Sometimes you think there are two news stories so disparate you could never possibly find a commonality between them. For instance, when Gary Barlow’s son went viral yesterday after a family photo of the Barlows showed Daniel, aged 24, towering over his father, aged 53, you’d never have thought anyone could possibly link it to the US election, even if they really wanted to. In fact, the relentless memes about his height were actually quite a nice respite from all the politics.
Then, mere hours later, Donald Trump arrived on stage at his election night party with Melania Trump and their son Barron. And suddenly two stories became one.
Barron Trump, who is 18 years old and inexplicably 2.06m tall (six foot seven), dwarfed his father Donald, who is pretty tall himself, at six foot two. While his mother Melania was a model, she isn’t exactly a giant, standing at a reasonable five foot eight.
The New York University student (presumably there on some sort of basketball scholarship) has captivated people across the nation with his height, just as Daniel Barlow has captivated the UK.
Gary Barlow's son is scared, he doesn't know why he's so big pic.twitter.com/U5nqEasKOc
— cants (@cantseyy) November 4, 2024
In comparison, Daniel Barlow is six foot two, which isn’t quite as towering as Barron, but does stand significantly taller than his former Take That star father Gary, who is a short king at five foot seven.
This hasn’t stopped the onslaught of memes, though, which have been coming thick and fast ever since Daniel Barlow’s height was revealed.
Early photo of Gary Barlow teaching his son to tie his own shoelaces. pic.twitter.com/1H1mZMVLTX
— D Fens Ghost (@D_Fens_Ghost) November 5, 2024
Gary Barlow manoeuvring one of his son’s Hot Wheels pic.twitter.com/i7YNlVPi7L
— Scott Chegg (@buckfastbadlad) November 6, 2024
Gary Barlow standing next to his son eating a croissant. pic.twitter.com/YanxH1hhjr
— Barrie White (@BarrieGWhite) November 5, 2024
But why do we care so much? And why does it give us such a thrill when someone has a surprisingly massive son? Clearly there’s a market for it — you need only look to family favourite film Twins, released in 1988 and starring Danny DeVito and Arnold Schwarzenegger, for proof of that. There was also a height-flipped version of Twins released in 2003 called Tiptoes, in which Matthew McConaughey has a brother who is a small person, but I think McConaughey would agree it’s best if everyone just forgot about that.
According to scarily large son Alex Williams, 28, it can be quite daunting being taller than everyone else in your family. “I’m six foot nine and tower over my parents,” he told the Standard.
Because I’m an IVF baby my parents joke that someone swapped the test tubes
“I was 6ft at like 10 or 11 years old so at that point I was like oops, we tall!” Alex says. “Towering over friends and family had a lot positives and negatives, at first I’d say more negatives as I didn’t embrace my height the way I do now. My mum jokes that I’m the milkman’s kid — an old person joke.
“Lots of the family say, ‘We don’t know where you came from or joke about adoption. And because I’m an IVF baby my parents joke that someone swapped the test tubes.”
Similarly to Alex, Barron Trump and Daniel Barlow’s height certainly makes them stand out. As for whether or not they actually enjoy the attention, that remains to be seen.
