From Hollywood icons to Olympic champions, these celebrities have spoken candidly about growing up adopted.

11 celebrities you didn’t know were adopted

From Hollywood icons to Olympic champions, these celebrities have spoken candidly about growing up adopted.

By Brianna Zigler

July 13, 2026 12:00 p.m. ET

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Nicole Richie in 2024; Kristin Chenoweth in 2025; Jamie Foxx in 2026. Credit:

Amy Sussman/Getty; Bruce Glikas/WireImage; Frazer Harrison/Getty

This week, *Little House on the Prairie* star Melissa Gilbert made a shocking family discovery.

After being adopted at birth, Gilbert searched for her biological family and discovered she had three half-siblings on her father’s side. Though those relationships proved a bit “fraught,” as Gilbert put it, she recently learned she also has three biological brothers on her mother’s side.

Of course, Gilbert’s adoption story is far from unique — and she’s far from the only major star to have been adopted or to have spent time in the foster care system.

Ahead, ** looks at 11 stars you may not have known were adopted.

Simone Biles

Simone Biles poses at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Bercy Arena on August 01, 2024 in Paris, France.

Jamie Squire/Getty

Before Simone Biles was a superstar gymnast, she spent part of her childhood in foster care. She reflected on the experience in a 2023 interview with CNN, explaining that she and her three siblings spent several years in the foster care system.

“I just remember, like, us as kids being so hungry and then I just remember this cat that would get fed and not, like, quite us,” she said of life before entering foster care. “And so we were taken and, thankfully, we actually got to stay in one foster home and we were all together … it was some of the best times ever. We were just so excited.”

At age 6, Biles and her younger sister, Adria, were adopted by their maternal grandparents, Ron and Nellie Biles. Their two older siblings, Tevin and Ashley, were adopted by Ron Biles’ sister and raised in Cleveland.

Kristin Chenoweth

Kristin Chenoweth backstage at the closing performance of the Broadway musical ‘The Queen of Versailles’ on Broadway at The St. James Theatre on December 22, 2025 in New York City.

Bruce Glikas/WireImage

In 2015, Broadway star Kristin Chenoweth wrote an essay about being adopted at birth for National Adoption Day.

“I’ve always known that I was adopted,” she wrote for PEOPLE. “It was never a secret or kept from me.”

Chenoweth went on to discuss how her adoptive parents described her as being “chosen,” which she felt was a “wonderful” way to put it. “First of all, it’s a blessing (and a huge sacrifice) for a birth parent to make the decision to give his/her baby a better life,” she wrote. “Sometimes people can’t take care of that baby just yet. (And their circumstances might change in 15 years.) But what a gift they are giving to both that child and the family who wants to adopt.”

Though she’s curious about her birth parents, she’s more than happy with the family she has, writing, “I have discovered a little bit about my biological parents, and each piece of information helps me, but ultimately I tell people: ‘I have my parents.’”

Lana Condor at Obsessed Fest held at nya Studios on June 27, 2026 in Los Angeles, California.

Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty

After Lana Condor found breakout success through the film adaptation of *To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before* (2018), it also gave her the opportunity to connect with a part of her heritage she hadn’t been able to experience growing up.

In the films, Condor’s character, Lara Jean Covey, is raised by her white father after her Korean mother dies when she’s just 9 years old. In the third film, *To All the Boys: Always and Forever* (2021), Lara Jean visits Seoul to feel closer to her late mother. Condor herself was adopted from Vietnam as an infant by a white family.

In 2019, Condor visited her birth country as part of an initiative led by former First Lady Michelle Obama to promote girls’ education. When she was 4 months old, her parents, Bob and Mary Condor, adopted her and her brother, Artie.

Reflecting on the experience in an interview with PEOPLE, Condor said, “When we landed my skin, my hair, my vision, every part of my physical being felt it knew it was in the environment where I was born. My hair looked so good!”

Jamie Foxx attends the 2026 BET Awards at Peacock Theater on June 28, 2026 in Los Angeles, California.

Frazer Harrison/Getty

Jamie Foxx was born Eric Marlon Bishop in Terrell, Tex. to birth parents Darrell Bishop and Louise Annette Talley Dixon. After his parents separated, Foxx’s mother realized she was not equipped for the responsibility of motherhood, which Foxx explained in his 2021 memoir, *Act Like You Got Some Sense.*

At seven months old, Foxx’s grandparents, Estelle and Mark Talley, took in Foxx and became his primary guardians. The Talleys were actually Louise’s biological aunt and uncle, but could not have children of their own. They adopted Louise when her own birth mother was struggling to raise her and her siblings.

Thus, they took on the parental role once again with Foxx. On an episode of his game show *Beat Shazam**, *Foxx got emotional talking about his adoptive family.

“My grandmother ... that’s somebody who said, ‘I see something in that little boy that’s very special,’” he recalled. “And she made sure I had every tool that I needed to grow and expand. When you’re a kid, you just want to be loved, and my grandmother loved me.”

Debbie Harry

Debbie Harry attends the ‘Supergirl’ New York Premiere on June 22, 2026 in New York City.

TheStewartofNY/FilmMagic

“Heart of Glass” rocker Debbie Harry opened up to *The Times* in 2025 about being adopted. The Blondie singer and *Videodrome* star was born in Florida, the result of an extramarital affair, and was placed for adoption at three months old.

She explained that she eventually hired a private detective to track down her birth mother, who turned out to be a concert pianist who didn’t want a relationship with Harry. “As an adult I had to respect that. If I’d found that out when I was a child it would have been crushing,” she admitted.

