Some celebrity friendships just warm your heart in all the best ways. Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper have one of those friendships. The best friends shared a special moment on Father's Day when they introduced their two sons virtually.
Andy is dad to 16-month-old Benjamin. Anderson was celebrating his first Father's Day, having welcomed son Wyatt Morgan Cooper on April 27. The friends haven't been able to get together, with or without their kids, due to social distancing. It's been quite some time for the longtime friends.
On Father's Day, Anderson appeared on Watch What Happens Live! He and Andy introduced their little boys to each other over video chat. It was a heartwarming moment for anyone who appreciates their friendship. Although Benjamin and Wyatt aren't quite ready to say much to each other, it's clear that their dads' friendship is going to be the foundation of a beautiful friendship between the boys.
Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper have enjoyed a close and beautiful friendship for decades now. The two were introduced in the '90s by someone trying to set them up on a blind date. While that was ruled out almost immediately, a wonderful friendship formed between the two.
On Father's Day, the two friends celebrated together for the first time. They marked the occasion by introducing Andy's 16-month-old son, Benjamin, to Anderson's 2-month-old son, Wyatt. The boys met virtually during an episode of Watch What Happens Live!
"I thought it would be fun if they met right now," Andy said, holding Ben in his lap.
"Look, that's going to be your good buddy, Wyatt," he told his son.
"That's Benjamin," Anderson softly told Wyatt.
"That's going to be your good buddy, and we're going to travel together," Andy told Ben.
"And if you like him half as much as I like his daddy, you're going to be great friends."
Anderson explained that Andy played a role in his road to parenting. In an appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, Anderson shared that Andy had been aware of his plans for some time.
"(Andy's) actually really helped me because my son is entirely wearing hand-me-downs from (his) son," he laughed. "I'm inherently cheap. I like a good value."
Anderson explained he felt more comfortable taking the hand-me-downs than going shopping in New York City at the height of the pandemic. "I wanted my son to be like a Depression-era child who grows up wearing hand-me-down clothes," Anderson joked.
Anderson then joked about how Andy being a dad gave him a push.
"He's been encouraging me all along," Anderson said of Andy's support.
"I figured if he can do it, that sort of gave me the final push," he joked. "And his kid is amazing, Benjamin is incredible."
Andy also introduced Anderson to Ben's nanny, who is moving on to work for Anderson. "The Radio Andy listeners are so smart. They figured out that my nanny, I've been talking about my nanny, that she's leaving, that she's going to go help out a friend," he said.
"The moment that Anderson announced it, I got a bunch of DMs from eagle-eared Radio Andy listeners saying, 'Wait, is that where your nanny went?'"
Anderson also opened up about his experiences as a new dad in People's Pride issue. "When I was 12 years old and knew I was gay and thought about my life, it always upset me because I thought, 'I will never be able to have a kid,'" he recalled.
"This is a dream come true."
"It feels like my life has actually begun," Anderson continued.
"And I sort of wonder, what was I waiting for? This is a new level of love. It's unlike anything I've experienced, and yet it's also very familiar and incredibly special and intimate. It's really extraordinary."
Becoming a father has made Anderson reflect on the kind of world he wants his child to grow up in and how he can bridge the gap between that and the world we presently live in. "I feel invested in the future in a way I hadn't really before," he said.
"There's something about having a child that makes you feel connected to what is happening and you want to make sure that the world this child is growing up in is a better one. You suddenly worry much more about the future of all of us."
Wyatt connects Anderson to the future, but also very deeply to the past. He was inspired to pursue parenthood by his own parents, Gloria Vanderbilt and Wyatt Emory Cooper. Gloria died last year. Wyatt died during heart surgery when Anderson was 10 years old. His brother, Carter, died by suicide at 23 in 1988.
"[To] have them meet and fall in love and create a family of their own and have this little family of ours … it made me really sad to think that I'm the only person left from that union [of my parents] and that I'm the only person left who remembers all those stories of my mom, my dad and my brother," Anderson said.
"I wanted to have a child who came from that and grew up knowing about that. That's why I chose to do it the way I did it."
