Miley Cyrus has plenty of love for both of her parents, even if she did inherit one negative trait from her father, Billy Ray Cyrus.
Speaking with David Letterman on the legendary talk show host’s Netflix show My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, Miley, 31, opened up about her complicated family life.
Miley’s mother, Tish Cyrus, divorced Billy Ray, 62, in 2022. Miley has since stuck close to Tish, 57, serving as maid of honor in her mother’s 2023 wedding to Dominic Purcell. Miley’s siblings Noah and Braison Cyrus did not attend the festivities. Us Weekly later confirmed that Noah, 24, previously had a relationship with Purcell, 54.
When Letterman, 77, asked Miley whether she considered her father her hero, she responded, “I mean, honestly, my mom is my hero.” She added that while both her parents helped her achieve success, their contributions “can’t be weighed on the same scale.”
She still shared plenty of appreciation for her father, saying she’s “grateful for being able to watch him ahead of me.”
“He’s almost given me this map, and it’s a map of what to do and what not to do, and he’s guided me on both,” Miley said. “Without my dad, I know … who I am as a person wouldn’t exist. Because my dad as a creative and like, as an artist, and the way his brain works has always made me feel safer in my own mind.”
But there was also one negative that Miley got from Billy Ray. At one point in the interview, Miley tried to remember back to when she moved to Los Angeles as a child actress for her role on Disney Channel’s Hannah Montana. She admitted she could not remember which siblings came with her.
“I also inherited the narcissism from my father,” she joked. “I don’t know anything about my own siblings except for the part that I was doing. … I was moving to L.A., and that’s all I really knew.”
Billy Ray gave Miley more than that, however. She also reflected on her father’s upbringing and how he was able to provide for her in a way that his parents could not.
“My dad had a really rough childhood, and my childhood — I mean, we can go and talk about the hard times or the struggles … but I had food, I had love, I grew up in a beautiful big house, and my dad didn’t have that,” she said.
Miley’s interview with Letterman is now streaming on Netflix.
