Each of the men is dad to two kids.
Justin Timberlake and Dax Shepard share a fear. The 39-year-old singer appeared on the latest episode of Shepard's Armchair Expert podcast, and both the guest and the host revealed that they worry about how their fame will affect their kids.
Timberlake and his wife, Jessica Biel, share two sons, Phineas, 1, and Silas, 5, while Shepard and his wife, Kristen Bell, have two daughters, Delta, 6, and Lincoln, 7.
"It's just a lot to unpack," Timberlake said. "I try to be conscious of making sure we can live a life where we're not weirdly private, but we're conscious of making sure they can be kids for as long as possible and not have the weight of somebody else treating them differently because of something that their parents do."
Shepard, meanwhile, said that he fears "kids are going to hang out with them solely 'cause of that or resent them because of that."
"To me, the two options both seem terrible. Either they're going to have fake friends or they're going to have people who hate them for no reason," Shepard said. "I have a good deal of fear about that."
In fact, it's such a fear that Shepard has discouraged his daughters from sharing who their parents are with their peers. This was never more true than when the girls participated in a Frozen play, as their mom plays Princess Anna in the Disney films.
"I had to tell my daughter, 'You cannot tell anyone in this thing that your mom is Princess Anna... I know you're proud and you should be able to say that, but I'm just warning you, that'll probably make other kids jealous and they won't know how to handle that feeling,'" Shepard recalled.
Timberlake could relate to that conversation, as he'd experienced a similar thing with his son due to his role in Trolls.
"We have this same thing where the kids at school with my 5-year-old are like, 'Your dad is Branch from Trolls,'" Timberlake said, before revealing how he hopes his kids will respond to their unique situation.
"I guess for guys like us, the hope is that we just keep instilling in them that we got really fun jobs, but it's not who we are," Timberlake said. "Hopefully down the road that has more weight to it."
Shepard likewise reflected on the "weird challenge" his kids will face as they get older.
"It'll all be what it'll be. They'll have this weird challenge of being privileged, which seems bizarre that that's a challenge, but that'll be their thing," he said. "We've all got a thing."
Timberlake's statements about fatherhood came shortly after he revealed the name of his youngest son for the first time.
"He's so cute and nobody's sleeping," he said on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. "But we're thrilled. We're thrilled and couldn't be happier. Very grateful."
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