His top priority. Jeremy Renner calls daughter Ava, born in March 2013, his “No. 1,” and he loves to share sweet photos of his little girl.
“Thank you Ava for the BEST day of my life and EVERYDAY since then,” the Hurt Locker star wrote via Instagram on Father’s Day in June 2022 alongside a photo of him holding Ava as a newborn. “Love has never been so exquisitely defined. You will always be the best part of me. And to my Father, you are and inspiration and my real life super hero ❤️❤️.”
Renner, known for playing Avengers member Hawkeye/Clint Barton in the Marvel Studios franchise since 2011, shares Ava with ex-wife Sonni Pacheco.
Since the pair split in 2014, Renner tries to cherish the limited time he has with his daughter. He told Men’s Health in November 2021 that he flew from London to Los Angeles nearly every weekend for 18 months to see Ava, but he eventually decided to tell studios to work with his schedule.
“It taught me how to have the nuts to say, ‘Everyone, f–k off. It’s my time with my daughter,’” the Mayor of Kingstown star said at the time, adding that he’d been warned that the studios could fire him. “I said, ‘Fine, recast me. I’m going to be here with my daughter.’ It was pretty gnarly.”
Renner said he must be able to visit his little girl or have her visit every weekend on every project, adding that he won’t take the job if that’s impossible.
“Acting and everything else goes out the window until my daughter says, ‘I want to hang out with my friends, and I don’t want to be around you so much, Daddy,’” the California native said.
Though Renner and Pacheco finalized their divorce in 2015, they’ve since been engaged in a contentious custody battle. The model alleged in 2019 court documents that Renner had previously threatened to kill her and himself, going on to claim a history of verbal, emotional and substance abuse.
Renner’s rep exclusively told Us Weekly at the time that Ava’s well-being was the Hawkeye star’s “primary focus,” adding, “This is a matter for the court to decide. It’s important to note the dramatizations made in Sonni’s declaration are a one-sided account made with a specific goal in mind.”
While the Canada native slammed Renner the following year as he requested to lower child support payments amid the coronavirus pandemic, the Oscar nominee subsequently accused his ex of removing more than $50,000 from Ava’s fund “for her own personal benefit.”
Pacheco denied the allegations and Renner denied her abuse claims. “I don’t respond publicly or privately to nonsense,” the American Hustle star told Men’s Health at the time. “It only empowers it. … If you respond to it, you give it gas. I don’t fuel s–t fires. I just don’t do it. I refuse to.”
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Scroll down for Renner’s sweetest moments with Ava:
