Celebrities who are or were actually intelligent

Lisa Kudrow was a Biology major at Vassar.

Conan O'Brien went to Harvard.

Judy Holliday had a genius IQ.

Rashida Jones went to Harvard

Mira Sorvina has a B.A. in East Asian Studies from Harvard.

Kris Kristofferson was a Rhodes scholar and has a degree from Oxford.

Hedy Lamarr

Morgan Fairchild is a smarty when it comes to virology and the history of terrorism.

Dolph Lundgren - Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in Chemical Engineering. He at MIT on a Fullbright Scholarship when he decided to drop out to pursue acting.

Natalie Portman

Matt Damon

Conan O'Brien

Going to an Ivy League doesn’t necessarily mean intelligence. Rashida Jones may indeed be smart but her dad is Quincy Jones.

And think if all the Presidential candidates who went to Ivy leagues. Some of them are as dumb as posts.

Yeah, Hedy Lamarr wins this one handily

R10, we're not sayng going to an Ivy League school proves they're smart, but Kudrow certainly is (you can see it in her) as well as O'Brien and several others mentioned here. If you're a Rhodes scholar, you have something going for you in the brains department.

Jodie Foster

Mayim Bialik

Steve Martin

Mick Jagger

Brian May

Jodie Foster graduated from Yale and is bilingual, her second language being French.

Streep - Vassar and Yale

Brian May of Queen is an astrophysicist and Danica McKellar of The Wonder Years is a mathematician.

A lot of Brits went to Oxford or Cambridge--all of Monty Python, Stephen Fry, Hugh Laurie, Emma Thompson...

This just proves that not all actors are stupid whores--just most of them.

Lady Gaga went to NYU.

[quote]Lady Gaga went to NYU.

I am underwhelmed.

Morgan Fairchild. Her insight and intelligence stands out among the dark Twitter landscape.

Edward Norton-Yale

Dee from What's Happening! grew up to be a veterinarian with a decades-long practice in West Hollywood.

The late model/actress Shelley Smith left show biz and got a degree in psychology, later founding an egg donor clinic. Her brains were on full display on Pyramid; if she was your partner, you were likely to win.

R22, Fairchild might well be smart, but how cunty and presumptuous for that article to say she "knows more than you" about "Syria and science."

Lisa Kudrow

Julia Louise Dreyfus, Brooke Shields, and Gina Davis.

I guess it bears repeating, R26.

John Lithgow, Courtney B. Vance (no relation) and Tommy Lee Jones

All Harvard grads.

Carol Wayne.

"Jodie Foster graduated from Yale and is bilingual, her second language being French."

We've no doubt Jodie is a cunning linguistic.

R21 Your first mistake was thinking someone gave a fuck.

Actually jodies second language is English

Is me. I arrive in America with genius grant for my poosey.

I speak several language. Especially French and Greek.

Jack Lemmon went to Harvard, Jimmy Stewart to Princeton, Katharine Hepburn to Bryn Mawr.

R33, didn't she grow up with English as her first language? I know she went to Lycee Francaise eventually.

Whatsersnatch who just got fired from Jeopardy

Hey y'all. I went to soooo many colleges before I was 16. Each time was inside a birthday cake for a frat party.

*Lycee Francais

Mayim Bialik

I'm not a celebrity and I'm not a Rhodes Scholar.

I'm nobody. Who are you? Are you nobody too????

Quentin Tarantino

Woody Allen, CUNY drop-out

Many successful comics seem to be quite intelligent.

Miriam Margoyles went to Cambridge.

*Margolyes

R44 Where she blew the boat crews. Every night.

Sue Sontag

I'm a very stable genius!

Einstein

Let me be the first to let this secret out of the bag. My grandfather is Albert Einstein, and he left me the formula - the DNA codes, actually - to start civilization all over again in the event of a nuclear war.....He also told me to hide as the present earth is imploding without getting killed

r46 lucky bitch

Cindy Crawford was studying engineering at Northwestern before she decided to give modeling a try.

In addition to Julia Louise Dreyfus,, other NU grads include Daphne Maxwell Reid, Jeri Ryan, Stephen Colbert, Anna Gunn, Ana Gasteyer, Kristen Schaal, and Zach Braff

Andre The Giant was a graduate of Sorbonne University

Graduating from Northwestern is about as impressive as graduating from NYU.

Nolan Gould and Ashton Kutcher

[quote] Ashton Kutcher

Receipts, please, R55.

[quote] Graduating from Northwestern

#9 in National Universities...

