50 Fun Facts About Famous Actresses

Which Nanny McPhee star is the only person to have won Oscars for both acting and screenwriting?

Emma Thompson won Best Actress for Howards End, then the screenplay Oscar for adapting Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, in which she also starred.

Which actress played Tom Hanks's mother in Forrest Gump despite being only ten years older than him?

Sally Field had shared top billing with Hanks as a fellow stand-up comedian in Punchline just six years before she was cast as Mrs. Gump.

Which Oscar-winning star of Les Misérables shares her name with the wife of William Shakespeare?

Anne Hathaway won her supporting Oscar as the doomed Fantine, a part her own mother had played on stage in the musical's first US tour.

Which actress, rejected for the film of My Fair Lady, won that year's Best Actress Oscar as Mary Poppins?

Julie Andrews had created Eliza Doolittle on Broadway, but studio boss Jack Warner wanted a bigger screen name. Mary Poppins was her first film.

Which Disney villain, a London heiress, have Glenn Close and Emma Stone both played in live action?

Cruella de Vil was Glenn Close's role in 101 Dalmatians and its sequel. Emma Stone later played the character in an origin story set in 1970s punk-era London.

Which Star Wars actress, the daughter of Debbie Reynolds, also worked as a Hollywood script doctor?

Carrie Fisher, the saga's Princess Leia, quietly polished other writers' screenplays for Hook, Sister Act and The Wedding Singer.

Which star of Some Like It Hot was born Norma Jeane Mortenson and first married at the age of sixteen?

Marilyn Monroe took her surname from her mother's maiden name, while a studio executive chose her first name because she reminded him of Broadway star Marilyn Miller.

Which Breakfast at Tiffany's star won the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her work with UNICEF?

Audrey Hepburn knew hunger first-hand: as a teenager in the occupied Netherlands, her family ground tulip bulbs into flour during the famine of 1944–45.

Which former MGM child star was the mother of Liza Minnelli, the Oscar-winning lead of Cabaret?

Judy Garland was sixteen when she filmed The Wizard of Oz as Dorothy, and her only Academy Award was the miniature juvenile statuette that followed.

Which actress, the most Oscar-nominated performer ever, won her third award as Margaret Thatcher?

Meryl Streep prepared for The Iron Lady by sitting in on a session of the House of Commons, and gave her fee to the National Women's History Museum.

Which Pretty Woman star won her Best Actress Oscar for playing legal crusader Erin Brockovich?

Julia Roberts became the first actress to be paid $20 million for a film when she took the part of the real-life campaigner against a California utility.

Which actress took the wheel of the bus in Speed and later played a stranded astronaut in Gravity?

Sandra Bullock also pulled off a rare double: she won a worst-actress Razzie for All About Steve the night before her Oscar for The Blind Side.

Which English actress played Rose in Titanic and later won her Best Actress Oscar for The Reader?

Kate Winslet first turned The Reader down because its shoot clashed with Revolutionary Road, the drama that reunited her with Leonardo DiCaprio.

Which actress played both Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games and Mystique in the X-Men films?

Jennifer Lawrence sat through eight hours of latex and body paint for Mystique's blue form, and won a Best Actress Oscar at 22 for Silver Linings Playbook.

Which Harry Potter star became a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador and helped launch the HeForShe campaign?

Emma Watson had acted only in school plays when she landed Hermione Granger, her first professional role.

Which Tomb Raider star, the daughter of actor Jon Voight, won an Oscar for Girl, Interrupted?

Angelina Jolie made her screen debut at seven in a bit part beside her father, and later became a special envoy for the UN refugee agency.

Which Australian actress went from the soap opera Neighbours to producing and starring in Barbie?

Margot Robbie played Donna Freedman on the soap from 2008 to 2011, and earned a Best Picture nomination as a producer of the doll's blockbuster.

Which Black Widow actress voiced the computer love interest in Her without ever appearing on screen?

Scarlett Johansson was a late replacement: Samantha Morton had performed the whole part on set before the voice was recast in post-production.

Which Sister Act star won an Oscar as the eccentric psychic Oda Mae Brown in Ghost?

Whoopi Goldberg, born Caryn Johnson, was only the second Black woman to win an acting Oscar, more than fifty years after the first.

In which road movie do Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis go on the run in a Ford Thunderbird?

Thelma & Louise earned Best Actress nominations for both its leads, and gave Brad Pitt an early supporting part as the hustler J.D.

Which member of a famous acting dynasty played little sister Gertie in E.T. as a child?

Drew Barrymore, a grandniece of stage and screen legends Lionel and Ethel, later teamed up with Cameron Diaz and Lucy Liu as the investigators of Charlie's Angels.

Which Cleopatra star married her co-star Richard Burton, divorced him, then married him again?

Elizabeth Taylor made 11 films with Burton, and had been famous since she played a would-be Grand National jockey in National Velvet at twelve.

Which star of Hitchcock's Rear Window and To Catch a Thief retired at 26 to become Princess of Monaco?

Grace Kelly made three thrillers for the director, who became one of her mentors, before she married Prince Rainier III in 1956.

Which actress, a former Miss Ohio USA, became the first Black woman to win the Best Actress Oscar?

Halle Berry won for the drama Monster's Ball, and also played Bond girl Jinx in Die Another Day and the weather-controlling Storm in the X-Men films.

Which British actress won both her Oscars as Southern belles, Scarlett O'Hara and Blanche DuBois?

Vivien Leigh was born in Darjeeling in British India, and had already played Blanche on the London stage before filming A Streetcar Named Desire.

Which Swedish actress, who acted in five languages, played Ilsa Lund in Casablanca?

