Real Life Relative / Live-Action TV

Real-Life Relative in Live-Action TV.

---

• 24:
  • Xander Berkeley and Sarah Clarke (George Mason and Nina Myers) married between Seasons 1 and 2. This meant that Xander got to interrogate his own missus in the second run. In addition, as an inside joke, a fake passport for Nina in Day 3 has the name "Sarah Berkeley".
  • In a What Could Have Been example, Donald Sutherland was to play the father of his son Kiefer's character, Jack Bauer, but was unavailable at the time of filming and was replaced by James Cromwell.
• Ian Lithgow, the son of John Lithgow, played one of Dick's students in 3rd Rock from the Sun.
• 30 Rock has Bertram Geiss (Tony Torn) playing a son of Don Geiss (Rip Torn). Tony is Rip's son. Also, actor John Lutz who plays Lutz on the show is married to actress Sue Galloway who plays Sue LaRoche-Van der Hout, though they aren't married on-screen and rarely interact directly with each other.
• 18 to Life: Jesse Rath plays Carter Boyd on the show. His older sister Meaghan Rath plays two separate minor characters, Violet (who isn't related to him) and Erin, Carter's sister (both of them are only in a single episode).
• Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos, both regulars on All My Children, were married in 1996... and then their characters got married. Given the nature of many soap storylines, this happened often.
• Dorian Missick has twice made guest appearances in TV shows which feature his wife Simone Missick in lead roles. He guest stars in the first season finale of All Rise as DJ Tailwind. Before that, he had a recurring role in the second season of Luke Cage as Dontrell "Cockroach" Hamilton, a criminal put away by Misty Knight (Simone) and Rafael Scarfe who got his conviction appealed after it turned out to have been obtained as a result of Scarfe planting evidence. Now he's a dice game runner and gun buyer in Harlem who proves to be a thorn in Misty's side. The flashback scene where Cockroach hurls colorful insults at Misty as she recalls Scarfe planting the gun was supposedly difficult for them to film without either of the Missicks corpsing.
• 'Allo 'Allo!: Vicki Michelle's sister, Ann Michelle, played a member of the Communist Resistance in "A Tour de France".
• In The Amazing Race's 13th season, Phil's father waited for the racers at the pit stop in New Zealand, which happened to be at his ranch.
• Season-spanning American Horror Story character Dr Arthur Arden (a.k.a. Hans Gruper), who originated in Asylum, is played by James Cromwell in all his scenes set in the 1960s, and by Cromwell's son John in all flashbacks set in the 1930s (including a cameo of the character in Freak Show). Reportedly this came about as a result of Cromwell learning that his character would be featured in flashbacks and immediately recommending his son be cast, since "He looks just like me at that age."
• Arrested Development:
  • Amy Poehler played then real-life husband Will Arnett's character Gob's wife for a time.
  • Arrested was fond of this trope. In a later episode (appropriately titled "Family Ties"), Michael (Jason Bateman) hires Nellie, played by Bateman's real-life sister Justine, to work at the Bluth Company. He thinks she is his long-lost sister; she's actually a prostitute. This makes the scene where Nellie tries to seduce Michael so very weird, as Michael himself lampshades while Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
    Michael: Marry me! ... That's so wrong... on so many levels.
  • In Season 4, it turns out that Tony Wonder and Sally Sitwell, played by married couple Ben Stiller and Christine Taylor, are a couple. They both appeared in the show earlier, but as unrelated characters.
• Arrowverse:
  • Arrow had a case with replacements: Dinah was Fernanda Baronne, until her sister Flávia Saddy had to take over.
  • The Flash:
    • Robbie Amell (Ronnie Raymond) and Stephen Amell (Oliver Queen) are cousins. In the Season 1 penultimate episode, Barry calls them both as his reinforcements for the fight against Eobard Thawne, and though they don't interact they do stand side by side.
    • In the Latin Spanish dub, Mario Castañeda voices every iteration of Harrison Wells (and Eobard Thawne when he's in that form), while his son Arturo voices Barry throughout the first two and a half seasons.
    • In the German Dub, Harrison Wells and his daughter Jesse are voiced by Uwe Büschken and his own daughter Olivia Büschken.
  • Supergirl:
    • Melissa Benoist's real-life ex-husband, Blake Jenner, played Adam Foster, Kara's Third-Option Love Interest (they were married at the time).
    • In the Brazilian dub from the second season on, Kara and Alex are voiced, respectively, by Mariana Torres and Adriana Torres, who are sisters in real life.
    • In the Filipino dub, James and Alex's voice actors are married in real life.
    • Jesse Rath's older sister Meaghan Rath plays a gender flipped version of his character from another dimension in two Season 5 episodes. As they have a strong family resemblance, it really works.
  • Legends of Tomorrow:
    • Ray Palmer's love interest and eventual wife Nora Darhk is played by Brandon Routh's wife, Courtney Ford.
    • Amaya Jiwe's ancestor, who shows up in a couple of scenes in Season 3, is played by Joy Richardson, Maisie Richardson-Sellers' mother.
    • In the Season 3 finale, Jefferson brings up a photo of his daughter, Martina. She is actually portrayed by Aurora Kerima Drameh, the real-life daughter of Franz Drameh (Jefferson's actor).
  • In the Elseworlds crossover, the minor villain Nora Fries is played by Cassandra Jean Amell, Stephen Amell's wife.
• The A-Team had an episode entitled "Bounty" in which Murdock fell in love with a vet named Kelly. Kelly was played by Wendy Fulton, who is still to this day married to Dwight Schultz and has been since 1983.
• Some of the actors' families also starred in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet:
  • Tim Healy's wife, Denise Welch, appeared as Jean, the new resident of Oz's flat.
  • Kevin Whately starred with his daughter, Catherine Whately, who played his on-screen daughter, Debbie, in the second series, and with his wife, Madelaine Newton, who played Dennis' girlfriend, Christine Chadwick.
  • Jimmy Nail's son, Thomas Bradford-Jones, also has a small part as Sir James and Celestia Palmer's son, Henry, in series two, as did his sister, Val McLane, who played Dennis' sister, Norma.
• Babylon 5:
  • Husband and wife Bruce Boxleitner and Melissa Gilbert played husband and wife. As well, a photo from their real wedding is used in the show as one from the characters' wedding. On the show, they don't work out.
    • Oddly, Melissa Gilbert was The Other Darrin in this example. An episode the previous season had featured a different actress as Boxleitner's wife, but she was unavailable for the second appearance.
    • Word of God is that Melissa Gilbert took the role for less money than she usually gets, as a favor to her husband.
• The Barrier: The actresses playing mother and daughter Emilia and Julia for most of the series are Ángela Molina and Olivia Molina, who are mother and daughter in real life, as well.
• "Bates Motel": Keenan Tracey(Gunner) is the son of Ian Tracey (Remo)
• Battlestar Galactica (2003):
  • The series has four minor characters played by real-life relatives of the main cast. Bodie Olmos ('Hotdog') is the son of Edward James Olmos (Admiral Adama), Lymari Nadal (Giana) is Olmos's wife, Susan Hogan, the wife of Michael Hogan (Saul Tigh) plays the lead judge in Baltar's trial, and Kerry Norton, Jamie Bamber's (Apollo) wife plays a medic.
  • In a behind the scenes example, the show's iconic cover of Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower" (and several other tracks) are performed by Brendan McCreary, the brother of the show's composer, Bear McCreary.
  • In the episode Greetings from Earth in the original series, most of the children are played by children of the series creator Glen A. Larson or star Lorne Greene.
• Bayan Ko has Real Life father-and-son actors Pen and Ping Medina playing the corrupt Rubio political dynasty in-series, with Pen playing the governor father and Ping playing the congressman son.
• Being Human (US):
  • Jesse Rath, the actor that plays Sally's brother in the sixth episode of Season 3, is Meaghan Rath's brother in real life, though it's worth noting he's played by a completely different actor in the pilot episode.
  • The little boy and girl that portrayed Josh and Nora's children Aidan and Sally are Sam Huntington's children Charlie and Audrey.
• The Best of Friends (1963) episode, "Double Trouble", featured the Cox Brothers, Fred and Frank Cox, a pair of actors who specialised in dual roles.
• In The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon's mother is played by Laurie Metcalf. In the series Young Sheldon, which takes place during Sheldon's childhood, a younger version of the same character is played by Metcalf's daughter Zoe Perry.
• Another extreme example: a two-parter of The Bill features three generations of the Woodward acting dynasty. Edward (an old crook), his son Tim (as his love child) and Tim's son Sam (as the first character's grandchild, not via the second).
• Pauline Quirke and Linda Robson, who played sisters Sharon and Tracey in Birds of a Feather, have been friends since primary school, enabling the opening credits to use genuine photos of them growing up together. Travis from the Revival was played by Quirke's son, Charlie.
• On A Bit of Fry and Laurie, one episode ends with a sketch of Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie invading a woman's house and demanding to see her husband; the woman brings down a baby, who she says is the only man in the house. The baby was played by Laurie's real-life son, and in the part of the sketch in which they start screaming at the baby, Fry is quite obviously trying not to laugh at the sight of Laurie half-heartedly yelling at his kid. (The resemblance is also uncanny.)
• Zack and Cyndi from The Bite are played by real life husband and wife Steven Pasquale and Phillipa Soo. This adds a bit of irony since Pasquale's character cheated on his wife with Soo's.
• Zooey Deschanel guest-starred as Temperance Brennan's cousin in an episode of Bones, which stars her sister Emily as Temperance. The writers took the golden opportunity to lampshade the hell out of this during said episode.
