Sydney Sweeney's Family ‘Filed for Bankruptcy’ Before Her Fame

A rags to riches story. Euphoria star Sydney Sweeney recently opened up about her family’s financial struggles before she made it big in Hollywood, revealing that they even had to file for bankruptcy.

“I watched my parents lose a lot. We filed for bankruptcy, and they lost their house back home on the lake,” she told Women’s Health of her family’s move from Washington to California in an interview published on Wednesday, November 15. “We couldn’t afford life in L.A. We couldn’t afford life anywhere.”

To help ease her parents’ financial stress and pay bills, Sydney, 26, said she worked odd jobs like babysitting, cleaning restaurant bathrooms, and giving tours at Universal Studios. Despite acting since she was 11 or 12 years old, it took several years for her to stop hearing “no” in her career.

“It was hard because they were supporting my dream, and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else,” she added. “I didn’t want to fail them. No matter how long it took, I was going to be in a TV show or a movie, and I wasn’t going to stop until something happened.”

Sydney started to gain recognition in 2018 with her roles in Everything Sucks!, Sharp Objects and The Handmaid’s Tale, which led to her big break as Cassie in Euphoria in 2019. She then booked major roles in Reality, The White Lotus, Anyone But You (coming December 15) and Madame Web (coming in February 2024).

Sydney Sweeney — Stefania D’Alessandro/WireImage

Discussing her rise to fame in a June interview with ES Magazine, Sydney said she “never accepted failure.”

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“I hated the answer ‘no.’ And I felt a responsibility to my family because I felt like we gave up and sacrificed so much for a dream that a little girl had,” she explained. “And I knew that I had to just keep going and keep working, and keep working really, really hard — work my ass off — because I couldn’t do anything else. I didn’t dream of anything else.”

However, despite now having a net worth of $10 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth — enough to buy back her great-grandparents’ lake house — Sydney knows she can’t slow down anytime soon. She told The Hollywood Reporter in July 2022 that she still struggled to afford life as an actor.

“I don’t have someone supporting me,” she said at the time. “They don’t pay actors like they used to, and with streamers, you no longer get residuals. The established stars still get paid, but I have to give 5% to my lawyer, 10% to my agents, 3% or something like that to my business manager. I have to pay my publicist every month and that’s more than my mortgage.”