Not everyone's childhood is filled with unfettered sunshine. Many celebrities and beloved public figures come with baggage from their past before they rose to prominence.
Here are 20 iconic figures with troubled histories.
1
Woody Harrelson
Harrelson’s father worked as a hitman.
2
Joaquin Phoenix
Phoenix was born into The Children of God cult, infamous for its abuse.
3
Charles Dickens
Dickens tried to have his wife committed to an asylum to facilitate an affair with a teenager.
4
Mark Wahlberg
In 1992 Wahlberg fractured his neighbor’s jaw in an attack "without provocation or cause.”
5
P. T. Barnum
The “showman” locked people in cages, enslaved others, and used it all for experiments and “show.”
6
Andy Warhol
Warhol was a domestic abuser and generally nasty man.
7
Steve Jobs
Jobs denied paternity to his daughter for many years, ordered DNA testing, and remained antagonistic after accepting the results of the tests.
8
Alfred Hitchcock
Many consider Alfred Hitchcock the greatest director of all time, but he regularly mistreated actors to an extreme degree.
9
Coco Chanel
Evidence suggests that Chanel cooperated with Germany during World War II, even working as a spy.
10
Marilyn Monroe
Monroe lived in foster care after living with her abusive mother. She was also forced to marry young by her mother.
11
Matthew Broderick
Broderick was involved in a car accident that tragically killed two people.
12
Colonel Sanders
In what was ruled self defense, Sanders shot a man over a billboard sign dispute by his gas station.
13
Stephen Colbert
Colbert’s father and two older brothers were killed in a plane crash.
14
Charlize Theron
Theron’s mother killed her father in self defence when Theron was still a teenager.
15
Tina Fey
Fey was brutally attacked as a five-year-old, but recovered.
16
Laura Bush
As a high schooler, Bush killed another student in a car accident.
17
Tim Allen
The actor and comedian was arrested for bringing drugs through JFK airport when he was younger.
18
Robert Downey Jr.
The actor’s former struggles with drugs are well documented, along with his abusive childhood.
19
Sherman Kelly
Kelly wrote the lyrics for “Dancing in the Moonlight” while recovering from an attack on him and his wife by a youth gang.
20
Chuck E Cheese
The cannon for Chuck E Cheese has the mouse celebrating birthdays because he, as an orphan, never knew the date of his own.