  Everyone, upon seeing the two in the same room: You two could be sisters!
• Bosch:
  • Titus Welliver plays Harry Bosch as an adult. Both of his sons portray Harry in flashbacks, with his younger son Quinn being used in Bosch for flashbacks to his childhood, while his older son Eamonn is used in Bosch: Legacy to portray Harry in flashbacks to his days as a young LAPD officer.
  • Titus's daughter Cora has a recurring role in Legacy as Sam the dog walker.
• Boy Meets World:
  • As in St. Elsewhere, William Daniels and Bonnie Bartlett played a couple on the show, where Mr. Feeny (Daniels) fell for the college's dean (Bartlett). In fact, Daniels and Bartlett have played a romantic couple on no less than four occasions: Killer on Board (1977), Touched By an Angel, Boy Meets World, and St. Elsewhere. Apparently, they are a living aversion to the Couple Bomb both in real life and onscreen (they've been married since 1951).
  • Topanga's parents were played by the husband-and-wife Michael McKean and Annette O'Toole for one episode. Also, Ben Savage's brother Fred Savage appears in one episode as a creepy lecherous college teacher.
  • The daughter show, Girl Meets World, is no slouch at this trope either. One of the speaking background characters that appears in lots of episodes, Sarah, is played by Sarah Carpenter, elder sister of main cast member Sabrina Carpenter.
• Robert Reed's real-life daughter appeared in one episode of The Brady Bunch. So did the daughters of Florence Henderson and series creator Sherwood Schwartz.
• The Brittas Empire:
  • A rare creator variant comes in the form of Andrew Norriss, whose son Jonathon played Carole's son Ben from "Mr. Brittas Changes Trains" to "The Last Day".
  • Harriet Thorpe, who plays Carole, had her son, Jack Thorpe Baker, show up in "The Stuff of Dreams", playing one of Brittas' twin sons in his Imagine Spot at the end of the episode.
• Shortly before they got married in real life, Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Joe Lo Truglio shared a scene with his fiancée Beth Dover, in which she amusingly enough played a craft store clerk helping his character Charles pick out the design for his wedding invitations.
  • The titular puzzle master, Melvin Stermley in The Puzzle Master is played by Melissa Fumero's husband David Fumero.
  • Andy Samberg's wife Joanna Newsom makes a cameo appearance in the Grand Finale, The Last Day where their characters end up insulting each other.
• The 90s series Brotherly Love was pretty much contrived for brothers Joey, Matthew and Andrew Lawrence to play themselves.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
  • The show took advantage of the fact that Nicholas Brendon (who played Xander Harris) has an identical twin, in an episode where there are two Xanders. Kelly Donovan (said identical twin) later stood in for Nicholas Brendon during the episode "Intervention", which coincidentally had Xander referring back to the events of the previous episode because Brendon had pneumonia at the time.
  • Adam Busch (Warren) and Amber Benson (Tara), respectively, were dating, and Joss Whedon actually told Adam, "You're gonna kill your girlfriend," to which the reply was "Warren gets a girlfriend?" "No, I mean your real girlfriend." Eight years later, by the way, they're still together.
  • Alyson Hannigan crossed over to guest star on Angel alongside her now-husband Alexis Denisof. They met while both were on Buffy, so it's part-Romance on the Set, part-this.
  • David Boreanaz's wife Jaime Bergman appeared in one episode of Angel season 5.
  • Dollhouse similarly took advantage of Enver Gjokaj (Victor) having an identical twin brother. He stood in as the second Victor in a dream sequence.
    • Dollhouse had another example of real-life relatives: the series finale has Eliza Dushku's younger brother Nate as Clive Ambrose's latest body. Her real-life boyfriend, Rick Fox, also cameoed.
    • Nate was also the gunman in one of Angel's flashbacks in Eliza's final appearance on that show.
• Castle:
  • Esposito and Castle (Jon Huertas and Nathan Fillion respectively) have been teasing Ryan (Seamus Dever) about his girlfriend, who up to this point has been The Ghost. At the end of "The Mistress Always Spanks Twice" she shows up, played by Dever's wife, Juliana Dever. The characters later marry.
  • Most recently, Stana Katic's husband Kris Brljac was an extra on Season 5's "Death Gone Crazy".
• On The Closer, Brenda's niece Charlie was played in several episodes by Kyra Sedgewick's real-life daughter, Sosie Bacon.
• Cobra Kai:
  • In "Nature vs. Nurture", the first of John Kreese's backstory flashbacks opens in a 1960s diner. We're given the impression that Kreese was a high school jock, especially as the man holds the same "no mercy" mentality as adult Kreese, bullies a busboy, gets offered a chance to serve in Vietnam, and most importantly is played by Martin Kove's son Jesse. Then the manager yells at the busboy, "KREESE! Those tables are not gonna bus themselves! Get back to work!"
  • In "The Good, The Bad, and the Badass," Ralph Macchio's son Daniel (who is named after Daniel LaRusso) can be seen in the town-hall meeting. He's the spectacled man sitting behind Johnny Lawrence while Miguel and Sam are giving their speech to save the All Valley Tournament.
  • In seasons 4 and 5, Daniel's cousin Vanessa is played by Ralph Macchio's daughter Julia.
• The Heartwarming Orphans from The Colbert Report Christmas Special were Stephen Colbert's own children Madeleine, Peter, and John Colbert. Madeleine also appeared aged eight in the Getty Oil segment on The Daily Show, producing some adorable outtakes.
  Stephen: How big was your profit margin last year?
  Madeleine: I don't know what that means, Daddy.
  • Stephen's brother Ed is a copyright lawyer and appeared on the show during the Shepard Fairey "Hope" poster fair use debate.
• The Confessions of Frannie Langton: Sophie Cooke (Marguerite Benham) and Stephen Cambpell Moore (George Benham) are married like their characters.
• Peter Barlow, the repeatedly Other Darrined son of William Roache's character Ken Barlow in Coronation Street, was briefly played by Roache's son Linus in the 1970s. Linus Roache returned to the Street in 2010, now playing a completely different son, long-lost Lawrence Cunningham. Lawrence's son is played by Linus's brother, James. And James Roache also appeared in the docudrama The Road To Coronation Street, as a young William Roache!
• Criminal Minds has several examples:
  • The victim the team is working to save in "3rd Life" is played by Gia Mantegna, Joe Mantegna's (Agent Rossi's) daughter in Real Life. She later returns in Season 12 as Cat Adams' partner-in-crime.
  • The two oldest Galen children from the episode "Damaged" are played by real-life twin brother and sister Nicholle Tom and David Tom.
  • JJ's sons Henry & Michael are played by Mekhai Andersen and Phoenix Sky Andersen respectively, AJ Cook's sons and the actual result of the pregnancies that put JJ into maternity leave in the first place.
• Crossing Jordan: Kathryn Hahn's husband Ethan Sandler plays ADA Jeffrey Brandau, her character Lily Lebowski's love interest.
• CSI: Marg Helgenberger's then-husband, Alan Rosenberg, appeared in "Weeping Willows" and "Leaving Las Vegas."
• CSI: NY: Gary Sinise's eldest daughter, Sophie, played an eyewitness in episode 6.12, "Criminal Justice."
• In Dad's Army, Pike's girlfriend Ivy was played by Ian Lavender's real-life wife. Arthur Lowe's wife, Joan Cooper, also took over the role of Dolly Godfrey towards the end of the series.
  • Lowe and Cooper were well known for this trope and often performed in repertory theatre together. Towards the end of Lowe's life, he would often agree to take roles only if his wife could act alongside him, and they were appearing in a play together when Lowe died backstage.
• Jon Stewart's son, Nathan, has appeared on The Daily Show at least twice. The funniest moment being when he played a cheap YouTube version of his father. Jon's inability to hold his laughter when the camera cut back was priceless.
• Peter Davison and his daughter Georgia Moffett.
  • In an episode of The Last Detective where Moffett guest-starred alongside her dad, the production team wanted her character to flirt with her dad's character of DC Davies. One or both of them 86ed that idea pronto.
  • They also played a father and daughter on Fear Stress And Anger.
  • And for the hat-trick is Doctor Who: Peter Davison played the Fifth Doctor from 1981-1984. Five regenerations later in the Doctor's life, Moffett starred in "The Doctor's Daughter" as the daughter-by-cloning machine of David Tennant's Tenth Doctor. And just to drive it further, Tennant and Moffett began dating shortly after this and married in 2011, with three more daughters and a son.^{Meaning, drumroll, please...}that The Doctor's Daughter, who also played The Doctor's Daughter, is now "The Doctor's Wife" and has had "The Doctor's Daughter" who is also "The Doctor's Granddaughter". Sadly, her first child with Tennant was named Olivia rather than Susan.
    • Before being cast as Jenny, Moffett was considered for the role of Rose Tyler, before that role was instead given to Billie Piper.
    • And Fifth finally meets Jenny in a Big Finish Doctor Who audio drama inevitably titled "Relative Time". (They'd already used "Relative Dimensions" for an Eighth and Alex audio.)
• In Destinos, Fernando's youngest grandchild Maricarmen is played by the real-life daughter of series lead Liliana Abud, who plays Raquel.
• On Detectorists, Becky is played by Rachael Stirling and her mother, Veronica, is played by her mother Dame Diana Rigg.
• Michael C. Hall and Jennifer Carpenter play brother and sister in Dexter, but were married in real life. They have since divorced.