[quote] graduating from NYU

#35 in National Universities

But I will argue that, absent nepotism or bribery, being accepted to and graduating from either is indicative of a measure of intelligence. And that is the topic of thread.

So many big brains from Vassar!

And I went to Vassar!

I'm not sure how much of a "celebrity" he was, but guitar player Mike Bloomfield.

Cindy Crawford attended Northwestern for one semester. Sorry, not impressed.

My vote? Terri Garr.

Ellie Kemper has a degree from Princeton.

James Spader comes across in interviews as very bright. Same with DL fave, RDJ.

And although I'm a big Brooke Shields fan, I don't think she's terribly smart.

R57, the US News List, as well as most of them, is not much of a sign of anything. And didn't they all study Theatre at Northwestern?

Sigourney Weaver and RDJ strike me as two of the smartest celebrities.

Angela Bassett, Yale B.A. and M.A..

RDJ?

DL fave Shelley Hack is a Smithie!

Lisa Kudrow co-authored papers in medical journals on headaches with her father.

Jodie has a quick wit in addition to the Yale degree.

Susanna Hoffs went to UC Berkeley & wrote an excellent novel.

Winnie from The Wonder Years is some kind of mathematician.

You is kind

You is smart

You is important

The overrated SNL alum cunt Kate McKinnon attended Columbia.

Have Einstein Visa and five language.

Low Radar Lez, Stephanie Zimbalist, attended Julliard.

Lisa Kudrow is legitimately one of the smartest people on this list. She was also the mastermind behind ensuring that the entire FRIENDS cast held out for, and got, a million dollars an episode toward the end of the show's run.

Phoebe Cates is also a Julliard alum.

Hedy Lamarr for the win. Exceptionally beautiful and brilliant.

Juilliard is prestigious, but I don't think, "Ah, that person must be smart," just because they went to Juilliard.

And that is how you spell it.

Colin Jost of SNL and Scarlett Johansson fame went to Harvard.

Julia Sweeney took a double major in economics and European history. While she was in the Groundlings, she supported herself as a studio accountant. Her one-woman shows are the product of a very bright mind.

[quote]I'm a very stable genius! R48

Not surprisingly, Orange It didn't read past the words "celebrities who are" before posting.

Spike Lee went to Moorehouse.

Childish Gannbino went to NYU.

R56 Ashton Kutcher 's IQ is known to be 160. Nolan Gould's IQ is 150.

On the flip side, Donald J Trump's IQ test from high school is rumored to be 73.

Regina Hall went to NYU.

[quote] Ashton Kutcher 's IQ is known to be 160.

I'd still like to see the actual test results, R82. But whatever.

R73 - Stephanie struck me as being intelligent and well spoken.

David Alan Grier

Sarah Bareilles

Brett Butler

Mary Tyler Moore had very little formal education but was like a sponge with information, especially current events.

Peter Weller has completed his Ph.D. in art history at UCLA.

David Duchovny Phi Beta Kappa at Princeton, Masters from Yale

Peter Weller likes to call himself Dr. Peter Weller after getting that PhD, which I find obnoxious.

Common dude you're Robocop.

Dr. Robocop, if you must

Arnold Schwarzenegger seems under-rated for smarts. His trajectory can’t all be luck and lifting weights. He came to the US, learned the language, and worked his ass off in school and as an investor while doing all that working out.

Ashley Judd earned a MPA from Harvard Kennedy School. She was enrolled in a PhD program at Berkeley a few years ago when migraines struck her and she had to take a leave of absence. Not sure if she returned.

Didn't Jayne Mansfield have a genius IQ?

R91 Sophia Loren said that during their famously photographed meeting she found herself increasingly impressed by Mansfield's wittiness and conversation and left thinking quite highly of her.

Her high IQ, as well as her brain, went out the window in New Orleans one rainy night.

R93, yes, that's right.

Have a cookie.

Carol Channing went to Bennington College, and was considered an expert on Greek Tragedy.

Isn't Sharon Stone a Mensa member?

Dunno, but Gena Davis used to crow about how she was.

Courtney Love—Portland State dropout; audited theology classes at Trinity College in Dublin for a stint. Not much for academic credentials. I know people hate her and her thoughts may be disorganized, but she is extremely well-read and very intelligent.

Trump went to both Fordham and UPenn both very acclaimed schools.

[quote] very acclaimed schools

Oh, my, R99.

It’s Hedley!

