Nicola Peltz Faces Career Crisis and Feuds

She's the girl who appears to have all a teenager could desire – right down to plans for her very own beauty range, just like mummy Victoria.

But ’s 15th birthday earlier this month was marred by the lack of public congratulations from her estranged big brother Brooklyn and his wife .

Parents Victoria and David were quick to celebrate their only daughter. David uploaded a sweet gallery of pictures to Instagram paying tribute to ‘my pretty lady’, while Victoria called her ‘my best friend’.

Neither mentioned Brooklyn by name, but Victoria’s post initially appeared to show a picture of Brooklyn with a toddler Harper giggling with delight. The image was then  removed from the post moments later, without explanation.

Brooklyn is said to be ‘furious’ that his parents keep posting pictures of him online.

Both of Harper’s other brothers, Romeo and Cruz, joined the public love-in, posting their own cute tributes.

Even Jackie Apostel, Cruz's girlfriend, crafted a wonderfully warm post calling Harper my ‘built-in bestie’. While Kim Turnbull, Romeo’s girlfriend, referred to the teen as ‘lil sis’ in her own tribute post.

Was this, one wonders, a subtle dig at Nicola, who – as one of only two girls in a family of six boys – was initially thought to have bonded with little Harper, even referring to her as ‘my baby sis’ in a post from the pre-feud days in 2023?

According to someone who has followed the saga closely: ‘It’s devastating for Harper, as Brooklyn has been refusing to engage with her. Until the falling-out he spoilt her rotten and spent her birthdays with her.’

Since Harper's birthday, the entire Beckham clan (minus Brooklyn and Nicola) have all been spotted watching World Cup matches in America.

The birthday snub comes after Harper was photographed knocking on the door to Brooklyn’s Los Angeles mansion last month. She then posted a note through the letterbox after getting no reply.

Brooklyn, 27, promptly accused his parents of setting up the incident for their own gain – which they denied vehemently.

All in all, for Harper – a sensitive and caring girl, say those who know her – the schism with her brother and Nicola has been devastating.

But, industry insiders tell me, the very public estrangement has not just been devastating for Harper and the Beckhams. It has also caused serious damage to Nicola’s acting career.

The wannabe movie star is, say some, now viewed as ‘kryptonite’ when it comes to getting bums on seats in cinemas.

Take her new movie, a thriller called Pretty Ugly, which was screened for potential buyers at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

For your film to be shown at Cannes is surely a fillip for any determined actress.

Yet it was shown in one of the event’s smallest rooms, ‘Salle H’, which holds just 53 people. For someone with Nicola’s public profile, this must have been galling. Sources say that the room wasn’t even full.

Somewhat extraordinarily, Nicola, 31, wasn’t even present herself. Indeed, she was notably absent from the entire festival, which many found baffling because she was also due to be there to promote another film, Prima, in which she plays a ballerina named Margo whose world unravels when the head of her ballet company marries a contemporary choreographer.

The indie production, which also stars Faye Dunaway and Mira Sorvino, has been slated for release this month. But the lack of buzz surrounding it has prompted fears it will not be the success Nicola hoped it would.

Meanwhile, another project of Nicola’s, the Ryan Murphy-helmed The Beauty – a science-fiction ‘body horror’ TV series – has been viewed as a damp squib since its release on Disney+ in January. This despite co-stars including Ashton Kutcher and Isabella Rossellini.

On paper, those three big roles should have meant 2026 was the year Nicola cemented her reputation as a serious actress.

But after her private dramas overtook her professional achievements, Nicola could be forgiven for thinking 2026 has been a resounding failure so far.

Even some in the Peltz-Beckham circles blame Nicola and Brooklyn’s feud with his parents for causing irreparable damage to her acting career. Surely, they say, no PR agency in the world could airbrush away the unpleasantness which Nicola is said to have personally driven, as Brooklyn has sought to excise his parents from his life.

The Beckhams, in contrast, have only become more relatable to their fans, despite their son’s damning Instagram post in January this year in which he made the extent of their estrangement clear.

‘There’s no denying Nicola is publicly most associated as being behind her husband’s feud with his parents – not as an actress,’ mused one source involved with the Peltz-Beckhams.

‘She and Brooklyn think the narrative around the row is misogynistic, with her being blamed for taking him away from his parents.

