Zachary Levi, most famous for playing Chuck Bartowski, is apparently not even the littlest bit Jewish.
This was pretty much my same thought process. I was so thoroughly convinced she was black, that when someone told me she wasn’t, I went and furiously Googled her, certain that she was a light-skinned black woman, perhaps with a non-black parent. That’s when I found out that she was Shankar’s daughter. So I was wrong, but so was the girl who thought Jones was just a dark-haired white girl!
Okay, yes, and thank you. Gods help me, but I love this awful, awful song, and thus, Simply Red. It is my official “I am in a break up, and I’ve no aspiration but to do anything but wallow and be unashamedly pathetic” song. It’s terrible, but has a special place in my cold, dark little heart.
Now then! Here’s what I was thinking when I clicked on this thread:
Excellent! There were times when I would think “That white woman looks black sometimes.” I’d see her and think she was white, then at other times wonder why she looked so brown, and would figure it was just the camera or something. Then I’d see her next to white people and go, “Is she white?” and at some point concluded she might be a very light black woman. Then I’d go, “That black woman looks really white.” Now why it never dawned on me that she could actually be black and white, I will never know.
Most “black” people in America are “part white.”
…and some “white” people are “part black.” (The only reason there’s a difference is that American culture traditionally classifies anyone with any visible African ancestry as black.)
What matters–in terms of how one is treated–is mostly just absolute skin tone, and also to some extent how one carries oneself. I doubt Jennifer Beals and Derek Jeter suffered much racial discrimination growing up.
As a kid I thought Abraham Loncoln was black for quite a while … I saw an episode of Different STrokes where the little kid was playing him in a school play or something so I just assumed Lincoln was black too.
For that matter, neither is Jason Biggs, who apparently fooled Woody Allen into believing he was Jewish without even trying to.
I didn’t realize for quite a while that sisters Jennifer Tilly and Meg Tilly are half Caucasian and half Chinese.
Whoa, I had no idea about Jennifer Tilly. (Well, or Meg Tilly–but I didn’t know who she was till just now so I never speculated either way.)
Maybe not, but I went to college with her brother and since he was so scuzzy (didn’t shower, his clothes looked like they were slept in) he never got any. THat must have hurt.
What!? Not only does dude have cornrows, but they’re righteous.* How could you not know he was mixed with something?
Is Chuck established as Jewish (I don’t recall such if so), or is it just because his last name’s Levi that this is a surprise?
And you know that’s not the type of “part white” being talked about in my post. Replace part with half if you must.
Totally astounded me!
Big fan of Queen but I never knew that.
Still gobsmacked.
You’re right, as seen in this photo: http://i.a.cnn.net/si/images/hockey/nhl/players/550.jpg
But I hadn’t seen him with his helmet off until well after he came to the Rangers, and by that time he had started to change his hair, as seen in this photo: http://cdn.nhl.com/rangers/images/upload/2009/04/McCarthy_Blueshirts_2002.jpg
Besides, by default I assume that all Hockey players are white and from Canada, Michigan or Wisconsin -unless I can’t spell their names; then I assume that they’re from Eastern Europe.
hahahahahahahahahhahaha… sorry
Well, until I realized he was voicing the bilingual Handy Manny, I had no idea that Wilmer Valderrama was of Hispanic descent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilmer_Valderrama
Of course, maybe that’s because I could only think of him as “Fez” from, from, from…well, I guess I didn’t really know where he was from. But I sure as Hell didn’t think it was Columbia or Venezuela!
So, you thought that back in the 60’s the first man the US was going to let set foot on the moon was going to be a black man?! Hehe. Hehehe. Bwahahahahahaha!!! Oh, mercy! Sorry, but too funny!
Not a celebrity today- though he was in his lifetime- but Alexandre Dumas, Sr. surprises a lot of people who didn’t know the author of Count of Monte Christo, The Three Musketeers, The Nutcracker and other classics not only had African ancestry through his French Creole father but it was obvious inhis appearance.
Peter Ustinov was part Ethiopian as well, though how much varies by the source. He claimed a quarter, but I think it was actually more like an eighth. Similar story about Russell Crowe’s Maori ancestry- I think it’s about 1/16 or 1/32.
Well… partly anyway… also part Native American it seems. (Photo of young Lena on her wiki page).
For myself, it’d be Grace Slick. Having only heard her singing “White Rabbit” in a particularly gravelly live recording I’d formed a mental image of a black blues singer in the mould of Billy Holiday. I was more than a little surprised to find one of her parents was Norwegian-Swedish, and the other a Mayflower descendant. :eek:
Oh…you beat me to it.
Not a race exactly, but I’d assumed Harry Morgan (bk4 MAS*H) was Jewish due to his birth name of Bratsberg. He’s actually the son of Norwegian immigrants.
An interesting example of self identified ethnicity:
Earle Hyman, the actor most famous for playing Cliff’s father on The Cosby Show, is by birth a North Carolinian of multiracial heritage (white, Native American and black or, as it was known in the NC of his birth, black), but has “changed race”. He identifies as Norwegian- he says Norway is the only place he’s ever truly felt at home and he lives there- where he’s an extremely respected member of the theater community- when he’s not working in the U.S… He speaks fluent Norwegian, his partner of many years is Norwegian (I don’t know if said partner is male or female- in an interview he says he’s been romantically involved with a Norwegian for 50+ years) and is an honorary citizen of Norway who has received medals and royal decorations for his work in theater there.
In sports, this quality gets you a spot on the “Reggie Cleveland All-Stars”. Outside sports, Hymie Weiss, who, with Schemer Drucci, headed the North Side gang after Dion O’Banion and before Bugs Moran, was a Polish Catholic.