I'm surprised how middle brow and bourgeois this listicle is. It's mostly a celebs who graduated from good schools. Seems a pretty lazy indicator of remarkable intelligence. Sure lots of Ivy and Seven Sister grads are clever but lots are not. I say that having 2 Ivy degrees myself.

Courtney Love has little higher education but clearly she's intelligent. If also batshit. Dolly Parton has no fancy schooling but seems highly intelligent.

Snoop Dogg is intelligent. Has a bit of city college.

Have you met people who went to Barnard, Vassar, and Harvard?

They are not all intelligent.

Of course not, R104, just like there are geniuses who went to Northwestern or NYU.

Barbie.

Since her creation in 1959, Barbie has had over 250 careers ranging from cheerleader to robotics engineer and everything in between.

I want to Gleason’s to got a BAA in potatoes salid

Can confirm that Jodie is a cunning linguist.

R77, thank you for the spelling correction on Juilliard. I'm embarrassed I never noticed that.

R107 Brendad majored in fishing for trouser gravy

[quote]Spike Lee went to Moorehouse.

Oh, dear.

Spike Lee also went to film school at NYU.

Geena Davis - very smart, high IQ, fluent in Swedish, lots of other cool stories about her

[quote] Have you met people who went to Barnard, Vassar, and Harvard? They are not all intelligent.

The vast majority of them are.

Vassar admitted a lot of pleasant jock males for years, after the trustees had a snit fit in the early 80s about the number of gay men who had been admitted. I don't know if the admission standards for men became tighter but I imagine they eventually did.

Well something became tighter, R115.

Ted Nougat

Kevin Sherbert

Scott Banjo

Rosanne Burp

MELANIE

Sharon Stone is very smart!

Sigourney Weaver, Holly Hunter, Kristin Scott Thomas

I went to an Ivy League school myself, but it's funny to me that this is about celebrities who were "actually intelligent" and the first several posts are all about the schools some stars went to and the degrees some of them have. I hardly ever think of one's level of education as proof of intelligence.

[quote]I hardly ever think of one's level of education as proof of intelligence.

While it's not going to discriminate finely among individuals, in aggregate I'd suspect that you could generalize people into tiers of intelligence based on school and level of education.

Obviously performance at the school makes a bigger difference - I'd argue that top 5% of students at any school would be among the top 5% at any school.

Still, I bet there is a very high correlation between school and intelligence.

Those celebrities went to Harvard before it was okay to plagiarize, so they must be bright.

quote [I hardly ever think of one's level of education as proof of intelligence.]

And you don't see color when you look at someone, either, right, R120?

Olivia Jade went to USC before she realized that she would have to actually attend classes and not just party, so she dropped out. Of course, she got in by fraud, so she wasn't intelligent.

Which celebrities attended Trump University?

Donald J. Trump has a degree from U. Penn, so he must be intelligent.

R126, I would not say there are many idiots on this thread, especially who are that idiotic.

R126 I only introduced the comment about the prestigious universities he attended because the OP started on that note and many on DL always name drop fancy schools as a signifier of intelligence. I went to NYU myself. Don’t Trump is also a DL villain and just awful so he can’t be smart right. Again this is not argument for Trump, it’s an argument for the critique of the status quo of the mindset on this site.

Harvard will give a degree to literally anyone.

Dick Cavett, M.A. Yale

[quote] Harvard will give a degree to literally anyone.

Anyone with two million dollars.

I went to Oxford.

R123 is a prime example of self-owning.

Not really, R133. That was merely a typo of a feature on the board. If you can read, the sentiment of the post still stands.

Poor dear, just take the L

[quote] Olivia Jade went to USC before she realized that she would have to actually attend classes and not just party, so she dropped out. Of course, she got in by fraud, so she wasn't intelligent.

Actually once she started attending lectures she seemed to enjoy it more. It was the scandal and social stigma that caused her to leave USC, and that wasn’t helped by the fact that USC put all accounts associated with the admissions scandal on hold, so she couldn’t sign up for classes for the next semester.

I believe she signed up for a community college in LA.

She never said she was an intellect or scholar. She was very frank about being the opposite.

Dear, R135, go fuck yourself.

Celebrities are stupid. Next.

Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum always struck me as a super cute big brained couple back in the day

Supreme Court Justice Mike Branson

Elizabeth Banks went to U Penn. She produces and directs so at least she was smart enough to know she couldn’t get by on her looks forever.

Streisand graduated from high school two years early, at the age of 16, placing fourth in her class. She credits her intelligence and thirst for knowledge from her father, who supposedly had a very high IQ and was an intelligent man.