• Diagnosis: Murder starred Dick Van Dyke as crime-solving doctor Mark Sloan, and co-starred his own son Barry Van Dyke as Mark's son, police detective Steve Sloan. Other members of the Van Dyke family appeared at various times during the show's run, including Dick's brother Jerry and daughter Stacy in one episode each as Dr. Mark's brother and daughter respectively. Barry's four children all appeared in multiple episodes, although not as Sloan family members: Carey as six different characters in as many episodes; Shane as four, the last of whom became a regular supporting role in the show's concluding months; Wes as three; and Taryn in three episodes. All four appeared together in two separate episodes, which therefore share the highest rating of 6.0 on the Van Dyke Scale...
• The Dick Van Dyke Show also had a few episodes with Jerry Van Dyke as Stacey Petrie, Rob's sleepwalking brother.
• Doctor Who has other examples, mind you:
  • An Eighth Doctor Doctor Who audio titled "An Earthly Child" features Paul McGann's real-life son as the Doctor's great-grandson (i.e. Susan's son).
  • In Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith's first episode, the production staff, looking for an actress to play a young version of new companion Amy Pond, asked Karen Gillan (the adult Amy) if she had any relatives. Karen mentioned a young cousin of hers, Caitlin Blackwood, and the production team decided to audition her. The two had never met before shooting started. Blackwood appeared again at Amy's wedding at the end of the series, presumably as one of Amy's cousins, even further driving this trope home.
  • David Troughton, son to Second Doctor Patrick Troughton, made appearances in "The Enemy of the World" and "The War Games" in 1969. He returned as different characters in the 1972 Third Doctor adventure "The Curse of Peladon" and the 2008 Tenth Doctor adventure "Midnight"...not to mention various 21st century audio Doctor Who dramas.
  • Jack Watling (Professor Travers in the Great Intelligence stories "The Abominable Snowmen" and "The Web of Fear") was the father of Deborah Watling (the Doctor's companion Victoria).
  • In the original production of the stage play "Doctor Who and the Daleks: Seven Keys to Doomsday", the companion character is Jenny, played (oddly enough) by Wendy Padbury (Zoe Heriot). In the Big Finish version she's played by Padbury's daughter, Charlie Hayes; the two went on to play opposite each other in several "Companion Chronicles" audios.
  • In the Series 6 episode "The Impossible Astronaut", William Morgan Sheppard plays the character of Canton Everett Delaware as he appears in 2011, and his son Mark Sheppard plays a younger Canton in 1969. The story goes that they were going to use makeup to make Mark look like an old man before he mentioned his father who'd be a perfect older version of himself. In this instance, the preparation for the scenes was reversed from their normal pattern, with William studying Mark's acting to make sure his own scenes would match Mark's.
    • Incidentally this also happened in an NCIS episode, "Broken Bird", with Mark Sheppard playing a young version of his father's character in Ducky's flashbacks.
  • The little girl in "Castrovalva" is played by Souska John, the niece of Caroline John (Liz Shaw).
  • Mark Gatiss said he wrote "The Crimson Horror" specifically for the mother-daughter duo of Dame Diana Rigg and Rachael Stirling. Gatiss' real-life hubby, Ian Hallard, tends to pop up in this and his other productions, as well.
    Doc Oho: Mark Gatiss has gone on record to say that he doesn't find work for his husband Ian Hallard and that he gets the roles on his merits as an actor. That's all well and good (because he is a genuinely good actor) but it is a remarkable coincidence that he has just happened to be the best actor for the roles in Gatiss' audio and TV Who and his Sherlock scripts too.
  • After the death of Roger Delgado, who played the Master, his widow Kismet Delgado was cast as the voice of the spider leader the Great One in the final story of the Letts-Dicks-Pertwee era, "Planet of the Spiders". According to interviews, this was a deliberate decision by the team to help her with her cash-flow problems after her husband's death. It was also oddly appropriate, as, under the plans made before Delgado's death, he would have played the Master in a different final story, in which the character would have been killed off in a possibly-redemptive way.
  • Two of the haemovores in "The Curse of Fenric" were Sylvester McCoy's sons Sam and Joe Kent-Smith.
• In the episode of Drunk History that recounts the founding of the Kelloggs cereal empire, the brothers John and Will Kellogg are played by the brothers Owen and Luke Wilson.
• In Dr Wonders Workshop, Paula's family is played by the real-life family of her actress, at least judging by the last names in the credits.
• In Due South Fraser's (Paul Gross' character) mother was played by Martha Burns ...who is Paul Gross' wife. They also starred together in the series Slings & Arrows, as former lovers.
• Bobby Troup and Julie London, husband and wife Emergency! supporting stars. Making things interesting, series creator/producer Jack Webb was London's ex-husband. Also, Randolph Mantooth's brother appeared as a guest actor and a firefighter in the background a few times.
• On Empire, the actors that play Andre and Anika, Trai Byers and Grace Gealey, got married in real life during the second season. On the show they have very little on-screen interaction (Anika starts out as Andre's father's much younger fiancee).
• In the last season of Eureka, Allison Blake's brother is played by the actress's real-life husband.
• Everybody Loves Raymond:
  • Madylin Sweeten and her younger twin brothers, Sawyer and Sullivan, play Ally Barone and her younger twin brothers, Geoffery and Michael, respectively.
  • A Lodge brother of Frank Barone was played by Ray Romano's father.
  • The Barones' neighbor, Bill Parker, is played by Patricia Heaton (Debra Barone)'s real-life husband;
  • Monica Horan (Amy Barone) is married to the show's producer Philip Rosenthal.
• In the pilot of The Fall Guy, stuntman Colt Seavers, played by Lee Majors, has to double Majors' then-wife Farrah Fawcett. This makes the scene in which Majors dons that poofy blond wig even more hilarious.
• In Family Ties, Tracy Pollan played the girlfriend of Michael J. Fox's character Alex Keaton. In Bright Lights Big City, Pollan played the cousin of Fox's character. The two of them married later that year, and are still married to this day. Pollan has also made a guest appearance on Spin City, as the high school flame of Fox's character.
  • Before Pollan, Fox had dated Nancy McKeon. The two of them played love interests on two made-for-TV movies, High School U.S.A. and Poison Ivy.
• An episode of Fantasy Island called "What's the Matter With Kids?" features Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows as husband and wife Child Psychologists.
• Fantasy Island (2021):
  • Roselyn Sánchez's husband Eric Winter guest stars in one episode.
  • Dave and Odette Annable play two characters who are like them a married couple.
• Farscape:
  • In the trilogy Look at the Princess, the simulations of John Crichton's son and daughter are played by Ben Browder's children.
  • Additionally, Ben Browder's wife, Francesca Buller, has played multiple alien characters, notably War Minister Ahkna.
  • Browder's children show up again in Stargate SG-1 as a pair of random kids running past SG1 in a village.
• John Cleese and Connie Booth were married when they wrote and played in the first series of Fawlty Towers, in 1975. They were divorced by the time of the second series in 1979, but this doesn't appear to have hindered the quality of the show in any way.
• James Roday Rodriguez and Maggie Lawson, were dating in real life when they starred in the Fear Itself episode "In Sickness and in Health" as a couple about to get married. The two are also castmates in Psych, and their characters officially entered a relationship in Season 5.
  • The episode "Bollywood Homicide" had a client of the week and his brother as the central part of the episode's plot. The brothers are played by real-life cousins Sendhil Ramamurthy and Jay Chandrasekhar.
• On the 1980s British TV series A Fine Romance, main characters Mike and Laura were played by real-life spouses Michael Williams and Judi Dench.
• On FlashForward (2009), John Cho's wife Kerri had a small guest role as a waitress.
• Flowers (2016): Sophia Di Martino (Amy) and Will Sharpe (Shun) in reality are partners, with two children.
• Forever Knight:
  • Geraint Wyn Davies' real-life son guest-starred in one Season 3 episode.
  • Another episode had the then-boyfriend of Catherine Disher, aka Natalie, as a guest star.
• During the "Halloween" episode of Frasier, Frasier spends most of the evening flirting with a woman dressed as Eve. The woman was played by Kelsey Grammer's then-wife Camille.
• Friends:
  • Matthew Perry's father played Joshua's (Tate Donovan's character) father in one episode.
    • Tate Donovan was also dating Jennifer Aniston at the time.
  • When Julia Roberts guest starred, her real-life sister played her assistant.
    • Roberts guest starred in the first place because she was dating Matthew Perry at the time.
  • In one episode Ross's old friend from high school comes to visit. Turns out he is the president (and only current member) of the Anti-Rachel club. He was played by Jennifer Aniston's then-real-life husband Brad Pitt.
• Before the final seasons were sent elsewhere, Game of Thrones had Sansa and Arya Stark dubbed in Brazilian Portuguese by Luisa and Helena Palomanes.
  • In House of the Dragon, Erryk and Arryk Cargyll are identical twin brothers, and so are their actors Elliott and Luke Tittensor.
  • Ron Donachie plays Ser Rodrik Cassel. His real-life son, Daniel Portman, plays Podrick Payne.
• In the first season of Get a Life, Chris Elliott's character's father was played by his real-life father Bob Elliott.
• On Gilmore Girls, the chemistry between Rory and Jess was made a little more obvious due to the fact that Milo Ventimiglia was already Alexis Bledel's real-life boyfriend when he was cast as Jess. In an odd coincidence, they broke up roughly around the same time the episode where Rory and Jess see each other for the final time aired.
• Gimme a Break!: During the last three seasons, Matthew Lawrence joined his older brother, Joey Lawrence, as Joey's (the character) little brother, Matt.
• Ginny and Georgia: One of Joe's employees is Padma. His actor (Raymond Ablack) and hers (Rebecca Ablack) are siblings.
