Veteran Hollywood actor Michael Douglas was shocked after discovering he is related to star Scarlett Johansson.
The 79-year-old star appeared on a series Finding Your Roots to delve into his ancestry, and he was stunned to find out that Scarlett, who he appeared alongside in 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, is a “DNA cousin” of his.
When told the news on the show, Douglas said: “Are you kidding? Oh, that’s amazing. All right. This is cool. This is so cool.”
Finding Your Roots presenter Henry Louis Gates Jr shared the news to Douglas. He told him that he and the 39-year-old actress “share identical branches of DNA on four different chromosomes,” reports state.
The presenter added that the branches of DNA “appear on Scarlett’s maternal lines, which stretch back to Jewish communities in Eastern Europe.”
Douglas said it was “incredible” to find out he and the actress were related, and he “looks forward” to seeing her again.
Filmmaker-writer Lena Dunham also discovered that she was related to a big star. While delving into her ancestry on the programme, Dunham found out comedy legend Larry David is her cousin.
She said: “My husband’s going to freak out! It’s Larry David! The other L.D.! This is the hottest information I could have ever got.”
The presenter told the filmmaker that she and her mother, Laurie Simmons, share “multiple long identical segments of DNA with the Curb Your Enthusiasm creator. To which, she replied: “This is incredible. You saved the best for last.”
