Buttons within buttons

This might be a really stupid thing to ask but I still want to know if its possible.

If you have a movieclip that contains two buttons, each with different actions. The movieclip that contains the two buttons also has an on realease action applied to it. Is there a way to disable the “parent” button and allow the two buttons contained within it to work?

I’ve tried the parent_moviclip.enabled = false; but that doesn’t seem to work.