About
Riley Keough has always stood at a lively crossroads of music royalty and modern Hollywood. Born Danielle Riley Keough on May 29, 1989, in Santa Monica, California, she is Elvis Presley’s eldest grandchild and the firstborn of singer-songwriter Lisa Marie Presley and musician Danny Keough. After early modeling gigs, she eased onto the screen with roles in The Runaways and Magic Mike, but global attention surged when she played the earnest road warrior Capable in Mad Max: Fury Road (2015). Keough has since balanced indie gems—American Honey, Zola—with prestige television. Her turn as the fiery 1970s singer in Prime Video’s Daisy Jones & The Six drew an Emmy nod and even won praise from the novel’s author, who said the performance set a “high bar” for future adaptations.
Beyond acting, Keough flexes creative muscles behind the camera. She co-founded the production company Felix Culpa, and her directorial debut, War Pony (2022), won the Camera d’Or at Cannes, signaling that her storytelling ambitions extend far past the spotlight.
Before Fame
Childhood for Riley mixed California beaches with backstage passes to some of rock’s most historic venues. She split her time between her father’s modest Los Angeles home and grandparent Elvis Presley’s Graceland, soaking up very different visions of “normal.” At fifteen she walked the Dolce & Gabbana runway and posed for Vogue, but an on-set visit during Lisa Marie’s music-video shoot convinced her that acting felt more like home than modeling. Film classes, dialect training, and small auditions followed. Her first major part came in the medical thriller The Good Doctor (2011), where she played a wary patient opposite Orlando Bloom—an experience she once said “taught me how to be calm even when lights, cables, and thirty people surround you.” Those early lessons in patience and craft shaped the grounded presence audiences recognize today.
Trivia
- Chanel’s creative ally: Keough was announced as a Chanel ambassador in 2024 and has become a red-carpet favorite for the house’s romantic couture.
- Surprising vocal chops: For Daisy Jones & The Six she recorded every song herself, only learning guitar a few months before filming began.
- Directing passion: She and best friend Gina Gammell wrote War Pony after spending years volunteering on the Pine Ridge Reservation.
- Tattoo tribute: A delicate script on her collarbone honors her late brother, Benjamin, who died in 2020.
- Lifestyle balance: She swears by transcendental meditation to keep anxiety in check during long shoots.
Family Life
Family stories around Riley read like American pop-culture history. Her mother, Lisa Marie Presley, passed away in January 2023, leaving behind a complex estate. After a brief legal dispute, Riley became sole trustee of the Presley holdings—including Graceland—fending off what she called “fraudulent” foreclosure claims in 2024.
She married Australian stuntman Ben Smith-Petersen in 2015 after they bonded during Mad Max training sessions in Namibia. The pair welcomed their first child via surrogate in 2021, a daughter they named Tupelo Storm—“Tupelo” nods to Elvis’s Mississippi birthplace and “Storm” honors Riley’s brother Benjamin. Keough later joked that she hadn’t realized Tupelo could shorten to “Tupie,” which sounded funny only after the paperwork was filed.
Riley remains close to half-sisters Harper and Finley Lockwood and often shares candid photos of family life on social media—quiet mornings in Hawaii where she spends downtime, or playful snapshots from Graceland’s back lawn. Despite public tragedy, she speaks openly about therapy and grief work, hoping to destigmatize mental-health conversations in celebrity circles.
Associated With
Creative collaborations color every chapter of Keough’s résumé. She sparred with Channing Tatum in Magic Mike, traded road songs with Shia LaBeouf in American Honey, and squared off against Taylour Paige in the viral saga Zola. On television, she shared smoky studio scenes with Sam Claflin in Daisy Jones & The Six, a production shepherded by Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine banner.
The momentum continues: Keough headlines Hulu’s limited series Under the Bridge opposite Lily Gladstone and is attached to the survival thriller Butterfly Jam with Barry Keoghan. Netflix also announced The Body, re-teaming her with writer-director Quinn Shephard, signaling an appetite for edgy coming-of-age tales.
