{"id":655710,"date":"2026-05-07T14:51:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T14:51:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/655710\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T14:51:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T14:51:16","slug":"what-parvati-shallow-watches-with-her-daughter-ama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/655710\/","title":{"rendered":"What Parvati Shallow Watches With Her Daughter, Ama"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Everett Collection (Universal, 20th Century Fox), Getty Images (Kevin Winter\/TAS24, Euan Cherry\/Peacock), Warner Bros., Netflix, Courtesy of retailer, Julian Hamilton\/WireImage\n <\/p>\n

On the surface, Parvati Shallow\u2019s childhood doesn\u2019t look anything like her daughter\u2019s. Shallow was raised in a cultlike Hindu commune in Florida, where she was named by the group\u2019s guru rather than her parents. Her 7-year-old daughter, Ama, has grown up enjoying the freedom and sunshine of L.A.\u2019s west side. Shallow was also fairly isolated from entertainment in her home, not really absorbing much until her family left the commune when she was 9 and she got into the Baby-Sitters Club series. Ama, on the other hand, has grown up with a mom who has not only given her access to TV, movies, and books but has become a keystone cultural figure through her devious and dominating work on shows like Survivor and The Traitors.<\/p>\n

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But look a bit deeper and there are more than a few similarities. Both Shallow and her daughter are nature crazed, with Shallow\u2019s childhood centering on walks in the woods and yoga classes while Ama\u2019s is more about trips to the beach. Shallow also says that, as a single mom, she\u2019s had to consciously try to create community for her daughter, inviting friends and family over for dinners and game nights. Those same friends have also stepped up, commune style, to help Shallow raise Ama, taking babysitting shifts and bringing their kids along, turning the mother-daughter duo\u2019s home into more of a village hub than an isolated outpost.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have family dinners every Monday or Tuesday night with this group of women I know who are in their 20s, so they\u2019re like big sisters to my daughter,\u201d Shallow says. \u201cThey come over every week and it\u2019s a consistent routine, which I think is important because I want my daughter to have a family that\u2019s bigger than me and people that she can rely on. It\u2019s great, too, because I don\u2019t want to play role-play games with Ama, but these friends will, and she\u2019ll feel good because she gets to order around grown-ups. Like, my daughter literally had one of my guy friends who\u2019s six-foot-four hog-tied, climbing into the trunk of his girlfriend\u2019s car as part of a game, and he was totally cool with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what Shallow, Ama, and other members of their chosen family like to listen to, watch, and play together.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Warner Bros.\n <\/p>\n

My daughter has been a live wire since she was born. She hasn\u2019t stopped moving. She\u2019s very athletic and very fierce, which is similar to how I was when I was little. But unlike me, she also has access to pop culture because of who I am.<\/p>\n

So, I\u2019ve brought her into some of my favorite classic movies from when I was a little bit of an older child, like Don\u2019t Tell Mom the Babysitter\u2019s Dead. We watched that together and it\u2019s so good. She was really scared for a bit because she was worried about the babysitter, but luckily, as I told her, the movie\u2019s not really about the babysitter.<\/p>\n

We also watched Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, which is a classic, and Mamma Mia. We just got together with some friends who projected that movie in their driveway onto their garage, so we had a little movie night with popcorn. It was like a block party for the kids and then the next morning, she wanted to watch Mamma Mia 2, so we did and then we had a dance party.<\/p>\n

I like bringing in the older movies because they\u2019re just sillier and slower. There\u2019s more character development. It\u2019s less like, \u201czing, zoom,\u201d where you\u2019re so overstimulated by whatever is happening.<\/p>\n

When something comes up in those movies that\u2019s inappropriate today, I\u2019ll talk to her about it straight up, too. Like, Mamma Mia is very heavy on the sexual innuendo, so if she asks me a question about it, I\u2019ll answer. Or if she\u2019s like, \u201cWait, how old was she when she got married?\u201d I\u2019ll say, \u201cWell, the reason why the mom didn\u2019t want the daughter to get married was because she\u2019s too young and she needs to live her life first. You shouldn\u2019t get married until you\u2019re older, have lived a good life, and done some things.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Don\u2019t Tell Mom the Babysitter\u2019s Dead, they chain-smoke constantly, which I thought I\u2019d have to talk about. But my daughter was like, \u201cEw, gross, I don\u2019t like cigarettes,\u201d so I didn\u2019t even really have to address it.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s nothing really off limits between us. If she asks me about something, we\u2019ll talk about it because I don\u2019t want to make it weird. We have a very open policy where she can ask me anything and she can say anything here at our house, but when she\u2019s out at school, there\u2019s certain things she can\u2019t say and can\u2019t do. And she\u2019s a very, very smart kid so she\u2019s aware and intelligent, so I don\u2019t have to overexplain anything to her. She gets it.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Kevin Winter\/TAS24\/Getty Images\n <\/p>\n