Somebody already probably said Gina Davis but then like she was on wait wait don't tell me her her clip of when she was on earlier this year she sounds old now but she's probably still smart.

Brian May, Frank Zappa, and Conan O'Brien.

[quote] Spike Lee went to Moorehouse.

I hope he's smart enough to know it's spelled "Morehouse."

R145, see R111.

[quote] Streep - Vassar and Yale

Streep went to Yale Drama School.

That’s StreiSAND, like sand on the beach, R142.

Frank Sinatra quit high school in the 10th grade.

Most definitely Stephen Colbert, the wittiest man that I've ever met.

I worked with an actor who graduated from Yale, and admitted he was coked out during his time there. I asked him, "How in the hell did you graduate?"He replied that once you're in, it was easy to pass classes. So he either was incredibly smart, or Yale is that easy. Or maybe a combo of both.

R120 That's not an apt comparison.

R147 So if she went to Yale Law School, that would be proof she's intelligent, but not drama school?

[quote]I worked with an actor who graduated from Yale, and admitted he was coked out during his time there. I asked him, "How in the hell did you graduate?"He replied that once you're in, it was easy to pass classes. So he either was incredibly smart, or Yale is that easy. Or maybe a combo of both.

Are you sure it was an actor and not George W. Bush?

Going to any drama school, even Yale or Juilliard, has no bearing on intelligence, just skill in acting. So, yes, R152.

R154 I've been an actor and I can tell you, if you don't think it requires intelligence, you don't know much. Especially on the stage.

I'm not saying acting doesn't require some intelligence. But not intellect. The better actors usually are intelligent.

Tyra Banks went to Harvard.

Haha. I love it when people claim to have “gone to Harvard.” Harvard Extension and Harvard Divinity School are not Harvard. You got the money, congratulations, you’re in.

Based on her internet "quotes" Marilyn Monroe was was Albert Einstein with a rack.

My husband has had the opportunity to interview several A list celebrities, Jodie Foster, Natalie Portman and Tommy Lee Jones stand out among the most intelligent and down to earth. He said he was surprised to discover how intelligent Annette Bening and Tom Hanks are. He thought Bening would be "kind of like a political wife" but he said she was "whip smart" and asked him almost as many questions as she asked him. He saw her 2 years later, and she remembered him and details about the conversation he had forgotten. He also said Tom Hanks was the most in real life charismatic celeb he talked to. Hanks was self-deprecating and announced he realized he wasn't the kind of actor who "transforms" and really was in awe of those that do. He also had a background in Shakespeare and the classics that surprised him

SCHOOLS DOES NOT EQUAL INTELLIGENCE little ones.

[quote] SCHOOLS DOES NOT

One of my friends worked closely with French legend Jeanne Moreau in the 90s. She was very sharp and well read.

And I didn’t get to know him well, but I met Max von Sydow at an art gallery in my late teens but he struck me as far more intelligent than the typical actor.

Formal education doesn't truly mean anything - I know plenty of people with degrees from high ranking institutions who are small minded, they just are able to achieve a certain level of purely academic proficiency.

[quote] Joan Rivers went to Barnard

That overrated cunt Greta Gerwig also went to Barnard.

[Quote] Graduating from Northwestern is about as impressive as graduating from NYU.

or Harvard

Although they are known to be well-educated women, Jodie Foster, Sigourney Weaver and Gillian Anderson all possess a tight-lipped seriousness when they act which makes them appear to be highly intelligent.

Thin lips are usually a sign of intelligence in actresses.

Helen Hunt

Elizabeth Taylor was very intelligent and a very savvy businesswoman.

R170, face it - she was the slut of all time.

[quote]Elizabeth Taylor was very intelligent and a very savvy businesswoman.

Perhaps, but when I read that she and Richard Burton repeatedly came so bombed out of their minds to the elaborate gigantic stage set of "Boom!" representing Sissy Goforth's Sardinia mansion that they not only thought it was a real house but they would ask the director Joseph Losey if they could buy it, I ceased to respect the intelligence of either actor.

(^.^) 🤪🤣😁😆😅😂🤪

RDJ is a high-school drop-out.

Still sharp as a tack.

I never heard that Whoopi Goldberg graduated from anywhere in particular.

She's eccentric and increasingly irascible, but very intelligent.

On the other hand I went to Vassar with Justin Long and later Anne Hathaway and can vouchsafe for their intelligence, especially Anne, who was an English major. Both nice people too.

