Welcome to Planet Romy

Taken from the winter 25 issue of THE FACE. Get your copy here.

In a world of carefully constructed online personas, Romy Madison Croquet, AKA Romy Mars, is a paragon of unselfconsciousness. The Paris-born, Manhattan-raised daughter of filmmaker Sofia Coppola and Phoenix frontman Thomas Mars emerged in March 2023, when she posted a TikTok of herself cooking vodka pasta, breezily lamenting that she’d been grounded for trying to use her dad’s credit card to charter a helicopter. It was a wink and a nod to the privileged world she was born into, a peek behind the curtain that must have wreaked havoc in the family group chat.

Two-and-a-half years on from that viral moment, Romy has nurtured a cult fanbase that goes far beyond her habitual online trolling. She still gets plenty of likes for posting off-the-cuff, insider‑y TikToks several times a day: Adam Driver on a private jet, asking Trump’s granddaughter Kai about the Epstein files, that kinda thing. But since spring 2024, Romy has also alchemised this viral currency into her own brand of pop stardom, releasing a small but mighty handful of tracks.

The sugary-sad A‑Lister is typically knowing: ​“I love this golden sunny West Coast /​Sceney plastic world /​I miss being a real girl, sure /​But I’m not a real girl anymore”. Ego, in which she reflects on her time in rehab, shows a young woman wise beyond her years: ​“Baby when this is all over /​And the time’s finally right /​Honey, then I’ll be six years sober /​Except expensive wine we’ll drink at night”. It’s smart, confessional pop for new-age girlhood, where growing up now, in this particular world, comes with a unique set of challenges.

To add to those, we got a selection of FACE friends and family to ask Romy all sorts of questions about what it’s like to be her. True to form, she answered without pretending she was anything other than, well, herself.

What’s your first cringe memory?
That’s really a triggering question, because there are simply too many that come to mind. And now I’m spiraling. Lowkey probably just being desperate for attention as a kid at camp. I was finding my place in the world and just did anything to cause a scene, because I didn’t think people would accept me into their friend groups. Summer camp is pretty culty because it’s all these kids that have been going to the countryside every summer since they were four, so now they’re all attached at the hip. When I got there I was like, ​“No one is gonna fuck with me because I’m new to this.” I wanted to be a star and I wish someone told me to save it for something cool, ​’cause I was deadass in the middle of nowhere making out with guys and fighting people.

I am still close with some of the girls who are happy to remind me about all the cringe parts – like when me and this girl got into a catfight over her saying I was bad at soccer. I lost my shit, because my family didn’t ever care that I wasn’t playing sports. So when this girl was like, ​“She can’t even kick a ball,” was quick to call her a loser and be a bitch. Then she pulled my hair or something and we went from there. We fought again and again throughout the rest of the summer. This cringe story is actually how I got addicted to fame, because later when I started acting and doing stuff in the public eye, I was like, ​“OMG, soccer girl is gonna see this.”

What’s the worst part about being a girl? What’s the best?
The worst part is that you get labelled ​“crazy” pretty fast. One of the lamest things you can do, in my opinion, is write someone off as crazy. Like, why don’t you explain both sides of the situation to me, and then we can see why the person acted out. It makes me sad when girls are called crazy for doing outlandish things, because there’s always something deeper behind it. People don’t do wild things because they’re crazy; you’re just too shallow to look closer and have empathy. But the best part is that even through all the crazy talk, someone’s mom is gonna be like, ​“This is girlhood,” and share a similar story, and you’re gonna feel so understood. So, whatever.

What’s the biggest misconception people have about your generation of girls?
It’s that we’re shallow for just focusing on our looks. You should try to see that the only reason girls appear vain these days is because of larger societal problems. There are a lot of thirst traps on the internet and OnlyFans girls and stuff, and I feel like older generations will say we’re losing touch with humanity. Or [with] all this, like, ​“end of the world” stuff, [are] insulting us. But really, the tech corporations are to blame because nobody’s nature or instinct is to sell themselves online.

I think it’s just years of comparison and insecurity that makes people reduce themselves to the way they look. We’re still deep, smart and interesting. It’s just not normalised to put your personality at the forefront anymore. Look at hookup culture. No one cares who you are, they just care if you have boobs or an ass. So how are you going to call young girls shallow or vain for focusing on our looks? It’s all we hear about. My bad.

Which singer or performer’s style from the past do you admire most?
I don’t think I have an eye for fashion, even though I like pretty clothes and make-up. Someone’s style who I admire from the past is easily Amy Winehouse. She was just herself and wasn’t afraid to express herself. I like how she did her hair and eye make-up a lot.