• In one episode of The Golden Girls, Bea Arthur's own adopted son plays a firefighter.
• Alton Brown frequently has members of his family make appearances on Good Eats. While most of his on-air family is portrayed by actors or members of the production crew, his late grandmother, mother, and daughter Zoey did make appearances as themselves. On a recent episode, Zoey Brown appeared as Alton's granddaughter which is humorous because she was effectively playing her own daughter (Zoey being Alton's only child).
• Gossip Girl:
  • Stars Penn Badgley (Dan) and Blake Lively (Serena) dated in real life as well as in the show.
  • Someone might say that the one-episode Vanessa/Chuck hookup and kiss might be imputable to the two actors playing the characters, Jessica Szohr and Ed Westwick, dating, but given the fact that the writers of the show seem to be on crack most of the time, that's highly debatable. Also, the set brought Sebastian Stan (Carter Baizen) and series regular Leighton Meester (Blair Waldorf) together.
• Grey's Anatomy's Derek Shepherd's mother is played by Tyne Daly; ironically, Daly is tied by parental roots to two actors from Private Practice, one fictional (she played Amy Brenneman (Violet)'s mother in Judging Amy) and one real (Tim Daly (Pete) is Tyne's baby brother).
• On the last couple of seasons of Growing Pains, Chelsea Noble played the romantic interest of Kirk Cameron's character. They ended up getting married in the show, and then later married in Real Life.
  • And then even later, Noble played Cameron's love interest in the short-lived WB series Kirk.
  • They've since appeared together in the Left Behind (2000) movies. (Although Cameron plays the main character and Noble plays... the anti-Christ's girlfriend.) They're both now evangelical Christians.
  • Cameron won't even kiss anyone other than Noble now. She's supposedly in Fireproof (uncredited) in Cameron's kiss scenes with his movie wife (played otherwise by Erin Bethea).
• On Grownish, twins Jazlyn and Skylar are played by sisters Chloe and Halle Bailey. Interestingly enough, despite looking extremely similar, in real life they are not twins as Chloe is two years older than Halle.
• Guilt: Daisy Head and her father Anthony Head play a stepdaughter and stepfather in the series.
• Hand of God: A minor character named Kugler is played by Ron Perlman's daughter Blake Perlman.
• Hannah Montana:
  • Billy Ray Cyrus and his daughter Miley played Hannah Montana's dad and the title character, respectively.
    • And his other daughter Noah was an extra.
  • Miley's real-life godmother, country music icon Dolly Parton, also appeared in a few episodes as the sister of Robby Ray.
  • Mateo Arias made a cameo appearance as Rico's brother. Rico is played by Moises Arias.
• On Hannibal Jack Crawford's wife Bella is played by Gina Torres, who is also married to Laurence Fishburne in real life. This makes the secret Bella was keeping from Jack (she has cancer) all the more painful when you know they're actually married and playing a married couple going through that.
  • Both Torres and Fishburne also appeared on CSI, but Gina appeared in season four, long before Fishburne became the series' star.
• Phil Silvers played the father of Jenny Piccolo (actress Cathy Silvers) on Happy Days.
• Haven:
  • Lucas Bryant plays main cast member Nathan Wuornos and his wife Kirsty Hinchcliffe joined the cast as Rebecca Rafferty in Season 4.
  • John Dunsworth plays main cast member Dave Teagues and his daughter Molly plays Vickie.
• Hawaii Five-0: James Caan is the father of Scott Caan, who plays Danny Williams. He guests stars as retired NYC police officer Tony Archer in the season two episode "Lekio".
• Hawkeye (2021): Alaqua Cox plays Maya while an adult. Cox's young cousin Dornell Besaw played young Maya in flashbacks. They reprise their roles too in the Sequel Series Echo (2024).
• The short-lived '60s sitcom He And She starred real-life husband and wife Richard Benjamin and Paula Prentiss.
• Heroes:
  • The actors playing Ted Sprague and Sandra Bennet are married in real life. In one episode, Ted threatens to kill Sandra. In the episode commentary, the actor playing Ted observes, "Yeah, our kids aren't gonna be allowed to watch this one."
  • The fact that Hayden Panettiere and Milo Ventimiglia were dating is going to make for some awkward television considering that Milo's character is her character's uncle.
• In the Dutch sitcom Het Zonnetje in Huis, father Piet Bovenkerk and son Eric Bovenkerk are played by real-life father and son John Kraaykamp and John Kraaykamp Jr.
• Hi-de-Hi!:
  • The twins (Stanley and Bruce) were played by actual twins, David and Tony Webb. In the end credits, they were billed together as "The Webb Twins".
  • Diane Holland got the role of Yvonne as she was the sister-in-law of co-writer Jimmy Perry.
• One Highlander episode had an appearance of Adrian Paul's then-wife Melani as an escaped female con hired to seduce Duncan. (She played the character until the plastic surgery, then Alexandra Vandernoot took over).
• On Home Improvement, the actress who plays Jill's sister Carrie is married to Richard Karn, who plays Al.
• House:
  • Co-stars Jesse Spencer and Jennifer Morrison were dating at the same time as their characters, Dr. Chase and Dr. Cameron, started their romantic relationship.
  • Inversely, a few months after Chase and Cameron made their relationship official in the third season's finale, Jesse Spencer and Jennifer Morrison decided to call off their engagement.
  • The teenage boy whom House yells at to wash his hands after going to the bathroom in the episode "Kids" is Hugh Laurie's son in real life.
• House of Cards (US):
  • Two of the main supporting actors are real-life husband and wife couple Michel Gill and Jayne Atkinson. However, their respective characters, President Garrett Walker and Secretary of State Catherine Durant, are not related.
  • In Season 3, Paul Sparks plays author Thomas Yates. His wife Annie Parisse plays a mother that Claire Underwood meets on the Iowa campaign trail.
  • In one episode of Season 3, Doug Stamper's niece and nephew are played by Michael Kelly's son and daughter.
• How I Met Your Mother has several recurring characters played by relatives of the main cast. Sandy Rivers, Robin's co-anchor, is played by Alyson Hannigan's husband Alexis Denisof. Scooter, Lily's high school boyfriend and co-worker, is played by Neil Patrick Harris's husband David Burtka. Blauman, a GNB employee, is played by Cobie Smulders' fiancee (and the father of her child) Taran Killam. Josh Radnor also ended up dating Lindsay Price, who played one of his girls of the week.
• On iCarly Gibby (Noah Munck)'s brother Guppy is played by his little brother Ethan.
• A few episodes of I Dream of Jeannie featured Barbara Eden's husband Michael Ansara as the Blue Djinn.
• Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, who starred in several classic comedy films in addition to producing and starring in I Love Lucy. Unfortunately, they had Real Life marital trouble during the course of the series and divorced after the final episode had aired.
  • Their children, Lucie Arnaz and Desi Arnaz Jr., starred in Lucille Ball's later shows.
• Ali Marsh plays a recurring role as a psychiatrist on In Plain Sight, which stars her husband Frederick Weller. Bonus points because their characters went on a date once, but she wasn't interested.
• It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia:
  • Charlie Day's character has an unrequited crush on a waitress played by his real-life wife, Mary Elizabeth Ellis.
  • Rob McElhenney (Mac) is married to Kaitlin Olson (Sweet Dee); they met when she auditioned for her part.
  • In another episode with a Shout-Out to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the person who was playing the role of "Chief" was actually Will Sampson's son.
  • In the episode "Mac Bangs Dennis' Mom" Danny DeVito's daughter Lucy plays the waitress Frank lusts after in the restaurant (as his date talks about how wonderful it is to have children), as well as the young woman who compliments "DB" in "The Gang Finds a Dumpster Baby".
  • Glenn Howerton's wife plays the woman whom Dennis manipulates and torments in "The DENNIS System".
• On one TV version of The Jack Benny Program (Season 4, Episode 8, original airdate Feb. 7, 1954), "Jack Dreams He's Married To Mary", Jack's wife plays his wife, and his daughter, Joan, plays his daughter.
• Jam and Jerusalem: Jennifer Saunders's daughters Freya and Beattie play Jennifer Saunders's character's daughters, Freya and Beattie.
• Jeremiah: In the episode Moon in Gemini, cast regular Ingrid Kavelaars' character Erin has a twin sister named Lauren, played by... her real-life twin sister Monique Kavelaars.
• The French TV series Kaamelott seems to have been cast largely from creator (and lead actor) Alexandre Astier's family. Note they're all professional actors anyway, so it hardly hurts the show. A lot of them were brought back ten years after the end of the series for The Movie, Kaamelott: Premier Volet. Alexandre Astier plays King Arthur and:
  • His father Lionnel plays Arthur's father-in-law, Léodagan;
  • His mother Joëlle Sevilla plays Arthur's mother-in-law, Séli;
  • His stepmother plays Arthur's mother, Ygerne;
  • His half-brother plays Arthur's brother-in-law, Yvain;
  • His children play Karadoc and Mevanwi's children;
  • His wife has a small cameo as the Lady of Flames;
  • His son plays young Arthur.
• The Kennedys: Tom Wilkinson and Diana Hardcastle, who play Jack and Rose Kennedy, are married in real life.
• The King of Queens:
  • A pretty interesting example: In a flashback to the childhood of Jerry Stiller's character Arthur Spooner, Arthur's father is played by Jerry's son Ben Stiller.
  • Jerry Stiller's wife, Anna Meara, plays Spence's mother, who is also Arthur's recurring love interest. Their real-life daughter Amy also plays several different characters on the show.
