Oliver Hudson is getting candid after his 19-year-old son, Wilder, decided to defer his college tenure for another semester.
“He had a bit of a false start in the sense that we moved him in, it was all very exciting [and] then he had to have his wisdom teeth out,” Hudson, 50, said during the Friday, November 6, episode of his iHeartRadio “Sibling Revelry” podcast. “We brought him home. There were some complications there, so [his teeth] weren’t taken out.”
The actor continued, “He was home for almost three weeks, went back to school
and then came home a week and a half later, got his wisdom teeth out and was home again for three weeks, living in his room, recovering.”
Hudson said that Wilder had “just got used to being home again” before he had to return to college once more.
“Going back to school was a bit of a task,” the Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test contestant acknowledged. “When he went back, he just felt a little depressed, like he didn’t belong there anymore, even though his best friend is his dorm-mate.”
Hudson and his wife, Erinn Bartlett, moved Wilder into the University of Colorado Boulder for his first year in August. (Hudson and Bartlett, 53, have been married for 20 years and also share son Bodhi, 16, and daughter Rio, 13.)
Speaking on his podcast, Hudson explained that Wilder now wants to take a sabbatical from CU Boulder.
“He just felt that he needed to experience adult life, and college will still be there waiting for him, so we’ve had long talks,” Hudson said. “[We] just chatted and really got to the heart of what he was feeling, and he was just carrying so much stress. And at 19, I don’t want that. Stress is a killer. I’d rather you smoke a f***ing pack of cigarettes than be stressed.”
Hudson, who acknowledged how “all [he] wants” is for his kids to be happy, eventually came to a resolution with Wilder.
“He knows what he wants to do. He’s already an actor. He did a job with me, and after pontification and good, deep conversation, we came up with a plan,” Hudson revealed. “The plan was for him to defer … his second semester [of his first year]. He wants to come home, he wants to take a shot at his life, which means that, of course, he’ll still be living at home, but he’s getting a job.”
According to Hudson, his son will also “work on his auditions” and enroll in a screenwriting class at a local community college.
“He’s going to really immerse himself in this business that he wants to be a part of,” Hudson noted. “I understand how nepotism works, obviously, but the truth about it in our business is that, yes, it will get your foot in the door … but you still have to perform. You still have to be good. No one’s going to give you a job just based on where you come from.”
The Scream Queens alum, who is notably the son of actress Goldie Hawn, continued, “I’m trying to instill that into my kids that you are owed absolutely nothing. You deserve absolutely nothing. You have to go and work for it and study it and get better at it.”