Harry’s adoptive parents were ultimately very traditional, and she always knew she wouldn’t have the normal life they wanted of her. “I wanted to get out in the world. Maybe if I’d have been madly in love I would have settled down, but it wasn’t like that for me. I had ambition,” she said.

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Keegan-Michael Key

Keegan-Michael Key attends the 75th NBA All-Star Game at Intuit Dome on February 15, 2026, in Inglewood, Calif.

Allen Berezovsky/Getty

The *Key & Peele* comedian discussed his adoption story—and how it has continued to shape him in adulthood—during a 2021 episode of *Running Wild with Bear Grylls*.

“I have a people-pleasing issue,” Keegan-Michael Key admitted to Grylls. “I do think it comes from being adopted. I think people who are adopted have this kind of situation where you go, ‘I’m going to do everything everybody else tells me, because I don’t want to get abandoned again.’ I think that happens to people.”

However, it was never a secret that Key had been adopted. “It was something my parents had always told me,” he explained. “I think they were trying to make me feel special. Like, ‘Hey, we picked you, and you’re special.’”

In 2015, Key told *The New Yorker* that he discovered he had several biological siblings after meeting his birth mother. “I literally went to bed one day with one sibling and woke up the next morning with seven,” he said.

Ray Liotta at the Festival Honors & Variety’s 10 Actors To Watch presented by Newport Beach Film Festival at The Balboa Bay Club And Resort on October 24, 2021 in Newport Beach, California.

Tiffany Rose/Getty

When Ray Liotta learned that he had been adopted at six months old, he harbored anger at his birth parents for their willingness to give him up. Over time, however, the late *Goodfellas* actor made peace with it.

“At first, I didn’t understand how a parent could give up a child,” Liotta told PEOPLE. “So, I had that kind of energy of just being like, that’s just f---ed up. And then you realize, when I finally met my birth mom and my birth siblings ... in my 40s, by then, I wasn’t as angry about it happening. I don’t know. It’s just another journey.”

Liotta, who was adopted in 1955 by parents Alfred and Mary, felt a newfound appreciation for his lot in life.

“After years, you grow up, and you just see the pattern of things. I’ve definitely developed more patience. Now, I’m grateful for my health. And being born. For my parents that adopted me. I mean, it could have gone a lot of different ways,” he admitted.

Frances McDormand

Frances McDormand attends the Los Angeles premiere of ‘Women Talking’ at Samuel Goldwyn Theater on November 17, 2022 in Beverly Hills, California.

Michael Tullberg/FilmMagic

Oscar winner Frances McDormand was born Cynthia Smith in 1957 and was later adopted by Noreen and Vernon McDormand, a deeply religious couple. She first came to them at age 1 as one of nine foster children they cared for and ultimately became the last of three children they formally adopted.

“They take in strays. They also have nine cats,” McDormand said of her adoptive parents in a 2003 interview with *The New Yorker*.

McDormand and her husband, director Joel Coen, also adopted a child. In 1995, they welcomed their son, Pedro, from Paraguay when he was 6 months old.

Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe on Aug. 5, 1962.

Marilyn Monroe, the ill-fated icon of mid-century Hollywood, had a notoriously difficult upbringing. She spent most of her early childhood in a foster home after being placed there by her troubled mother, Gladys, when she was only 2 weeks old. Gladys had already had two children taken from her by her ex-husband.

Still, Gladys visited Monroe frequently, and Monroe returned to her mother’s care when she was 7 years old. That reunion was brief, however, as her mother was soon diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and committed to a psychiatric hospital. After spending years in various unpleasant foster homes and orphanages, Monroe moved in with a family friend named Grace McKee Goddard when she was 11.

Monroe wrote fondly of Goddard in her posthumously published memoir, *My Story*: “If not for Grace I would have been sent to a state or country institution where there are fewer privileges, such as being allowed to have a Christmas tree or seeing a movie sometimes,” she wrote.

Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi

Nicole Polizzi attends the ‘Jersey Shore Family Vacation’ Premiere at Marquee New York on April 23, 2026 in New York City.

Manny Carabel/Getty

Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi became famous as a “guidette” on *Jersey Shore*. The hit reality series followed a group of young adults living together in Seaside Heights, N.J., and became notorious for its cast’s outrageous behavior and embrace of Italian stereotypes.

Many viewers were surprised to learn that Snooki, who embraced an Italian identity on the show and was raised in an Italian family, is not ethnically Italian. She was adopted from Santiago, Chile, at 6 months old by Helen and Andrew Polizzi.

“I was always meant to be with my adoptive parents, which I don’t even, ew, I hate saying adoptive parents because they are my parents, it’s weird,” she said in a 2018 YouTube vlog.

“Even though my nationality is Chilean, I grew up Italian,” she continued. “So when people ask me what my nationality is, I say, ‘I’m Chilean but I grew up Italian.’ I feel like I’m both.”

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Nicole Richie

Nicole Richie attends the Carlos Eric Lopez’s Fourth Annual Dí­a de Muertos Gala at Paramount Pictures Studios on November 01, 2024 in Hollywood, California.

Amy Sussman/Getty

When Nicole Richie was 3 years old, her biological parents, Peter Michael Escovedo and Karen Moss, decided they could no longer afford to care for her. They left her in the care of family friend Lionel Richie.

Lionel Richie and his first wife, Brenda Harvey, became Nicole’s legal guardians before officially adopting her when she was 9 years old. In a 2018 interview with *DuJour*, Richie reflected on how, after Lionel and Harvey divorced in 1993, they sometimes overcompensated by spoiling her.

“Their way of making me happy was to say yes to everything I wanted, but I don’t think a little girl should have that much freedom,” Richie recalled.

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