  • Also Doug's cousin Danny is played by Kevin James' brother in Real Life, Gary Valentine.
• Kojak featured Telly Savalas and his brother George as Det. Stavros.
• In Kulderzipken, King Jozef and his sister Saint-Lutgardis are played by real-life sibling Jan and Reinhilde Decleir.
• L.A. Law:
  • Father and son René Auberjonois and Rémy-Luc Auberjonois played father and son in an episode.
  • Husband-wife actors Michael Tucker and Jill Eikenberry were both regulars on the show and also appeared together in several late '80s/early '90s TV movies that they produced.
• The character of Compo Simmonite died on Last of the Summer Wine following the death of the actor Bill Owen. Several episodes later and after the funeral, Compo's long-lost son Tom moves into town and is played by Owen's real-life son, Tom Owen.
• Law & Order:
  • Benjamin Bratt and Julia Roberts were dating when they starred in a memorable episode of the original series. Mostly notable for the fact that Roberts' character attempted to seduce Rey Curtis (Bratt), who is married, leading to a venomous and hateful series of betrayals.
  • Another Law & Order example (sort of) derives from when Jill Hennessy was on the show as Claire Kincaid. Jill was filming some scenes from a crossover with Homicide: Life on the Street and the filming coincided with the filming of Law & Order, so Jill's identical twin sister Jacqueline came in and filled in for Jill during some courtroom scenes.
  • The short-lived Law & Order: Special Victims Unit character Ken Briscoe, the nephew of the original series' Lennie Briscoe, was played by Jerry Orbach's son Chris.
  • Speaking of Homicide, Det. Frank Pembleton and his wife Mary were played by real-life married couple Andre Braugher and Ami Brabson.
• In the Season 3 premiere of Leverage, Nate helps a young inmate escape from jail. The inmate is played by Edwin Hodge, brother of Aldis Hodge, who plays Hardison.
• In Life With Mikey, Michael J. Fox is the title character. His sister, Kelli Fox, has a minor role.
• Little House on the Prairie sports a peculiar variation. Melissa Gilbert, playing Laura Ingalls, is of a different family than her real-life brother, Jonathan Gilbert, playing Willie Oleson. In reality, they were both adopted by the same family but are not blood-related. It gets even better because Melissa Gilbert's in-show brother, Matthew Laborteaux, is the real-life brother of Patrick Labyorteaux (Matthew dropped the "y" from his surname), playing Matthew's friend on the show, Andrew Garvey, who are also both adopted! To top that, the role of Carrie Ingalls was played by twins Lindsay and Sidney Greenbush. While it's not rare for twins to play the same role, especially as a baby, there was an episode where both of them played side by side, when Carrie's character created an imaginary friend, played by her actual sister! Even more, the twins have a brother who also appeared as a guest star on Branson.
• A couple of episodes of Living Single featured the mothers of Khadijah (Queen Latifah) and Regine (Kim Fields), played by their real mothers Rita Owens and Chip Fields.
• On Lost, Benjamin Linus is played by Michael Emerson. His wife Carrie plays Ben's mother Emily. Thankfully, Squick is avoided because Emily dies in childbirth and thus only appears during baby Ben's birth and as a hallucination on the island to young Ben.
• Lucifer:
  • Chloe Decker's father, John, is portrayed by Chris Payne Gilbert, who is married to Lesley-Ann Brandt (Maze) in real life.
  • Tom Ellis' daughter cameos as a mourner in Dan's funeral, sitting behind Lucifer.
• Real-life couple Michael and Susan Hogan played the parents of Dana Fairbanks in The L Word, and the parents of Myka in Warehouse 13
• On Magnum, P.I., Zachary Knighton's wife, Betsy Phillips, recurs as his character's love interest in seasons two and three.
• Maid: Margaret Qualley and Andie MacDowell play daughter and mother on the show, just like they are in real life. Alex's troubled relationship with her mother Paula is a major plot arc. Qualley also specifically asked that MacDowell play her mom so they could work together.
• The first season The Man from U.N.C.L.E. episodes "The Quadripartite Affair" and "The Giuoco Piano Affair" were two of the relatively few episodes that gave Illya Kuryakin (played by David McCallum) the Girl of the Week. She was played in both episodes by Jill Ireland, who was at the time of filming married to McCallum.
• Bud Bundy's little brother made several appearances on Married... with Children.
• The title character of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is played by Rachel Brosnahan. Her husband Jason Ralph appears in a recurring role in the final two seasons as Mike Carr, an executive on The Gordon Ford Show.
• The husband-wife version of this trope is even older then He & She: the very first sitcom on American TV, Mary Kay And Johnny (1947–50), featured real-life married couple Mary Kay and John Stearns in the title roles. Their son Christopher, born in 1948, was written into the show shortly after his birth.
• M*A*S*H:
  • Star Alan Alda's father Robert Alda starred as a visiting/rival surgeon in two episodes. In the second one, Alan Alda's half-brother also guest-starred as a medic.
  • The photograph on Col. Potter's desk, supposedly of Potter's wife Mildred, was actually a picture of Harry Morgan's real-life wife, Eileen Detchon.
• On Master of None, Dev's (Aziz Ansari) parents are played by his real-life parents, Shoukath and Fatima Ansari. His father actually took acting lessons. Aziz's cousin Harris appears in season 2 as Dev's cousin.
• The Mentalist:
  • Simon Baker's wife appeared in an episode of her husband's hit show as the widow of that episode's victim. His daughter, Stella Baker, had a cameo as an angry inmate in a season seven episode.
  • Tim Kang's wife plays one of the women in the bar during Cho's Instant Seduction scene in "Crimson Casanova" (she's the one who walks off in disgust when he suggests a threeway), a Reality Subtext which makes the scene even more hilarious.
• Merlin featured Emilia Fox as a semi-regular and her uncle James Fox as a guest star, though the two of them never interacted — in fact, by the time James turned up, Emilia's character had long since been killed off.
• On Midnight Caller, the father of Devon's child is played by Wendy Kilbourne's husband James Read.
• Most of the random characters on The Mighty Boosh are friends and family of Noel Fielding and Julian Barratt. The biggest example is definitely Noel's younger brother Mike, who plays Naboo and is also part of the main cast, but there are several other notable ones:
  • Noel's then-partner Delia Gaitskell (credited by her stage name, Dee Plume) plays "Neon" of the Electro Girls in Series 1, and "Anthrax" of the Goth Girls in Series 2.
  • Noel and Dee's nephew played the shaman Kirk, who ended up having a minor recurring role as the most extremely powerful and debauched shaman on the council, who just happens to manifest as a nine-year-old boy.
• The 1980s revival of Mission: Impossible featured a 2-part episode where Barney Collier from the original series was rescued by the current IMF team, which included his son Grant. Grant was played by Phil Morris, the real-life son of Greg Morris (Barney).
• Monk: A lot of Tony Shalhoub's real relatives appeared on the show at different points.
  • Tony's wife Brooke Adams has appeared as five different characters on the show:
    • In "Mr. Monk and the Airplane", Brooke plays Leigh Harrison, a flight attendant who is driven crazy by Monk's antics. She is later interviewed by James Novak in "Mr. Monk's 100th Case", where it is shown that she has developed a fear of flying and also was driven to drinking, which was also implied by her final appearance in the former episode.
    • In "Mr. Monk and the Kid", Brooke plays Abigail Carlyle, whom Monk and Natalie interview after her son, violinist Daniel Carlyle, is discovered to have been kidnapped and the kidnappers amputated one of his fingers to send back to them as a message.
    • In "Mr. Monk Visits a Farm", Brooke plays Sheriff Butterfield, a county sheriff. All of a sudden, the scene where Monk is roped into going square dancing very terribly with her (while looking visibly uncomfortable for the entire scene) becomes a thousand times funnier, especially since he brings up Trudy during the scene. In her first crossing paths with the leads (while Monk and Randy are looking at Randy's uncle's old pickup truck), she even winks at Monk, though it's hard to see if this is her quickly breaking character.
    • In "Mr. Monk and the Badge" as Edith Capriani, a Crazy Cat Lady that Monk gets fed up with for pulling him away from other cases.
    • In Mr. Monk's Last Case: A Monk Movie, she plays Beth, Monk's publisher who rejects his latest manuscript.
  • Tony's brother Michael has played three characters throughout the series' run:
    • In "Mr. Monk and the Missing Granny", he plays Ron Abrash, a former radical who Monk and Captain Stottlemeyer question as a person of interest in a kidnapping. Which makes the part where Monk says, "I've been smoking THE TRUTH, man!" that much funnier when you consider just exactly who Tony is speaking to.
    • In "Mr. Monk Bumps His Head", Michael plays Ned, the beekeeper whose farm Roger Zisk crashes his car into when trying to cover up bee stings that he'd received the night before when dumping his pregnant girlfriend's body.
    • In "Mr. Monk Is the Best Man", Michael is the minister who presides over Leland and T.K.'s wedding ceremony.
  • Tony's sister Susan Shalhoub Larkin appears as Linda Kloster's housekeeper in "Mr. Monk and the Genius" (the one who drops the tray and discovers the body).
• On My Name Is Earl, Randy is played by Ethan Suplee. Willie the One-Eyed Mailman is played by Ethan's real-life dad, Bill Suplee.
• Mystery Science Theater 3000:
  • The end of the show's Laserblast episode had Trace Beaulieu's father in a brief cameo as an extremely-aged Dr. Forrester.