Which album inspired you to write for the first time?
Back to Black. Amy Winehouse is my favourite musician because of how honest she is in her lyrics about admitting the worst parts of herself. When I hear music that’s about someone admitting they have flaws, I feel like I can do that too, and I also feel less guilty about how I feel. It was also the first album I heard where she sang about her ex-boyfriend in a way that made it seem like it was really the end of the world. Her lyrics – ​“We only said goodbye with words /​I died a hundred times” – made me really love music and lyrics. Attaching your self-worth to someone who isn’t in it like you are is like dying a hundred times, and I could sing about something like that forever. I am aware that it’s sinister but I connected with her a lot about substances, too. In rehab, I wrote the most songs I ever had and I wasn’t embarrassed to play them in front of people because Amy did that.

Have you thought of the name for your debut album?
My friend Harlan had written ​“All the love in the world” in Sharpie on her guitar a while ago. I think it was the name of a play her mom was working on or something. That image of ​“All the love in the world” stuck with me for some reason. And then later, my mom said something about everyone loving me while I was crying and I just thought: all the love in the world won’t help. I told my friends and they liked the idea. So I wrote a song called All the Love in the World, which felt like a start to a bigger project.

If you had to have one song lyric tattooed on you, what would it be?
I don’t think I’d get lyrics tattooed on me. More just, like, smaller stuff, but my favourite lyric right now is: ​“Like heroin that broke my baby blues” by Jessie Murph. I think it’s too sad to have on my body forever, but I love it because she’s comparing someone to heroin and how it ​“broke her baby blues”, which I interpret as disrupting her confidence or innocence or something. I played the song for my friend in the car and she freaked out. I feel like people who are sensitive can understand what I mean. She’s talking about a person who had a similar effect on her life as heroin. This is the kind of lyric that makes me think for a long time. I asked myself: was it the person that made her feel like this, or was it her fault that she got too attached to him, or whatever. A human being like heroin is a perfect song to me. So good.

If you had to pick an object that encapsulates your ideal creative vision, what would it be?
A girl I used to know would have Percocet pills [next to her] on a pink beach towel while she would tan on her lawn. That was the most interesting thing ever, because Percocet is a serious painkiller people take after surgery. But she was just taking it to chill out and get a nice tan in a bikini. To me, it symbolises how painful something can be, even if it’s pretty on the outside. A guy she really loved left her, so now all the money and prettiness isn’t going to make her feel better. It’s sinister, but it felt important to me.

I saw a great video where you read aloud from your diary. It was so insightful and funny. Along with being a wonderful songwriter and performer, you’re so good at writing prose. Will you ever publish more longer-form writing?
This is so nice. I really love to write, I always have. The clip of the writing you saw was probably the thing I wrote about my nutritionist [“Reading u a passage from my Diary about my Nutritionist”]. I didn’t know how to express my frustration, so I just opened a Google doc and lost my mind. I felt way better in the end. I don’t know if I’ll ever publish a longer piece of writing. I feel like it’s kind of egotistical to release a memoir, since I haven’t done that much with my life yet. Maybe when I’m much older and I’ve lived a longer time, I’ll have a whole book to write.

Who do you fancy right now?
My boyfriend Miles [Jebbia]. He’s just really the vibe. I feel like I’ve lived so many lives and this is my best one. It was really fun in the summer because we were always together, but now he’s at school in London.

What’s a funny DM you received after your helicopter TikTok blew up?
I wish I had a funny DM from my viral TikTok, but my parents took away my phone, so I didn’t see any of the responses until way later and my account was still private, so I didn’t get any messages. I just remember wishing I could read what was going on because people would tell me in person that it was in the newspaper. To think someone used my face as a fire starter.

When was the last time you felt true joy?
When I landed in London and was in the car on my way to see Miles. I get lonely in New York, so I was really excited to see him.

What song do you listen to when you are emo?
Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black or Lord Huron’s The Night We Met.

Brandy Melville or Chanel?
Chanel, obviously – what kind of question is that? It’s not realistic that I’m gonna wear Chanel head to toe all the time, though, so Brandy is good for me. 🥂🥂🥂

From one Juul devotee to another: what flavour and percentage are you going for, and why haven’t you switched to Elfbar/​Geek Bar, etc? Is it because Juul is the champagne of vapes?
I use all the electronic ones. I like the Juul, but at a certain point it just tastes smoky and dry, so I go back to fruit punch Geek or whatever. I hate when people tell me it’s bad for me, because there are so many things that are bad for me. Like, it’s not normal to watch edits of yourself when you’re depressed, because it suppresses any room for growth and just makes you feel like you’re cool, no matter what. No one raises a red flag at those kinds of habits in my life. But vaping? Seriously a prob.

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