‘After all, the world never takes kindly to a woman taking a boy away from his mother.

‘Regardless, it has left a very dark cloud over her. Nicola hasn’t come out of this looking very good at all. She must be enraged.’

She won’t be the only one angered. Her father, the billionaire Nelson Peltz – known for his ‘take no prisoners’ attitude to business – must also be deeply frustrated.

‘Nicola’s father has funded a lot of her acting projects,’ says a source. ‘She has had so much privilege other actors and actresses don’t have, yet her career just doesn’t seem to be working out in the way she must have hoped it would.

‘She has always wanted to be an actress and she has had many goes at it.’

Her distinctly wobbly acting career isn’t the only fly in the ointment for Nicola at the moment. Further drama ensued for her last month when she parted ways with Yogi’s House, a Los Angeles-based dog rescue organisation she helped launch with long-standing friend Emma Kenney in 2022 in the wake of the Los Angeles fires that left many animals displaced.

However, the non-profit’s website now lists Emma as its only founder. Communicating, as ever, through her social media, Nicola has unfollowed the charity on Instagram, removed Yogi’s House from her own profile and now just describes herself as a ‘dog activist’ (a career avenue, one would imagine, that doesn’t pay too many bills).

Her sudden distancing from the foundation has left those associated with the Beckhams rather bewildered, because the charity was listed by Brooklyn as one of the 12 reasons why he turned his back on his ‘controlling’ parents.

He claimed his mother failed to support a GoFundMe page set up to rescue pets affected by the Los Angeles fires and transport them to safe foster homes.

Brooklyn, meanwhile, donated $5,000, as did his mother-in-law Claudia, and Nicola’s brother Zach chipped in $300, with the GoFundMe eventually raising $59,444 – a sum which surely counts as pocket change for Nelson Peltz.

In a statement to the Daily Mail, Nicola’s spokesman said: ‘Nicola is humbled by the work Yogi’s House does to support dog welfare in California.

‘Nicola is proud to have been a founding partner of Yogi’s House, and she’s currently considering other opportunities to support dog welfare in any way possible. This is her true passion in life, and she will never give up on the dogs.’

There was, though, no explanation for why she has parted ways with the charity. Sources familiar with Nicola, however, suggest she has fallen out with the co-founder, Emma.

The pair were friends of her former publicist Alex Schack, though Nicola is understood to no longer be close to Schack. The publicist was a guest at her £3million wedding on Palm Beach back in 2022.

‘The reason [she’s split from the charity] must be something significant given her dog rescuing has become a major plank of her PR,’ a friend says. ‘Her connection to animals and involvement in charities is good for her profile.’

Nicola is also understood to have fallen out with another long-time friend Will McCance, who produced her 2024 movie Lola, in which she plays a 19-year-old teenage mum from a dysfunctional family. She also wrote and directed the movie.

Meanwhile, I hear that her on-off publicist, the New York-based so-called ‘attack dog’ Matthew Hiltzik, is growing tired of Nicola’s various dramas.

‘It’s not just David and Victoria she has rubbed up the wrong way,’ says a source. ‘There are many, many other people who have now come and gone from Nicola’s life. She could fall out with her own shadow.’

There is even some suggestion she is disagreeing with other Peltzes.

Last month Nicola and Brooklyn attended the wedding of her brother Will, 40, to Kenya Kinski-Jones, 33, the daughter of legendary music producer Quincy Jones, at the Peltz estate in Mount Kisco, Westchester County, New York.

It’s the same location Nicola and Brooklyn chose to renew their wedding vows almost a year ago.

But Nicola only appeared in three out of the 100 photographs of Will’s big day, which were shared on Vogue’s website.

In one she was pictured with Will and her father Nelson. Another was a shot of her and her siblings, while another was a group photo where Brooklyn was standing next to her – the only snap he appeared in.

‘Nicola was very much on the periphery of this wedding. And she is not used to that,’ says a family source.

‘The fact that Nicola was in so few of the photographs on the Vogue website is very telling indeed. She is used to being at the centre of attention.

‘She is the spoilt youngest daughter of Nelson and Claudia. She got what she wanted when she wanted it.

‘Now Kenya has come along and she has formed the most amazingly close relationship with Claudia.’