  • Additionally, Mike Nelson's real-life wife, Bridget Jones (no, not that Bridget Jones) appeared several times, including as Mr. B Natural, Lisa Loeb, Nuveena, Flavia, and Slicer the Nanite. She was also one of the actresses who portrayed Magic Voice before Mary Jo Pehl took over permanently. Bridget was also one of the show's writers, including a stint as a full-time member of the writing staff from season 4 onward.
• Extreme example: Michael, Nat, and Alex Wolff (father and sons) play a father and his two sons in The Naked Brothers Band. On top of that, Jesse, Alex's May-December girlfriend, is actually his cousin.
• Narcos has Pedro Pascal's youngest sibling, Lux Pascal, appear in two episodes of the third season.
• NCIS:
  • Troian Bellisario, who plays Sara, is a (step) sibling to Sean Murray, who plays Timothy McGee, her character's brother. A third sibling, Michael Bellisario, had a recurring role on the show but shared no scenes with either sibling. All three actors also appeared on JAG, though in different roles, and producer Donald P. Bellisario is their father or stepfather. A fourth sibling, Chad W. Murray, plays Seaman McDonald's corpse in NCIS episode "The Immortals" and the unnamed redhead that picks Gibbs up in the silver convertible is Sean Murray's real-life mother Vivienne Bellisario. Nepotism much?
    • On top of that, Sean Murray's daughter Cay Ryan Murray recently had a role as a teenage hacker in an episode (19x19 The Brat Pack)
  • Mark Harmon's son, Sean, plays young Gibbs.
• Meanwhile, on NCIS: Los Angeles, Kensi and Deeks are played by in-laws Daniela Ruah and Eric Christian Olsen—she's married to his brother, who plays his stunt double. This fact has not stopped the show from shipping Kensi and Deeks together, and as of season 10, the characters are married in-universe.
• Emily, the estranged daughter of Gerry Standing in New Tricks is played by Dennis Waterman's daughter Hannah. This is a subversion; Emily's not actually his.
• A story arc in Ninja Sentai Kakuranger involved Jiraiya/Ninja Black, who is played by Kane Kosugi, being forced to challenge his sensei-turned-nemesis Gali, who was played by Kane's actual father Sho Kosugi.
  • Happened earlier as well in Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero, where Kane Kosugi plays Ultraman's human host Kenichi Kai, while Sho Kosugi voices Ultraman himself.
• Nirvana in Fire: Liu Yi Tong (Han Zhuo, Xia Jiang's son) is the son of Liu Yi Jun (Xie Yu).
• NUMB3RS:
  • Dylan Bruno's brother, Chris Bruno, guest starred in episodes of "Chinese Box" and "Jacked" as Tim King.
  • Rob Morrow's wife, Debbon Ayer, guest starred in "The Fifth Man" as a woman whose home was being invaded.
  • David Krumholtz's then-partner (now wife), Vanessa Britting, guest starred in "Tabu".
• In the fourth season of Nurse Jackie, Bobby Cannavale plays Bad Boss Mike Cruz while his real-life son Jake plays Cruz's addict son Charlie. Hilarity ensues when Charlie overdoses in the season finale and Cruz fails to revive him.
• On The Odd Couple, Jack Klugman played bitter divorcee Oscar Madison, and his wife, Brett Somers, played Blanche, Oscar's ex-wife. During the series' run, Klugman and Somers really did separate, though their marriage didn't officially end until Somers died in 2007.
• The Office (US): Michael Scott's girlfriend Carol in seasons 2 & 3 is played by Steve Carell's wife, Nancy Walls.
• Doris Hare's sisters both appeared in the On the Buses:
  • Betty Hare played her on-screen sister Aunt Maud in "Aunt Maud".
  • Winifred Braemar played Winnie in three episodes of Series 4.
• Toward the end of its run ''One Day at a Time (1975) had as regulars both Nanette Fabray and her niece, Shelley Fabares, providing an interesting side-by-side example of how anglicizing your name for the stage seemed less necessary from one generation to the next. Casual viewers didn't always know they were related, especially if they didn't realize their last names are pronounced the same.
• In One Life to Live, openly gay actor Scott Evans played closeted Oliver Fish while Scott's supportive mother Lisa played Oliver's homophobic mom.
• One Tree Hill actors Chad Michael Murray (Lucas Scott) and Sophia Bush (Brooke Davis) were briefly married. When the two divorced, their characters broke up on the show as well.
• In Our Flag Means Death, Stede's younger self is played by the son, Theo, of his main actor, Rhys Darby.
• Another extreme example was the two-part episode "Sandkings" in The Outer Limits (1995). Beau Bridges played the episode's main character, Dr. Simon Kress, his father Lloyd Bridges played Simon's father, and his son Dylan played Simon's son.
• Sofia from Orange Is the New Black, a male-to-female transgender character played by Real Life male-to-female transgender actress Laverne Cox, is played by Cox's twin brother in a flashback sequence to her life before her gender reassignment therapy. Also, a young Daya in a flashback is played by Dascha Polanco's real-life daughter Dasany Kristal.
• Oz:
  • Resident Manipulative Bastard Ryan O'Reily (played by Dean Winters) and his mentally challenged older brother Cyril O'Reily (Scott William Winters) are brothers in real life.
  • Their eldest brother, Bradford Winters, was series creator/head writer Tom Fontana's main collaborator for most of the series' run, as well.
• Parks and Recreation:
  • Nick Offerman's wife, Megan Mullaly, plays Ron Swanson's crazed ex-wife, with whom he has a deeply unhealthy relationship.
  • In one episode, Leslie had a disastrous date with a strange Cloudcuckoolander played by Will Arnett, Amy Poehler's then-husband.
• Semi-example: Shirley Jones, who is/was David Cassidy's stepmother, played his mother in The Partridge Family. AIR neither was consulted on the casting of the other.
• Peaky Blinders:
  • Joe and Finn Cole (John Shelby and Michael Gray) are brothers in real life, and play cousins in the show.
  • Tom Hardy and his wife Charlotte Riley are both in the show, though their characters (Alfie Solomons and May Carleton) never cross paths.
• In the first few Perry Mason TV movies in the 1980s, William Katt played Paul Drake Jr., in-universe son of 1950s/60s TV series character Paul Drake. In real life, Katt is the son of Barbara Hale, who played Mason's secretary Della Street in both the series and the TV movies.
• Michael Emerson's wife, Carrie Preston, plays his character's fiancee on the show Person of Interest.
• Power Rangers:
  • Power Rangers Zeo introduces us to David Trueheart, Tommy's long-lost brother... played by Eric Frank, actual brother to Tommy's actor, Jason Frank.
  • In the original Mighty Morphin, Jason Frank's son Jacob Frank plays the son of Rocky, Adam, and Aisha's teacher.
  • In Power Rangers Ninja Storm, Shane's brother Porter Clarke is played by Pua Magasiva's real-life brother Robbie Magasiva.
  • Yoshi Sudarso plays Koda, the Blue Ranger in Power Rangers Dino Charge. His brother Peter plays another Blue Ranger in the succeeding series, Power Rangers Ninja Steel.
• On Primeval, Connor and Abby are played by actors who are currently engaged in real life. James Lester and Christine Johnson are also married in real life.
• In Private Practice, Idina Menzel plays a patient's mother and a potential love interest. At the time, Menzel was married to Taye Diggs, who plays Dr. Sam Bennett.
• In The Punisher (2017), Dinah Madani's mother is played by Shohreh Aghdashloo. Her husband Houshang Touzie appears in the season 1 finale as Dinah's father to provide Frank with medical treatment.
• In The Rat Patrol episode "The Field of Death Raid", real life brothers Christopher and Nick George play fictional brothers Sam and David Troy.
• Raven: Michael Mackenzie, who is the father of James Mackenzie (Raven), plays Raven's mentor Cyrus in the first spinoff Raven: The Island.
• Red Dwarf:
  • In the episode "Timeslides", Lister's younger self was played by Emile Charles, Craig Charles's younger brother. Baby Lister in "Ouroboros" was played by Danny John-Jules's nephew, Alexander John-Jules.
  • The mechanoid and blob incarnations of Camille in "Camille" were played by Robert Llewellyn's then-girlfriend (now wife) Judy Pascoe. In his memoir The Man In The Rubber Mask Llewellyn claims that the publicity shot of Kryten and Camille is in his parents' photo album: "That's our elder son and his wife and children, that's our daughter and her children, and that's our middle son who's a robot and his girlfriend."
• In Robin of Sherwood Edward of Wickham and his son Matthew were played by real father and son Jeremy and Robert Bulloch. According to DVD commentaries, many of the child extras throughout the series were played by children of cast and crew members.
• Father-son example: in Romeo!, Master P makes occasional guest appearances as the father of the title character, played by his son Li'l Romeo.
• In the Hallmark Channel movie A Royal Christmas, Rich Bitch Queen Isadora is rude and snooty to her son's "commoner" girlfriend and constantly tries to push him into a relationship with his childhood sweetheart, who is of royal birth and who despite her icy demeanor she is clearly genuinely fond of. As the Queen is played by Jane Seymour and the girl is played by her daughter, this is understandable, and even lampshaded in one scene — "You remind me of myself at that age!"
• Sabrina the Teenage Witch:
  • In the TV series, Melissa Joan Hart's real-life sister Emily played Sabrina's cousin Amanda. She then played Sabrina on the animated series while Melissa Joan Hart played her aunts.
  • In addition, Melissa Joan Hart's sisters Alexandra and Samantha guest-starred on the final season.
