Brooklyn Beckham Just Took On Years of Rumor and Speculation, In Six Shocking Instagram Stories

The eldest son of David and Victoria Beckham took to Instagram to break his silence on the years-long estrangement he and his wife have had with his famous parents.

Brooklyn Peltz Beckham and Nicola Peltz in 2024Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

For nearly four years now, Beckham family obsessives—an unusually cross-generational and transatlantic cohort—have been combing gossip columns, Reddit threads, Instagram follows, unfollows, and the occasional Netflix documentary for clues to one of pop culture’s most persistent cold wars: the apparent estrangement between parents David Beckham and Victoria Beckham and their eldest son, Brooklyn Peltz Beckham, 26, along with his wife, actor Nicola Peltz, 31.

The questions have been endless, and increasingly granular. Why was he conspicuously absent from Victoria Beckham’s recent biographical documentary? Why didn’t Brooklyn and Nicola publicly wish David a happy 50th birthday?

David, Victoria, and Brooklyn Beckham in 2002.

 David Jones – PA Images/Getty Images

In the absence of answers, the internet did what it does best: it filled the vacuum with theories, most of them circling a familiar, gendered narrative—that Peltz, an American heiress turned actor, had somehow wrested control of Brooklyn from his powerful, image-conscious parents. Ten days ago, news broke that Brooklyn had reportedly sent his parents a cease and desist letter, demanding they only contact him through his lawyer.

Then, quietly, on Monday, Brooklyn appeared to decide he’d had enough.

In a series of Instagram stories, Brooklyn addressed his 16.5 million followers directly. “I do not want to reconcile with my family,” he wrote. “I’m not to be controlled. I’m standing up for myself for the first time in my life.”

Victoria Beckham and Nicola Peltz in 2024.

 Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

What followed was a remarkable refutation of the Beckham family narrative—one that inverted years of tabloid shorthand. Brooklyn alleged that the much-discussed wedding dress controversy had been misunderstood: that Victoria Beckham had initially offered to design Nicola’s gown, only to cancel late in the process, despite Nicola’s enthusiasm about wearing it. And, he confirmed the rumor of Victoria “hijack[ing] my first dance with my wife,” serenaded by Marc Anthony. “She danced very inappropriately on me in front of everyone,” recalls Beckham, saying “I never felt more humiliated in my life.”

According to Brooklyn, an even deeper rupture stemmed from a dispute over branding—specifically, his refusal to “sign the rights away” to his own name. According to Brooklyn’s posts, that decision impacted a larger family business arrangement, and with it, how he was treated thereafter. “My holdout affected the payday,” he wrote, later stating plainly that “Brand Beckham comes first.”

“My family values public promotion and endorsements above all else,” he writes. “Family ‘love’ is decided by how much you post on social media.” Yet, even after attending “every fashion show, every party,and every press activity to show our perfect family,” Brooklyn alleges that “the one time my wife asked for my mum’s support to save displaced dogs during the LA fires, my mum refused.”

Cruz Beckham, Harper Beckham, David Beckham, Victoria Beckham, Romeo Beckham, Brooklyn Beckham and Nicola Peltz in 2023

 Darren Gerrish

There were other details, more intimate and unsettling. He claimed that women from his past were repeatedly invited into family gatherings in ways that made both him and Nicola uncomfortable. He said his parents had refused to see them, while privately and publicly feeding stories to the press—sometimes, he alleged, enlisting his own siblings to attack him on social media.

Perhaps most striking was Brooklyn’s rejection of the dominant narrative about Nicola’s influence. “The narrative that my wife controls me is completely backwards,” he wrote. “I’ve been controlled by my parents for my entire life.”

Representatives for Brooklyn Beckham and Victoria Beckham did not immediately respond to Vanity Fair. This is a developing story.