[quote]Perhaps, but when I read that she and Richard Burton repeatedly came so bombed out of their minds to the elaborate gigantic stage set of "Boom!" representing Sissy Goforth's Sardinia mansion that they not only thought it was a real house but they would ask the director Joseph Losey if they could buy it, I ceased to respect the intelligence of either actor.

John Waters points out that the set was outdoors without a roof, but they still thought it was real.

[Quote] I never heard that Whoopi Goldberg graduated from anywhere in particular.

[Quote] She's eccentric and increasingly irascible, but very intelligent.

[quote] Seems a pretty lazy indicator of remarkable intelligence.

R102, perhaps that’s because the topic is celebrities who are “actually intelligent”, not celebrities who are “remarkably intelligent”. I think one standard deviation above average IQ (that is, an IQ above 115) qualifies as "actually intelligent", given that it applies to only 16% of the population. The majority of people who graduate from a top-ranked university meet at least that fairly low bar. An “actually intelligent” person can be a genius or just somewhat smarter than average.

A list of celebrities who are or were on the far right of the IQ bell curve would be a short list because very few people, famous or otherwise, are that intelligent.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders - Ouachita Baptist University (BA) in Arkadelphia, AR.

Faye Dunaway - (BFA) Boston University

Speaking of Ol’ Burton, he came off as extremely intelligent and a big reader from his diaries, which are some of my favorite celebrity ones save Warhol’s. He was a total cunt who seemed to hate that he was self aware about being a sell out who wasted a lot of his potential for quick cash and booze. His bitchy loathing of most Hollywood types was probably because he was often the smartest in the room.

On the other side of things, Marlon Brando seemed like a moron. Very talented and intuitive (at least before he went insane) but not sharp. Truman Capote said this after profiling him in that iconic New Yorker piece.

[quote] On the other side of things, Marlon Brando seemed like a moron.

R180, did you see the documentary on Brando? He was far from a moron.

And I don’t know if you can call what Liz had intelligence, savvy is probably the correct word. Great people skills too. I’m not trying to diminish her, but I think she had resilience and strength rather than just plain smarts, which allowed her to outlast her peers and power through being on her death bed every other year. Among other things. One tough broad.

[quote] Joan Rivers went to Barnard

As did Greta Gerwig and Martha Stewart.

Funky Dineva went to Florida State University and got his degree in economics.

I do not know if actors are more intelligent, but in general I find they are better read and know alot more about history and philosophy than people in other fields.

R185, whom do you know? I certainly wouldn't make such a claim, and I know a lot of actors.

Lydia Cornell is a Russian language/European art scholar. Seriously.

[quote] and know alot

Bootsy Whiteclaw

Truman Capote stated he had very high scores on IQ tests when he was young. In some versions, his score was 215--in others, it was 185. In either case, if true, he was a genius.

Here he is telling one version of the story in an appearance on the Dick Cavett Show.

Albert Einstein is said to have had an IQ somewhere between 160 - 180. So Trump Capote was significantly smarter than Einstein, but didn't have the smarts to comprehend that chain smoking and heavy drinking was going to kill him early?

Being intellectually smart doesn't prevent a person from having emotional and psychological problems and then making poor choices while running from them, R191.

Capote said in an interview on the Stanley Siegal Show, while under the influence of something, when asked by Siegel what was going to happen if he kept on drinking and using drugs, that it would kill him. He knew.

Einstein's personal life was also far from perfect.

I am not convinced about how smart Lisa Kudrow is supposed to be. Yes she is good at impro but the outtakes of her laughing on Friends seemed to be in response to the dumbest things.

Liza Minnelli solved Fermat's Last Theorem as part of her doctoral mathematics dissertation from MIT.

R193, your mastery of logic makes your intelligence clear.

I have to mention two people I met and spent some time with. Don Ameche popped up behind me at Mass one day and had the most encyclopedic knowledge of Hollywood cinema of anyone I ever spoke with, including my professors in film. Dennis Fariña was around for a workshop and had this incredible talent to put people at ease, to meet them at any level, and I always think of this as a kind of genius in itself, especially if you've had the experience of dealing with people who are difficult

Anyway, both those guys were the kind of people you think, "Man. What a helluva guy..." later.

Joan Allen must be a genius.

[quote]Albert Einstein is said to have had an IQ somewhere between 160 - 180.

I have an IQ of 162. Believe me, I'm no Einstein.

It's just a number. Although maybe that explains why I sometimes feel that I'm surrounded by idiots.

R199