Will “Grandpa Walton” Geer was a gay (or bisexual) Communist (and open about both).
Woody Harrelson’s father is suspected by some conspiracy theorists as being a second (or third or whatever the count is up to by now) gunman in the JFK assassination. He is currently serving life in prison in Texas for murdering a judge.
Goldie Hawn and Kate Hudson are direct descendants of Edward Rutledge (the South Carolina delegate to the Continental Congress and the youngest signer of the Declaration of Independence).
Hal Holbrook is the only actor who can legally perform a one man show of Mark Twain while wearing a white suit. While Twain’s work is in the public domain, the white suit is considered a legal trademark of Holbrook’s based on the fact that Twain himself did not perform while wearing one (he wore dark suits onstage). Holbrook is also the closest we are likely to come to seeing Twain because he studied Twain’s voice and mannerisms with Twain’s daughter Clara and his secretary.
Speaking of Mark Twain, his money made an odd progression. His estate was inherited by his only surviving child, Clara. She married twice, both times to Russian musicians, and she had one child- Nina Gabrilowitsch- by her first husband. When she died (she was very old- this was in the early 1960s) her estate was worth about $2 million due to her father’s royalties; she left it in a trust fund which benefitted her daughter and her second husband, Jacques Samossoud, who survived her but was very elderly. When her daughter committed suicide a few years later, completely ending the Clemens bloodline, she left no will. Her estate, valued in the millions, passed to the family of her stepfather (who had recently died). Here’s the irony: Samossoud’s family members were White Russians living in France who had never heard of Mark Twain when suddenly a multimillion dollar estate landed in their lap. (Twain must have spun in his grave considering his lack of love for the French.)
Bewitched probably set a record for the most gay cast members (Erin Murphy, Maurice Evans, Paul Lynde, Agnes Moorehead and Dick Sargent). The twins who portrayed Adam are the illegitimate sons of Tony Curtis but did not know it until they were teenagers (a photo of the boys as adults almost negates any need for DNA testing.) David “Larry Tate” White lost his wife in childbirth and his son to the Pan-Am Lockerby bombing.
The television series Roseanne at one time had three Oscar winners in regular or recurring roles: Estelle Parsons, Red Buttons & Shelley Winters.
Author Jerzy Kozinsky (The Painted Bird, Being There) was bumped from a flight due to overbooking in NYC and thus missed having dinner with the wife of his best friend, Roman Polanski; he also missed being slaughtered by the Manson family. The matron in his novel Being There was based on his wife who, prior to him, was married to a steel billionaire fifty years her senior (and through inheritance was one of the richest women in the world).
Kurt Vonnegut’s daughter was the first Mrs. Geraldo Rivera. They divorced thirty years ago but Vonnegut still hates Rivera.
Uma Thurman’s father is one of the world’s most quoted scholars on the subject of Buddhism. Her mother was previously married to Timothy Leary, who was the godfather of Winona Ryder.