• Eugene Levy and his son Daniel Levy created the show and play father and son on Schitt's Creek. Eugene's daughter/Dan's sister Sarah Levy has a recurring role in the show, but her character Twyla is not related to her father and brother's characters, while Annie Murphy plays their daughter/sister Alexis.
• Scrubs:
  • The episode "My Unicorn" had John Bennett Perry as the Patient of the Week and his son Matthew Perry as the patient's son. Except it turned out Gregory wasn't really Murray's father. That episode also cameoed Matthew's cousin Anthony as "Old Murray".
  • Series creator Bill Lawrence is married to Christa Miller (Jordan), who also did voice-over work for his show Clone High. The wedding video that Dr Cox watches after Jordan's first appearance is actually Bill and Christa's, which is why only she can be seen. Lawrence also wrote both of her pregnancies into the series.
• The second and third seasons of SeaQuest DSV has Peter and Michael DeLuise on the main cast, though their characters are not related. In one episode, Dom De Luise appears as the father of Michael's character, and David DeLuise has a small cameo.
• In interesting variant in the Lifetime Original Movie Secrets of My Stepdaughter — Tiera Skovbye plays the stepdaughter of the title, with her real sister Ali Skovbye plays her stepsister.
• On Seinfeld, Julia Louis-Dreyfus's half-sister Lauren Bowles made occasional appearances as a waitress in the coffee shop that the characters frequent.
  • Speaking of Louis-Dreyfus, she and her future husband Brad Hall were castmates on Saturday Night Live. Several years later, Julia guest-starred on an episode of The Single Guy, which was created and produced by Hall.
  • Lauren was also a main cast member on Julia's short-lived Watching Ellie.
• Sherlock does this to an art, presumably to make the onscreen chemistry between characters feel more natural.
  • Sherlock and Mycroft's parents are played by Wanda Ventham and Timothy Carlton, Benedict Cumberbatch's own parents.
  • Mary Morstan (Watson's fiancee/wife) is played by Amanda Abbington, who was Martin Freeman's real-life partner (although they were together until just before the 2017 series was shown).
  • Sherlock as a child is played by one of Steven Moffat's sons.
  • In a What Could Have Been example, Mark Gatiss's partner, Ian Hallard, had a minor role as the barrister defending Moriarty in "The Reichenbach Fall". Despite fan hopes that he might be this universe's version of Sebastian Moran, it was a one-off appearance, and that role has now been played by another actor.
• In The Shield, Vic Mackey's daughter Cassidy is played by Michael Chiklis's real-life daughter Autumn Chiklis.
• Skins:
  • A very obvious example of real-life twins Kathryn and Megan Prescott playing the twins Emily and Katie, respectively.
  • And the significantly less obvious example of Effy's mum (Morwenna Banks) cheating on her screen husband (Harry Enfield) with her real one (David Baddiel).
• In Sledge Hammer!, humor about the title character's ex-wife were made a lot (although the reason for the divorce was never fully explained). When she actually appeared in the last season of the show, she was played by Heather Lupton, real-life wife of Sledge's actor David Rasche.
• After he gained more creative control on Sliders, Jerry O'Connell got his real-life brother added to the regular cast, playing his long-lost brother. When Jerry departed the show, his brother went with him.
  • Charlie O'Connell would later make an appearance as the brother of Jerry O'Connell's character in Crossing Jordan.
  • Charlie O'Connell also appeared in a third season episode, as a different character (before his regular character was introduced).
  • In the Sliders episode "Greatfellas", the series' co-creator Tracy Tormé's real-life father Mel Tormé is a country-western singer, a Bible thumper and a government informant. According to the younger Tormé, "everything he's not in this life." Whether he still has a son named Tracy in this world isn't mentioned.
• In Smallville, twins Shawn Ashmore and Aaron Ashmore both played parts; the former as an early Freak of the Week bit part and the latter as a regular good guy. Nobody ever notices they look alike.
• The Sopranos:
  • Steven Van Zandt plays Silvio Dante. His wife Gabriella is played by Van Zandt's real wife Maureen Van Zandt.^note They've been married since 1982; Bruce Springsteen was the best man at their wedding.
  • In the flashback sequence in "To Save Us All From Satan's Power", a young Jackie Aprile, Jr. is played by Matt Cerbone, the younger brother of Jackie Jr.'s regular actor Jason Cerbone.
  • Tony Soprano was portrayed by James Gandolfini. For the prequel film The Many Saints of Newark, his son Michael portrays a younger Tony.
• Space: 1999, starring Martin Landau and his wife Barbara Bain, both also having starred before in the show Mission: Impossible.
• Stargate Atlantis:
  • Real-life siblings David and Kate Hewlett also play brother and sister onscreen in the aptly named episode "McKay and Mrs. Miller". Fans loved her so much that TPTB brought her back for three more episodes.
  • This was actually Art Mimicking Life — in "The Siege" McKay was originally to have been composing the video to his brother. David Hewlett convinced them to shift it to sister, as he had no brothers, but did have a sister who was an actress, should they ever want to go that route later on in the series...
  • Hewlett said in an interview that in their first episode together the director instructed them to act like brother and sister, forgetting that they actually were.
    "I remember Martin [Gero] actually said to us once, 'Now remember you guys are supposed to be brother and sister.' And we were laughing because we were treating each other so horribly, we could only be brother and sister. ... He was like, 'Remember you're brother and sister,' and we were like, 'Yeah—? Thank you for reminding us?'"
• Stargate SG-1:
  • Peter DeLuise, a director of the show, occasionally also made cameo appearances. His brother David played as a love interest to Carter.
  • His other brother Michael DeLuise appeared as Colonel Danning in "Wormhole X-Treme!" and father Dom De Luise as Urgo.
  • As well as his wife Anne Marie DeLuise (nee Loder) as Farrell in "The Other Side" and Cameron Mitchell's high school sweetheart Amy Vanderburg in "Bounty".
  • Peter's brother Michael joined him on the fifth season of 21 Jump Street, playing Joey Penhall, the younger brother of Peter's character Doug.
  • In another episode, Michael played a younger Doug Penhall with Dom De Luise as his father.
  • David had the role of Bug Pollone in 3rd Rock from the Sun, and his brothers Peter, Michael, and his father Dom DeLuise did a cameo in one episode.
  • Also on Stargate SG-1, actress Lexa Doig joined the cast in Season 9 as Dr. Carolyn Lam, working alongside husband Michael Shanks, who played Dr. Daniel Jackson.
• Quite a few times on Star Trek:
  • In "Miri" many of the children in non-speaking roles: Lisabeth Shatner (who Kirk picks up and carries at one point), Grace Lee Whitney's two sons John Decker and Scott Dweck, and Gene Roddenberry's daughters Darlene and Dawn.
  • In Star Trek: Voyager, "Q2", father and son John and Keegan de Lancie play Q and "Q Junior". Also, an instance of Plot-Relevant Age-Up-Q Junior is an adolescent, but the last time we saw him, three seasons earlier, he was an infant. Of course, since he's a Sufficiently Advanced Alien, he can look however he wants.
  • "Far Beyond The Stars", an Elseworld episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine in which the regulars were writers for a 1950s science fiction magazine, had Nana Visitor (Kira) and Alexander Siddig (Bashir), who were married at the time, as a married couple based on C. L. Moore and Henry Kuttner.
    • Another episode featured Kira and Bashir arguing because the former was carrying Keiko O'Brien's baby, and the procedure to make that happen had been performed by Bashir. Visitor was actually pregnant with Siddig's child.
  • Kitty Swink, the wife of Quark's actor Armin Shimerman, appears twice in the show.
  • In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Inner Light", the son of Kamin, the person whose life Picard is experiencing, was played by Patrick Stewart's son Daniel.
  • Wil Wheaton's younger siblings Jeremy and Amy played Mason and Tara, two of the children who were abducted along with Wesley in "When the Bough Breaks".
  • Majel Barrett, who was dating series creator Gene Roddenberry during TOS (where she played Number One in the pilot and Nurse Chapel in the series proper) and was married to him by the time TNG rolled around (playing the computer's voice and Lwaxana Troi).
  • Rebecca Romijn, who plays Number One on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, is married to Jerry O'Connell, who voices Commander Ransom on the animated show Star Trek: Lower Decks.
  • On Star Trek: Picard, Geordi's daughter Alandra is fittingly played by LeVar Burton's daughter Mica Burton.
• St. Elsewhere:
  • The real life married couple William Daniels and Bonnie Bartlett played Mark and Ellen Craig on the series.
  • Sagan Lewis (Dr. Jackie Wade) was the wife of the producer Tom Fontana during the production of the series. They later divorced and remarried.
  • Blythe Danner, who played Paige Gerradeaux in "The Women", was married to the series' executive producer Bruce Paltrow. He also directed that episode, among many others.
  • Mark Harmon's niece Tracy Nelson played Jennifer Milbourne in "The Women".
  • The director David Anspaugh cast his daughter Vanessa as Dr. Auschlander's granddaughter Jessica in "Fade to White".
  • Deborah May and George DelHoyo, who played the recurring characters Terri and Ken Valere in Season Four, are married in real life.
  • Christina Pickles' then husband Victor Lobl directed six episodes in Seasons One and Two.
  • John McIntire and Jeanette Nolan, who played Harry Cragen and Sophia Pavlon in "To Tell the Truth", were married in real life.
  • The real-life married couple Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows played Victor Ehrlich's parents Lech and Olga Oseransky in "Russian Roulette", "Visiting Daze" and "The Abby Singer Show".
  • Shelly Gibson, who played Chaplain Claire McCabe in the Season Six episodes "Heaven's Skate" and "Split Decision", was the then wife of the producer and writer Channing Gibson.
