Former Glee cast member Lea Michele has been the subject of a rumor that she can’t read. It started in 2018 when a 40-minute video, “Lea Michele is Illiterate” was posted, which made theories that the American actress was illiterate. This was based on Glee co-star Naya Rivera’s memoir claiming that Michele refused to improvise her lines on the Fox series and other kinds of “evidence.” The video went viral on TikTok five years later and became a long-running meme. The Scream Queens actress finally addresses those wild rumors, but I’m not sure the internet will let this go.
In the past, Lea Michele has gotten real about the internet rumors of being illiterate, saying that she knew her lines on Glee (which can be streaming on your Hulu subscription) every single day. On an episode of Therapuss with Jake Shane, the Emmy nominee wasn’t having it, where she expressed her disbelief at still talking about this rumor “all these years later” and that it couldn’t be further from the truth:
For everyone who thinks that I can’t fucking read, I was on the debate team. I would write speeches. [...] I’m one of the only women in my whole family to get accepted to college. My mother and my mother’s whole family was extremely poor from the Bronx, not very well educated, and my parents moved me from the Bronx to New Jersey to get a good education and to thrive, and I did.
I never for a second would have believed those bonkers rumors that Lea Michele couldn’t read. In fact, the talented actress credited her “photographic memory” for being able to successfully memorize her lines to play Rachel Berry. There’s no way you could be a grown working star on TV and Broadway and not be able to able to read your script or sheet music. While Michele was homeschooled when she was around 11 when she performed in Ragtime, she did have a high school education at Tenafly High School, where she was on the volleyball team, choir, and debate team, as she said.
Sadly, I feel like all of the evidence in the world wouldn’t be enough for internet users to believe that Lea Michele is literate. It’s like people would prefer to listen to TikTok conspiracy theories compared to the truth straight out of the actress’s mouth. In order to further prove her point, Michele took Jake Shane’s flashcards on the episode and read them out loud beautifully. Not a single stutter. But, the “Cannonball” singer predicted that people online will speculate that Shane “called her in advance” to “memorize” those cards.
As unfortunate as it is that Lea Michele has gotten caught up in the rumor mill about being illiterate, she’s tackled other previous speculation battles before. Back in 2016, after Ok! Magazine said the New Year’s Eve actress had an unhealthy binge eating habit, Michele responded through laughter and an overdramatic reading of the article. She was also the subject of backlash when Glee co-star Samantha Ware alleged Michele made the TV set intolerable, which inspired other performers from the show to chime in their thoughts on the Funny Girl actress. She responded by returning to Instagram, saying she was sorry for her “shortcomings” and would reflect on “any pain” her actions on the Ryan Murphy show may have caused.
Lea Michele should not have had to prove on Therapuss with Jake Shane that she could read. But now that she has, hopefully the internet will finally drop this rumor about her being illiterate. But even if internet users are stubborn and will still come up with “evidence-based” conspiracy theories about the Golden Globe nominee, at least Michele can reclaim some control over the narrative and laugh about the outlandish rumor.
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