Donald Glover's advice to his young mentee Malia Obama: You 'will only get to do this once'

It's hard out here for a nepo baby. Well, at least if your dad is the former leader of the free world and all. Expectations — and skepticism — may be insurmountably high.

Donald Glover is keenly aware of this, as he revealed in a recent GQ profile with the advice he shared with his protege Malia Obama.

The Atlanta and Swarm creator's latest venture is Gilga — part production company, part talent incubator, part operating farm — and one of its first projects is a short film by Obama, 24, who also spent time in the Swarm writers' room.

As her mentor, Glover laid out some hard truths. "The first thing we did was talk about the fact that she will only get to do this once," he said. "You're Obama's daughter. So if you make a bad film, it will follow you around."

He's got a point. Sure, her status as a former first daughter no doubt helped her up the professional ladder, but it also puts a target on her back. If she comes out with something bad, her critics will use it as an example of Obama lacking her own merits. And even if she comes out with something good, if it's not epic on the first go-round, she could still be dismissed.

For his part, Glover and his Swarm co-creator Janine Nabers were very impressed with the eldest Obama scion. She co-wrote an episode of the acclaimed Prime Video series, which Nabers called the "wildest" of the season.

"I think it's going to surprise a lot of people," Nabers told ET about the episode. "It's pretty dope. I'm really proud of it."

And last year, Glover praised Obama's work ethic, telling Vanity Fair that "she's just somebody who's gonna have really good things coming soon." In hindsight, that sounds more like a promise than a prediction.

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