Hedy Lamarr (née Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler)

Born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, Hedy Lamarr's parentage was about as Jewish as a matzo ball in a synagogue. Her mother, Gertrud (née Lichtwitz), was a Budapest-born pianist, and her father, Emil Kiesler, was a Lemberg (now Lviv) bank director. Both parents were secular Jews, with her mother having converted to Catholicism, and Hedy herself was raised Catholic. So, religiously, she barely dipped a toe into the tribe, but ancestrally, she's practically royalty.

After a scandalous European film career that included a nude scene in Ecstasy, she fled to Hollywood, reinventing herself as Hedy Lamarr. Her on-screen persona was pure glamour, starring in classics like Algiers and Samson and Delilah. She was known as