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The Shady Side Of The Roberts Family Revealed

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Three generations of one Hollywood family, and nearly every one of them has a scandal with their name on it.

Eric Roberts, Julia Roberts and Emma Roberts have combined for Oscar nominations, box office records and decades of tabloid ink, but the family’s private history reads far rougher than the red carpet photos suggest. Arrests, a custody war, a devastating suicide note and a set nickname that stuck for years all trace back to the same bloodline. Nicki Swift’s video “The Shady Side Of The Roberts Family Revealed” pulls those threads together.

• Eric Roberts was arrested in 1987 for cocaine and marijuana possession, then arrested again in 1995 for domestic violence against his wife, Eliza Garrett.
• Julia Roberts bankrolled Kelly Cunningham’s legal fight against Eric for custody of infant Emma in 1993, a move that cost Eric custody and led to an estrangement between brother and sister that didn’t end until 2004.
• Nancy Motes, Julia and Eric’s half-sister, died by suicide in 2014 and left an eight-page note accusing Julia of bullying her over her weight.

Eric Roberts’ Lost Years

Before Julia Roberts became a household name, her older brother Eric was the Roberts family’s rising star, earning an Oscar nomination for 1985’s Runaway Train. That momentum collided with a drug habit that followed him through the decade. Police arrested him in 1987 on cocaine and marijuana possession charges, and the pattern of trouble didn’t stop there — in 1995 he was arrested again, this time for domestic violence against his wife, Eliza Garrett.

Those years of instability set up the family’s most damaging rupture. When Eric split from partner Kelly Cunningham, the two went to war over custody of their newborn daughter, Emma, in 1993. Julia didn’t stay on the sidelines — she paid for Cunningham’s attorneys, and Eric ultimately lost custody. The financial and emotional betrayal, as Eric saw it, froze the siblings’ relationship for over a decade.

The Reconciliation And The Reopened Wound

Julia and Eric didn’t speak in any meaningful way until 2004, when the birth of Julia’s twins reportedly softened things enough for a reconciliation. It’s the kind of fracture-and-repair story that echoes across other famous families with messy internal politics, similar to the fallout chronicled in celebrity relationships that started out friendly and ended up anything but.

But the family’s private turmoil resurfaced with tragic consequences a decade later. Nancy Motes, Julia and Eric’s half-sister, died by suicide in 2014. She left behind an eight-page note that accused Julia of emotional cruelty, specifically bullying related to her weight — allegations that reopened old wounds about how the family’s most famous member treated the people closest to her.

Julia’s Reputation On Set

Away from family matters, Julia built a separate reputation inside production offices. During the filming of 1991’s Hook, her clashes with director Steven Spielberg reportedly got bad enough that crew members gave her a nickname that stuck: “Tinkerhell.”

Crew members on the set of Hook nicknamed Julia Roberts “Tinkerhell.”

Stories like that have shadowed other stars accused of difficult on-set behavior, a theme covered at length in pieces like actors who treat their co-stars like trash.

Emma Roberts’ Own Controversy

The family’s third generation hasn’t escaped the pattern either. Emma Roberts, Eric’s daughter and the same infant at the center of the 1993 custody fight, drew her own headlines over her relationship with actor Evan Peters. In July 2013, Emma was arrested in Montreal on domestic violence allegations following a physical altercation in a hotel room. She’s also faced repeated rumors of difficult behavior on set, a reputation that has trailed her career even as she’s built a steady list of TV and film credits.

Three Roberts, three separate scandals, and one family name that keeps landing back in the same conversation — which is probably why Nicki Swift needed a whole video just to sort out who did what to whom.