs to escape the spotlight, she heads to one of her favorite places in Los Angeles: a Big 5 Sporting Goods in Studio City, where she is able to indulge in one of her greatest passions, sports.

"Being here feels like the beginning of the school year and you’re getting all the apparel for the sports teams you’ve joined," she said. "It gives me butterflies."

Van Patten's enthusiasm for sports was something she developed during her high school days, when she signed up for the LaGuardia High School basketball team, something she described as a "great escape" from her studies.