Nepotism Rules! Times You May Not Have Realized Characters On The Same Show Were Played By Relatives.

Look, everyone knows that The Waitress in It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is Charlie Day’s real-life wife, and that Mac and Sweet Dee are married in real life. We all know that Hannah Montana’s dad was played by Miley Cyrus’ real Dad, and that Chelsea Noble met her husband Kirk Cameron on the set of Growing Pains and Danica McKellar’s real-life sister, Crystal McKellar, played Becky in Wonder Years and Steve Carell’s real-life wife played his love interest, Carol, on The Office. Here, however, are 11 more obscure examples of real-life family members on the same show.

Which ones did you already know? I’ll tell you this: The very first one blew my mind (as did the Seinfeld one).

1. Over on FX’s The Bridge, Demian Bichir’s brother, Bruno Bichir, joined the show this season as Sebastian Cerisola.

2. Benedict Cumberbatch’s real parents played the parents of his character, Sherlock Holmes, in Sherlock.

3. Gabriel Macht’s real-life wife, Jacinda Barrett (previously of The Real World: London), played his love interest on Suits.

4. Xander Berkeley and Sarah Clarke, who played George Mason and Nina Myers on 24, married between the first and second seasons of the Fox drama.

5. Carrie Preston, who plays the love interest of Michael Emerson’s character on Person of Interest, is also Michael Emerson’s real-life wife.


6. In an episode of Scrubs, Matthew Perry’s real-father, character actor John Bennett Perry, played his character’s father (or, at least we thought so).

John Bennett Perry also appeared in an episode of Friends as the father of a character played by Tate Donovan, who was the love interest of Rachel at the time and the real-life love interest of Jennifer Aniston.

7. In Castle, Seamus Dever’s wife, Juliana Dever, also plays his character’s wife on the show.

8. This waitress in Seinfeld? Julia Louis Dreyfus’ sister, Lauren Bowles (who is in True Blood).

9. For some reason, I can’t find one decent screenshot, but Renee Estevez — the real-life daughter of Martin Sheen — played President Bartlett’s personal assistant in 43 episodes of The West Wing.

10. In Hannibal, Jack Crawford’s wife is played by Laurence Fishburne’s real-life wife, Gina Torres.

11. Jon Stewart’s son, Nathan, has also appeared on The Daily Show a couple of times.

And watch the last five seconds of this clip to see Jon Stewart barely keep it together after his kid was on.

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