Celebrity Activists
by Devans00 | created - 08 Dec 2014 | updated - 16 Dec 2015 | PublicFamous people with a cause or more. They leverage their fame and big name to bring attention to issues important to them. I respect the fact that they use their fame for more than cutting in lines at restaurants and getting into night clubs. Inclusion doesn't mean support, just acknowledgement.
1. Lauren Bacall
Actress | To Have and Have Not
Lauren Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske on September 16, 1924, in New York City. She was the daughter of Natalie Weinstein-Bacal, a Romanian Jewish immigrant, and William Perske, who was born in New Jersey, to Polish Jewish parents. Her family was middle-class, with her father working as a ...
Liberal politics.
2. Harry Belafonte
Actor | Bobby
Harold George Belafonte was born on March 1, 1927 in New York City. He was educated at the New York Dramatic Workshop. He grew up in Jamaica, British West Indies, and did folk-singing in nightclubs and theaters, and on television and records. His debut was at the Village Vanguard in New York. Also,...
Civil rights and other causes.
3. Matt Damon
Actor | Good Will Hunting
Matthew Paige Damon was born on October 8, 1970, in Boston, Massachusetts, to Kent Damon, a stockbroker, realtor and tax preparer, and Nancy Carlsson-Paige, an early childhood education professor at Lesley University. Matt has an older brother, Kyle, a sculptor. His father was of English and ...
Water.org and other Africa humanitarian groups
4. Ruby Dee
Actress | American Gangster
Ruby Dee was an American actress, poet, playwright, screenwriter, journalist and civil rights activist. She is best known for originating the role of "Ruth Younger" in the stage and film versions of A Raisin in the Sun (1961).
She also starred in The Jackie Robinson Story (1950), Cat People (1982), ...
Civil Rights
5. John Fugelsang
Actor | Coyote Ugly
John Fugelsang was born on September 3, 1969 in Long Island, New York, USA. He is an actor and writer, known for Coyote Ugly (2000), Somewhere in the City (1998) and Price Check (2012). He has been married to Charmien LaFramenta since February 29, 2004. They have one child.
Earns the title of Social a Justice Warrior, SJW. He's all about fairness and equality around a range of human issues. Part of the Sexy Liberals group of actors and comedians.
6. Audrey Hepburn
Actress | Breakfast at Tiffany's
Audrey Hepburn was born as Audrey Kathleen Ruston on May 4, 1929 in Ixelles, Brussels, Belgium. Her mother, Baroness Ella Van Heemstra, was a Dutch noblewoman, while her father, Joseph Victor Anthony Ruston, was born in Úzice, Bohemia, to English and Austrian parents.
After her parents' divorce, ...
Goodwill Ambassador of UNICEF and humanitarian efforts.
7. Eva Longoria
Actress | Desperate Housewives
Eva Jacqueline Longoria was born on March 15, 1975 in Corpus Christi, Texas to Ella Eva Longoria (née Mireles), a special education teacher & Enrique Longoria Jr., a rancher. The youngest of four sisters who grew up in a Mexican-American family on a ranch near Corpus Christi, Longoria attended ...
Philanthropist for various causes.
8. Edward James Olmos
Actor | Battlestar Galactica
Born February 24, 1947, in East Los Angeles, at The First Japanese Hospital to Pedro Olmos and Eleanor Huizar. Raised on Cheesebrough's Lane, he attended Greenwood Elementary and Montebello Junior High. He then graduated from Montebello High School in 1964. After which he received an Associative ...
Humanitarian who devotes time and energy to a wide variety of causes.
9. Elliot Page
Actor | Juno
Elliot Page was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia to Martha Philpotts, a teacher, and Dennis Page, a graphic designer. Page wanted to start acting at an early age and attended the Neptune Theater School. They began their career at the age of 10 on the award-winning television series Pit Pony (1999), for...
LGBTQ rights activist.
