Michael Douglas discovers Marvel co-star is distant relative: ‘Are you kidding?’
Michael Douglas has discovered he is related to one of his Marvel co-stars.
The actor, who is the son of three-time Academy Award nominee Kirk Douglas and is married to Best Supporting Actress winner Catherine Zeta-Jones, appeared on an episode of genealogy series Finding Your Roots.
At the end of his segment on the episode, Douglas received a surprise from host Henry Louis Gates, who told the Ant-Man actor he is distantly related to one of his Marvel Cinematic universe (MCU) co-stars: Scarlett Johansson.
“Your DNA cousin is the actress Scarlett Johansson,” Gates told the star, who won Best Actor for Wall Street at the 1988 Oscars.
Gates added: “Michael and Scarlett share identical stretches of DNA on four different chromosomes, all of which appear on Scarlett’s maternal lines, which stretch back to Jewish communities in eastern Europe.”
Visibly surprised, Douglas said: “Are you kidding? Oh, that’s amazing. Alright, this is cool. This is so cool. That’s incredible.”
He said he “looks forward to seeing” Johansson again to inform her of their connection.
The actors both appeared in superhero mash-up Avengers: Endgame – Douglas as Hank Pym and Johansson as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow.
While Douglas has enjoyed a successful Hollywood career as an actor and producer since the 1970s, he does not want his children to follow in his footsteps.
In 2021, Zeta-Jones, whom he’s been married to for 23 years, revealed that Douglas warned their kids away from acting as he believes it is harder to succeed with famous parents.
Zeta-Jones said that Dylan, 23, and Carys, 21, want to follow in their parents’ footsteps, but said their Wall Street star father has tried to steer them away from the idea.
Douglas, who is 79, believes that they would have to work harder to overcome the association of who their parents are.
In the same episode of Finding Your Roots, Gates told Girls star Lena Dunham that she is a distant relative of Curb Your Enthusiasm’s Larry David.
Dunham replied: “It’s Larry David – the other LD! This is the hottest information I could have ever gotten.”
