For Will Ferrell, being funny is just par for the course.
So, his wife Viveca Paulin and their sons Magnus, 22, Mattias, 19 and Axel, 16, have learned to tee up for his jokes.
“Children are overrated. I’m annoyed by them. I don’t even know why we had kids,” Ferrell teased on the July 7 episode of All the Smoke. “They eat your food. They’re a money and time suck. They don’t empty the dishwasher, take out the trash or do anything.”
But in all seriousness, the comedian knows he hit a hole in one with his family. In fact, he brought his eldest sons to the Los Angeles premiere of his new golf comedy The Hawk on July 9. And while the kids have walked red carpets, attended award shows and sat courtside with their dad before, Ferrell and Paulin know the importance of keeping their children grounded.
“We’ve always tried to impart with our boys that, ‘OK, you’re going to grow up in Hollywood, you’re going to grow up in L.A. and that’s just a part of it,'” the Anchorman star continued. “You have to say please and thank you, you have to look people in the eye, you have to shake their hand.”
And though many—including Ron Burgundy—would argue he’s kind of a big deal, Ferrell’s love story with Paulin began before he was famous.
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The two met at the South Coast Repertory’s acting program in his home state of California after he graduated from USC in 1990. And while they initially started dating, the Swedish actress decided the Elf actor should just be her buddy.
“She was the more mature [one],” Ferrell acknowledged on the July 1 episode of IMO with Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson. “She was like, ‘What are we going to do though? Where’s this going?’ We were just both kind of the one that got away for each other for a while.”
For the next five years, the pair remained friends. They dated other people, and Ferrell switched coasts to join the cast of Saturday Night Live in 1995. But their relationship shifted from platonic to romantic when he traveled from New York back to California in 1996.
As a “diehard Laker fan,” Ferrell continued, he knew he liked Paulin when he opted to miss the first round of the Western Conference playoffs between the L.A. Lakers and the Houston Rockets for a walk with her through Runyon Canyon. Afterwards, she invited him to her place for a beer.
“She gives me a beer, and she drank her beer in two sips,” he recalled on the podcast. “So she drinks it and she’s like, ‘Do you want another one?’ I go, ‘I haven’t even finished the first one….Sure.’ So, I’m double-fisting, and she’s really nervous.”
Paulin then confessed her feelings for Ferrell.
“She’s like, ‘So, I just want to tell you, I still really like you,'” he added. “I said, ‘What?’ Of course, I can’t play it cool. I go, ‘You’re not gonna believe [this]. I just told my uncle if there’s anyone I would marry, it’s you.'”
Still, the Talladega Nights alum and the former Pomona College soccer player didn’t race off to the altar right away. In fact, Ferrell said that when Paulin drove him home and he tried to kiss her, she gave him the cheek. So, he added, they stayed in this “weird” friend zone and she continued seeing someone else. But when the season of SNL was over, Paulin informed Ferrell that she was single.
They began dating long-distance, with her in California and him in New York (a 1998 visit to her family in Sweden even helped inspire his 2020 film Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga). Ferrell then proposed to Paulin at Woods Cove in Laguna Beach, where they had their first date.
“It was the middle of the night, and I was like, ‘Honey, does this place look familiar?'” the Blades of Glory star said on Live With Kelly and Ryan in 2020. “And she’s like, ‘The beach at night is creepy.'”
With the significance of the location not ringing a cowbell and the proposal “going downhill so quickly,” Ferrell continued, he pulled out the 1950s diamond ring he knew she’d wanted that he’d purchased at an auction. But she was too stunned to reply.
“I was like, ‘Are you going to say yes?'” he continued. “And she’s like, ‘Oh yeah, yeah sure, but how did you get the ring?'”
The couple wed in 2000 and welcomed son Magnus four years later. Brother Mattias arrived in 2006 followed by Axel in 2010. And as their family and Ferrell’s career grew, their shared sense of humor remained the same.
For Valentine’s Day, for instance, “I usually write little messages like, ‘My love for you has increased over the years by 3 percent,'” Ferrell told Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest. “And she, luckily for me, thinks that’s really funny.”
But growing up, the kids didn’t always find their dad hilarious. Like when Magnus recalled on TikTok how his father “dressed up as a medieval lord to embarrass me at prom.” But when it comes to incorporating comedy into parenting, Ferrell found that 60 percent of the time, it works every time.
When the kids would argue, “I’d just try to find fun ways to diffuse the tension,” the 59-year-old added on Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson‘s podcast. “There’d be a big argument, and then I would just leave for a little while and just come out in my underwear, nothing but my underwear, and go, ‘Guys, we’ve got to be serious about this, OK? Look at me, listen to me.’ They’d just start [laughing].”
Or, he’d have them put their hands in the middle and say, “hermanos siempres, which is brothers always,” he continued. “They’re like, ‘What?’ ‘Just say it.'”
Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic
But rather than pressure their kids to follow in his comedic footsteps, Ferrell and Paulin encouraged them to pursue their own interests—like sports.
“Magnus is a big soccer player,” Ferrell added. “Mattias is basketball and volleyball and Axel’s basketball and volleyball.”
He also noted “the boys all grew up playing piano.” In fact, Magnus is a singer and signed with Republic Records. “Then Mattias is doing some acting stuff and Axel’s playing ball for right now,” Ferrell continued, “but he can sing too.”
And as they follow their dreams, they know they can count on their parents’ support.
“It’s so tough out there, and they’re finding stuff they’re just passionate about,” Ferrell added, “and it’s just like, ‘Go!'”
If you’d like to go down memory lane and look at more of Ferrell’s roles in honor of The Hawkstreaming on Netflix, read on.
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