• The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, with the Sprouse brothers Dylan and Cole as the title characters.
  • And the same with any other Disney movie or television show with twins. Disney loves twins and uses them as much as possible.
• On Suits, Harvey's love interest Zoe Lawford is played by Gabriel Macht's wife Jacinda Barrett.
• Supernatural:
  • In Heartache, Alan Ackles, father of series star Jensen Ackles, guest stars as a detective, allowing the father/ son duo to share a scene. They already previously starred together in 2005 film Devour.
  • Over the course of the series, several family members of the main actors, Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki, have appeared as background extras including Ackles' sister and brother-in-law and Padalecki's parents.
  • Jensen acted alongside his then-rumored girlfriend Tania Saulnier in the episode "Scarecrow".
  • Genevieve Padalecki met Jared Padalecki while playing the demon, Ruby, during Season Four of Supernatural. By Season Six, she's guest starring as herself in a Alternate Universe episode and married to Padalecki — in real life and on the show. Whew.
  • Just one season prior to meeting Cortese, Padalecki's then-girlfriend Sandy had made an appearance on the show, where his character interrogated and brutally shot her in the head. Awkward.
  • Jensen's wife Danneel Ackles debuted in Season 13 as a character named Sister Jo/Anael. Took her long enough.
• Switched at Birth announced that Zoey Deutch, series regular Lea Thompson's daughter, would be appearing in a multi-episode role.
• Tatort (NDR; Hannover): The actress Maria Furtwängler who plays KHK Charlotte Lindholm is the daughter of Kathrin Ackermann who portrays Charlotte's mother Annemarie Lindholm.
• Taxi:
  • Danny DeVito's mother, Julia DeVito, played Louie's mother on Taxi. He also met Rhea Pearlman when she guest starred, and she appeared a few times after they married.
  • In addition, Tony Danza's son, Marc Anthony Danza, played a kid that Tony wanted to adopt.
• It seems like Stiles and Lydia might have a little trouble with their relationship on Teen Wolf as the sheriff (Linden Ashby) and Lydia's mom (Susan Walters) are married in real life and have been for nearly 30 years now.
• On Terriers, Hank's sister Stephanie is played by Donal Logue's sister Karina.
• Texas Rising: Bill Paxton, who plays Sam Houston, and James Paxton, who plays Roy, are father and son.
• The '80s Disney TV movie The Thanksgiving Promise features several members of the Bridges family: Beau, Lloyd, Lloyd's wife Dorothy, Beau's other son Jordan, and an uncredited Jeff.
• Chris Masterson appeared on his brother Danny’s series That '70s Show as an unrelated character. They also played brothers on one episode of White Collar.
• An episode of Marlo Thomas' 1960s sitcom That Girl had Danny Thomas in a brief cameo as a priest, just so she could call him "father".
• That Mitchell and Webb Look: Robert Webb's wife Abigail Burdess played his partner or wife in one sketch on the show (along with many other characters) while their baby was played by the pair's real daughter.
• Third Watch: Paramedics Carlos Nieto and Holly Levine dated and got married in the final season. They were played by real-life husband and wife Anthony Ruivivar and Yvonne Jung.
• thirtysomething had married couple Ken Olin and Patricia Wettig playing the respective spouses of the other two central characters. They later play a couple in Brothers & Sisters.
• The Mockumentary This Country is written by brother and sister Daisy May Cooper and Charlie Cooper, who star as cousins Kerry and Kurtan Mucklowe. Their father Paul Cooper plays Kerry's father Martin Mucklowe, and their uncle Trevor Cooper plays Len Clifton (who is not related to the Mucklowes).
• In another example involving the aforementioned John Dunsworth: he and his daughter Sarah both star in the sitcom Trailer Park Boys (he plays Mr Lahey, she plays Sarah) — though unusually for this trope in a sitcom that's all about a very tight-knit community with lots of Tangled Family Trees, the characters are apparently not related to each other and no Lampshade Hanging jokes are ever made about a suspicious resemblance.
• In a 2005 episode of the Canadian soap opera Train 48, John Neville played the grandfather of his grandson Joe Dinicol's character Zach Eisley.
• The Tribe from Season 4 onward. Ebony, Java, and Siva, who play sisters on the show, are played by the real-life Cassie sisters.
• The Twilight Zone (1985):
  • In "Ye Gods", Carolyn Seymour (Megaera) is the ex-wife of the director Peter Medak.
  • In "Opening Day", Elan Oberon (Sally) was the girlfriend (later wife) of the director John Milius.
  • "Still Life" features the real-life father and son John Carradine (Professor Alex Stottel) and Robert Carradine (Daniel Arnold).
  • In "The Storyteller", brothers Billy and Tony Anton played Daniel and Nathaniel Ellidge.
  • In "The World Next Door", the real-life married couple George Wendt and Bernadette Birkett played Barney and Katie Schlessinger.
  • In "The Junction", the married couple Chris Mulkey and Karen Landry played Ray and Sarah Dobson.
• Two and a Half Men:
  • Martin Sheen also appeared on an episode of the show, in which he played the father of Charlie's Stalker with a Crush. Charlie is, of course, played by Charlie Sheen. In the same episode, Martin Sheen's character gets in a relationship with the mens' mother, much to their horror.
  • And Emilio Estevez (who, unlike his father and brother, chose to use their real family name) has also appeared on the show.
  • So did Charlie Sheen's now ex-wife Denise Richards and real-life daughter Sam, who appeared in a Season 2 episode.
• Two of a Kind, So Little Time, Sister, Sister, Double Trouble, and Sweet Valley High are all built around twin sisters being played by twin sisters (first two the Olsens, the other three the Mowrys, Sagals, and Daniels respectively).
• The Brazilian dub of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt had a mother and daughter (Monica Rossi and Carol Kapfer) ironically voicing stepmother and stepdaughter (Jacqueline and Xanthippe) - and the father was also in the dub, but as an unrelated gay man (Titus).
• Veronica Mars Logan Echolls' parents are played by real-life husband and wife Harry Hamlin and Lisa Rinna.
• Walker, Texas Ranger: Many of Chuck Norris' family members have been very involved throughout the series, from writing to producing to directing, but having a younger relative being cast in Season 9's "Child of Hope" is what really sets things apart. Max Parkins, the infant in Walker and Alex's care while Walker hunts down his father's killer, is played by Chuck's grandson, Max Carlos Norris, and Max's father, Chuck's son, Michael, directed the episode.
  • In Walker, Jared Padalecki and Genevieve Padalecki play husband and wife Cordell and Emily Walker.
• The Walking Dead has a few examples.
  • Hilarie Burton guest stars as Negan's wife Lucille alongside husband Jeffrey Dean Morgan.
  • Macsen Lintz was replaced by his older brother Matt Lintz to convincingly age him for a rather long Time Skip.
    • Both of them are brothers of Madison Lintz, who has played their (adoptive) sister Sophia.
• The West Wing:
  • Emilio Estevez and his daughter have a brief appearance in an episode, in "archival video" of a younger Jed Bartlet and daughter Zoe.
  • Martin Sheen's daughter Renée Estevez has a small recurring role as staffer Nancy, who interacts with the President from time to time. In the series finale President Bartlet tells Nancy that he's looking forward to spending time with her mother after he leaves office, a nod to Sheen's real-life wife.
• Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego:
  • Rockapella member Barry Carl's daughter appears in the opening of "Beach Blanket Bye Bye," as he had brought her to visit the set during taping.
  • Each episode would feature an informant providing clues via television, which was often a way to shoehorn in some celebrity cameos. In "Tango Mysterioso," however, the informant was Greg Lee's mother. The subtitles even identify her as "Greg's Mom (Really... No Kidding!)" The producers pulled this as a prank on a delighted Greg, who had no idea his mom would be appearing on the show and can be seen discreetly wiping away some Manly Tears afterward. See it here.
    Greg: Can we please have a nice round of applause for the finest informant ever on this show?
• Whiskey Cavalier: In "Five Spies and a Baby" guest star Tina is played by Scott Foley's real-life wife, Marika Dominczyk.
• Wings:
  • Tony Shalhoub's wife Brooke Adams guest-starred on this show as a nun who is helped by Shalhoub's character Antonio.
  • In addition to Shalhoub and Adams, a handful of episodes featured guest spots by relatives of the cast.
    • Tim Daly's sister Tyne played a wealthy woman who attempts to make Brian a kept man.
    • Tim Daly's wife, Amy Van Nostrand, played a woman in a married couple who befriends the Hacketts.
    • Amy Yasbeck's husband John Ritter played Casey's estranged husband Stuart.
• The Wonder Years:
  • Danica McKellar as Kevin's main love interest, and her real-life sister Crystal McKellar in a recurring role as an unrelated character who was also Kevin's sometime girlfriend, Becky Slater.
  • Ben Savage (brother of Fred) has a small part in one episode (see the Boy Meets World example above).
• The X-Files:
  • The episode "Hollywood A.D.", a movie is made based on Mulder and Scully's lives as paranormal FBI agents. Téa Leoni is cast as the movie version of Scully, and it is mentioned (jokingly) that she has a crush on Mulder. Tea Leoni being David Duchovny's wife, obviously. Of course, Duchovny also wrote and directed that episode...
  • In the flashbacks of "Emily", younger Scully is played by Gillian Anderson's younger sister.
  • Though not a relative to anyone in the cast, the baby playing William at the end of "Existence" was Jerry Shiban, the son of John Shiban, a writer and producer of the show. He was only a few weeks old in that episode, but the role was re-cast for Season 9.

---