My daughter loves Taylor Swift, though we\u2019ve listened to it so much that I can never listen to it on my own now without her. She also ran KPop Demon Hunters into the ground, which I think a lot of parents can relate to.<\/p>\n

I guess when I was little, I could play Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey and Paula Abdul songs over and over and never get sick of it, but as an adult, it\u2019s like, \u201cno.\u201d I don\u2019t even like to watch the same movie I\u2019ve watched already.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Netflix\n <\/p>\n

She\u2019s watching this show right now called Super PupZ<\/a>. I don\u2019t know how she found it, but I think it\u2019s on Netflix. She\u2019s newly obsessed with it and I think she\u2019s watched the entire thing like three times.<\/p>\n

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Photo: 20th Century Fox\/Everett Collection\n <\/p>\n

We love the Trolls movies. I\u2019m obsessed, though I will say you feel totally cracked out at the end of all of them. Each progressive Trolls movie has gotten more and more insane.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Courtesy of retailer\n <\/p>\n

We don\u2019t do any video games, but we do hands-on games. We\u2019ll play Twister or Chutes and Ladders. We have this game Sleeping Queens<\/a> that\u2019s fun. Go Fish is a classic, and we\u2019ll play it at dinner or breakfast. It\u2019s just something to sort of keep us in an activity so that we can talk because I\u2019ve found it difficult to have a conversation with my kid unless we\u2019re doing something together, like roller skating. If we\u2019re roller skating together, we can talk about anything. If we\u2019re in the car together, we can talk about anything. But if we\u2019re sitting at a table, it\u2019s like the momentum stops. So that\u2019s why we\u2019re always playing games.<\/p>\n

We have an art area at my house too, where it\u2019s sort of free-form. I have a bunch of canvases that she can grab. We have acrylic pens that are really great. She has watercolors that she can do anywhere in the house. When we\u2019re sitting together, doing art, we can talk.<\/p>\n

I think kids process their feelings through creative outlets. I have another friend who\u2019s a musician and she will do what she calls art therapy or art camp with my daughter. I\u2019ll bring my daughter over to her house and she\u2019ll have an activity to do, like sidewalk chalk or making a painting or picture, and then they\u2019ll write a song together based on the picture that she drew or whatever she\u2019s feeling. I\u2019ll leave her there and when I come back, they\u2019ll perform their song for me.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s so cool. I\u2019m a big believer in roping in your talented, creative friends to help parent your children. I think it can also be really rewarding and fulfilling for the adults who teach the kids, too, if they\u2019re into it.<\/p>\n

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Photo: Euan Cherry\/PEACOCK via Getty Images\n <\/p>\n

When I was on Traitors, she\u2019d watch it with me, and at the beginning, she was like, \u201cYou killed someone!\u201d She was beside herself. I had to be like, \u201cIt\u2019s pretend.\u201d<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t usually have the TV on for myself when my daughter\u2019s around because she\u2019ll just beam in on whatever I\u2019m watching so I\u2019m pretty discerning about my TV time. I\u2019ve got to wait to watch Heated Rivalry until she\u2019s in bed.<\/p>\n

Ama is really into The Traitors. It\u2019s actually the only reality show that I enjoy watching, too, because it\u2019s so theatrical and campy and the way they shoot it is so cinematic. Also, Alan Cumming is to die for and I have friends on the show every time.<\/p>\n

I am divorced, and my daughter\u2019s dad and his family listen to a lot of NPR news. So my daughter will hear it when she\u2019s with them and then when she comes home, she\u2019s like, \u201cTell me about this man who just got killed. What\u2019s going on?\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll talk about it, but I don\u2019t want that vibe in my house. We\u2019re not listening to the news together, and we\u2019re not talking about the news otherwise. If she asks me about stuff, I\u2019ll answer and I\u2019ll say, \u201cIt\u2019s pretty scary and there are some people who are really afraid. That\u2019s why it\u2019s important to protect each other and look out for each other, and if you ever feel scared, you can ask me,\u201d but it\u2019s hard. Those kinds of questions always come at bedtime too, in part because I think she\u2019s trying to delay the inevitable, but that\u2019s also when I\u2019m the most tired too. Being a mom is hard.<\/p>\n


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