10. Kal Penn
Actor | Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle
Kal Penn was born and raised in Montclair, New Jersey, to Asmita, a fragrance evaluator, and Suresh Modi, an engineer. His parents are Gujarati immigrants to America from India. He attended the Freehold Regional High School District's Performing Arts High School where he participated in the ...
Various roles and activities with the President Barack Obama Administration.
11. Wendell Pierce
Actor | The Wire
Wendell Edward Pierce is an American actor and businessman. He is known for roles in HBO dramas such as Detective Bunk Moreland in The Wire and trombonist Antoine Batiste in Treme; as well as portraying James Greer in Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan, high-powered attorney Robert Zane in Suits, and Michael ...
New Orleans philanthropist, capitalist and entrepreneur.
12. Mark Ruffalo
Actor | Spotlight
Award-winning actor Mark Ruffalo was born on November 22, 1967, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, of humble means to father Frank Lawrence Ruffalo, a construction painter and Marie Rose (Hebert), a stylist and hairdresser; his father's ancestry is Italian and his mother is of half French-Canadian and half ...
Water and renewable resources.
13. Maria Shriver
Actress | Last Action Hero
Maria Shriver was born on November 6, 1955 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. She is a producer and actress, known for Last Action Hero (1993), Still Alice (2014) and Paycheck to Paycheck: The Life and Times of Katrina Gilbert (2014). She was previously married to Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Alzheimer's and Special Olympics
14. Gary Sinise
Actor | Forrest Gump
Gary Alan Sinise was born in Blue Island, Illinois, to Mylles S. (Alsip) and Robert L. Sinise, A.C.E., a film editor. He is of Italian (from his paternal grandfather), English, Scottish, Irish, French, German, and Swedish ancestry. His family moved to Highland Park, where he attended high school. ...
Military and veteran causes.
15. Tracie Thoms
Actress | Rent
Tracie Thoms has had wide-ranging success in film, television and theatre throughout her busy career.
Tracie's currently a series regular opposite Oscar winner Octavia Spencer on the Apple series, Truth Be Told, while at the same time recurring on Fox's 9-1-1 and ABC's Station 19.
Tracie realized a ...
Anti police brutality
16. Betty White
Actress | The Proposal
Betty White was born in Oak Park, Illinois, to Christine Tess (Cachikis), a homemaker, and Horace Logan White, a lighting company executive for the Crouse-Hinds Electric Company. She was of Danish, Greek, English, and Welsh descent.
Although she was best known as the devious Sue Ann Nivens on the ...
Animal causes. Friend of Koko the Gorilla
17. Olivia Wilde
Actress | Tron: Legacy
Actress and activist Olivia Wilde is a modern day renaissance woman, starring in many acclaimed film productions, while simultaneously giving back to the community.
She was born on March 10, 1984 in New York City. Her parents are Leslie Cockburn (née Leslie Corkill Redlich) and Andrew Cockburn. Her ...
Artists for Peace and Justice Haiti and ACLU of Southern California among other organizations.
18. Will.i.am
Actor | X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Will.i.am was born on March 15, 1975 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He is a music artist and actor, known for X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009), Rio (2011) and Rio 2 (2014).
Technology related causes.
19. Jeffrey Wright
Actor | The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun
Born and raised in Washington DC, Jeffrey Wright graduated from Amherst College in 1987. Although he studied Political Science while at Amherst, Wright left the school with a love for acting. Shortly after graduating he won an acting scholarship to NYU, but dropped out after only two months to ...
Sierra Leone ebola and health education in Africa
20. Elizabeth Taylor
Actress | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was considered one of the last, if not the last, major star to have come out of the old Hollywood studio system. She was known internationally for her beauty, especially for her violet eyes, with which she captured audiences early in her youth and kept the world hooked ...
HIV and AIDS
21. Kathy Griffin
Actress | The Cable Guy
Kathy Griffin was raised in the near-west Chicago suburbs, in an Irish-American family. She has three older brothers and an older sister. When her parents retired to California, Kathy moved west with them after graduating from Oak Park River Forest High School, and began trying to break into show ...
Veterans
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