Actress Lea Michele recently had a few things to say about people spreading false rumors about her, especially the one where people have been circulating that she can’t read.
This rumor appeared more than a decade ago
Michele, 38, has been subject to a wild conspiracy theory for more than a decade since her days on Glee.
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The rumor goes that she doesn’t know how to read, and that she gets other people to recite her lines to her so she can memorize and deliver them.
She spoke about it with Jake Shane
In an episode of the Therapuss with Jake Shane podcast on Thursday, May 8, Michele addressed the rumor and gave details on how she first learnt about it.
She said, “For everyone who thinks that I can’t fucking read I was on the debate team. I would write speeches.”
Shane asked her if it frustrates her
The host went on to ask Michele, “You must think that rumor is hysterical, or does it really piss you off?” to which she replied, “It depends on the day.”
“Sometimes I think it’s crazy that people care enough about me that they would make up something. That someone has so little to do in their life in their day that they would waste it on me is hilarious to me,” Michele said.
There are moments that bother her
“And then there are moments where I fucking get so frustrated by it because I’m one of the only women in my whole family to get accepted to college,” she added.
She went on to give background on her life, saying, “You know 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.”
Michele pointed out the effort her parents went to
The actress explained, “My parents and my family are so proud of that, and it really was so important for my grandmother to see me, and for someone to minimize that, it’s so sad and so frustrating. But yeah, I don’t know — it’s wild. It’s a crazy thing.”
She recalled the time she found out about the rumor
Michele recalled the first time she found out about the rumor, sharing that Glee creator Ryan Murphy was the one to tell her about it in 2015.
“I’ll never forget the same day that all came out Donald Trump said he was going to punch John McCain in the face or something like that. It was 2015 and he said something so wild but what was trending online more was Lea Michele can’t read,” she said.
Michele asked Shane for his notes to read
“Ryan Murphy called me and was like, ‘Have you heard this rumor?’ and I was like, ‘No, what’s going on?’ and the fact that we are here all these years later,” she added.
Then, on the podcast, Michele asked for Shane’s notes to prove she can read in real time, saying, “Give me the notes, I’m reading them! I didn’t memorize them! Jonathan [Groff] is not here to read me this shit.”
She realized people will make theories anyway
The actress said that it doesn’t matter if she tries to disprove the idea that she can’t read, people would just make theories about that too.
“The theories, oh my god the theories, they’re going to be like Jake called her in advance. This doesn’t prove anything. She memorized it. She saw the cards in advance,” Lea said. “This proves nothing.”
Michele also confirmed she does memorize her lines
Although she can clearly read, the actress also seemed to confirm that she memorizes her lines, saying. “I have photographic memory, too. How do you think I memorized all those Rachel Berry speeches?”
I think it’s safe to assume a person can have the ability to read and memorize at the same time.