Ingrid Bergman later began an affair with Italian director Roberto Rossellini that caused such a scandal in America she stayed in Europe for several years.

Which singer won Best Actress for Funny Girl in the only tie that Oscar category has ever seen?

Barbra Streisand stumbled on her bell-bottomed pantsuit on the way to the stage. With Yentl she became the first woman to write, produce, direct and star in a major studio film.

Which Godfather actress, born with the surname Hall, won an Oscar for a comedy named after her?

Diane Keaton, nicknamed Annie, gave Annie Hall its title. Her stage surname was her mother's maiden name, taken because the actors' union already had a Diane Hall.

Which former child star of Taxi Driver studied at Yale and won two Best Actress Oscars by 29?

Jodie Foster started even younger, in a Coppertone sunscreen commercial at three, and won her Oscars for The Accused and The Silence of the Lambs.

Playing which English queen earned Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett Oscar nominations at the same ceremony?

Elizabeth I won Dench the supporting award for about eight minutes on screen in Shakespeare in Love, while Blanchett was up for the lead in a biopic of the young monarch.

Which actress, whose first language is Afrikaans, won her Oscar as serial killer Aileen Wuornos?

Charlize Theron won for Monster, becoming the first South African to take an acting Oscar, and later played the warrior Imperator Furiosa in Mad Max: Fury Road.

Which Jerusalem-born Oscar winner began her career as a hitman's protégée in Léon: The Professional?

Natalie Portman went on to play Padmé Amidala in the Star Wars prequels while studying psychology at Harvard, and won Best Actress for Black Swan.

Which Legally Blonde star did her own singing as June Carter Cash to win an Oscar for Walk the Line?

Reese Witherspoon was so nervous about singing in front of a live audience that she asked her lawyer to get her out of the contract.

Which actress won an Oscar as the British monarch in The Queen, set just after Princess Diana's death?

Helen Mirren was already a household name in Britain as detective Jane Tennison, the lead of the long-running police drama Prime Suspect.

Which Harry Potter actress won her first Oscar three decades earlier for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie?

Maggie Smith, the films' Professor McGonagall, won a second Oscar for California Suite and later found a new audience as Downton Abbey's Dowager Countess.

Which actress, whose mother played the shower victim in Psycho, broke through as Laurie Strode in Halloween?

Jamie Lee Curtis became known as a scream queen, then won an Oscar more than four decades later for the comedy Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Which Yale-trained actress won an Oscar for her feature debut as Patsey in 12 Years a Slave?

Lupita Nyong'o was born in Mexico City, where her Kenyan father was a visiting lecturer, and landed the part as she graduated from drama school.

Which Ghostbusters actress was Oscar-nominated twice in one year, for Gorillas in the Mist and Working Girl?

Sigourney Weaver won two Golden Globes for those parts but neither Oscar. Her first nomination had come for playing Ellen Ripley in Aliens.

Which Honolulu-born Australian wore a prosthetic nose to play Virginia Woolf in The Hours?

Nicole Kidman was born while her parents were in Hawaii on student visas, and the role made her the first Australian to win the Best Actress Oscar.

Which sultry-voiced actress met future husband Humphrey Bogart on To Have and Have Not, her debut at 19?

Lauren Bacall had been a teenage cover model, and went on to make three more thrillers with Bogart, including The Big Sleep and Key Largo.

Which actress won an Oscar at eleven for The Piano and later played the mutant Rogue in the X-Men films?

Anna Paquin made her acting debut in the drama after an open audition advertised in a New Zealand newspaper, and became the second-youngest Oscar winner in history.

Which Gone with the Wind actress beat Warner Bros. in a landmark case over long studio contracts?

Olivia de Havilland sued in 1943 and won a ruling that contracts could not outlast seven calendar years. The decision became known as the De Havilland Law, and she lived to 104.

Which Bonnie and Clyde star announced the wrong Best Picture winner at the 2017 Oscars?

Faye Dunaway and co-star Warren Beatty, handed the wrong envelope, named La La Land instead of Moonlight while marking their gangster film's 50th anniversary.

Which actress played Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate, just eight years older than her screen daughter?

Anne Bancroft had already won an Oscar as teacher Anne Sullivan in The Miracle Worker, and was married to comedy director Mel Brooks.

Which double Best Actress Oscar winner gave up acting to serve 23 years as a Labour Member of Parliament?

Glenda Jackson won for Women in Love and A Touch of Class, collected neither Oscar in person, and returned to the stage as King Lear after leaving politics.

Which star of Hitchcock's The Birds is the mother of Melanie Griffith and grandmother of Dakota Johnson?

Tippi Hedren later devoted herself to big cats, and her foundation supports the Shambala Preserve, a California refuge for lions and tigers.

Which Carmen Jones star was the first African American nominated for the Best Actress Oscar?

Dorothy Dandridge nearly missed the part: she had just played a schoolteacher, and director Otto Preminger could not picture her as a femme fatale.

Which Los Angeles-born star of the silent era became the first Asian American to appear on US coinage?

Anna May Wong, a laundry owner's daughter, is regarded as Hollywood's first Chinese American film star and appeared with Marlene Dietrich in Shanghai Express.

Which Italian star won the first Oscar given for a non-English-language performance, in Two Women?

Sophia Loren won Best Actress as Cesira in Vittorio De Sica's wartime drama, and went on to collect seven David di Donatello awards for Best Actress in Italy.

Which silent-era star returned to the screen as forgotten film legend Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard?

Gloria Swanson was not looking for a comeback, and director George Cukor suggested her only after other famous names from the silent years had been approached.