Penn Badgley Shares the Differences Between Being a Dad & Stepdad

Penn Badgley is sharing some very rare insight into his family life.

If you didn’t know, the 37-year-old You actor married wife Domino Kirke in 2017 and the two share a 3-year-old son. Domino, 40, also shares son Cassius, 15, with ex Morgan O’Kane.

In a new interview, Penn spoke candidly about his “very different” roles as a dad and a stepdad.

Keep reading to find out more…“I have an interesting situation where I have a biological son and a stepson,” Penn shared on New York Times‘ Modern Love podcast. “And my stepson is — his father is very much in his life, so his father is his father, and I’m something else.”

Penn also said that his approach to parenting the boys is “very different” since there is a 12-year age gap between them.

“So I have two different kind of parental roles,” Penn explained. “My biological son is only 3 and a half. So, that’s a very different thing, too. I need to be able to more consciously show him my vulnerability as he gets older in those years.”

Penn also noted that since Cassius is a teenager, he “doesn’t want to spend that much time with us anyway.”

While he admitted he struggled to form a bond with Cassius, Penn credited Tom Cruise‘s 2014 sci-fi action epic Edge of Tomorrow for helping them connect.

“I just knew it was important. It was like the stars had aligned so that my wife and my youngest son were asleep, and I was just like, ‘This is a good time to do this! You’re not going to play video games now. We’re going to do this!’” Penn recalled. “He loved it.”

Earlier this week, Penn began production on the fifth and final season of You!