I'd like to nominate Natalie Portman.
- Born in Jerusalem, she moved to America at the age of 3, and now has dual American and Israeli citizenship.
- At the age of 4, Portman started dancing and performed in local troupes. At the age of ten, she was asked by a Revlon agent to become a child model, but she turned down the offer to focus on acting. In a magazine interview, Portman said that she was "different from the other kids. I was more ambitious, I knew what I liked and what I wanted, and I worked very hard. I was a very serious kid."
- She was a smart cookie: as a student, Portman co-authored two research papers that were published in scientific journals. Her 1998 high school paper, "A Simple Method to Demonstrate the Enzymatic Production of Hydrogen from Sugar", was entered in the Intel Science Talent Search. She even skipped the premiere of her film (Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace) so she could study for her high school final exams.
- She studied psychology at Harvard University while still working as an actress, graduating in 2003 with a bachelor’s degree. "I don't care if [college] ruins my career," she told the New York Post. "I'd rather be smart than a movie star." While attending Harvard, she was a resident of Lowell House and wrote a letter to the Harvard Crimson in response to an essay critical of Israeli actions toward Palestinians. In 2002, she contributed to a study on memory called "Frontal Lobe Activation during Object Permanence: Data from Near-Infrared Spectroscopy" during her psychology studies at Harvard. This publication placed Portman among a very small number of professional actors with a defined Erdős–Bacon number.
- Her film resume: In 2001, Portman opened in New York City's Public Theater production of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull. In 2005, Portman received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture for the drama Closer. She also won a Constellation Award (Best Female Performance) and a Saturn Award (Best Actress) for her starring role in V for Vendetta (2006). She played leading roles in the historical dramas Goya's Ghosts (2006) and The Other Boleyn Girl (2008). In May 2008, she served as the youngest member of the 61st Annual Cannes Film Festival jury, and her directorial debut, Eve, opened the 65th Venice International Film Festival's shorts competition in 2008. Impressive, no?
- In 2011, Portman won the Academy Award, the Golden Globe Award, the BAFTA Award, the Screen Actors Guild Award and the Independent Spirit Award for her lead performance as Nina Sayers in Black Swan.
Fun facts
- She speaks 6 languages: Portman has professed an interest in foreign languages since childhood and has studied French, Japanese, German, Hebrew, and Arabic.
- Even her ancestors were badass: Her paternal grandfather, whose parents died at Auschwitz, was an economics professor in Israel, and her Romanian-born great-grandmother was a spy for British Intelligence during World War II.
- She has a famous "twin": Portman looks startlingly similar to Keira Knightly- who is also an actress.
Source: Wickipedia
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