Lea Michele is addressing the long-running internet meme about her literacy with a mix of humor and frustration. During her appearance on Jake Shane‘s Therapuss podcast, the Glee alum finally confronted the persistent online joke questioning her ability to read, expressing that she finds it “so sad and so frustrating.”
For years, Michele has been the subject of a viral internet theory suggesting she never learned to read. On Therapuss, she took the opportunity to set the record straight about her reading and writing capabilities, highlighting her academic achievements.
“For everyone who thinks that I can’t fucking read, I was on the debate team,” Michele told Shane. “I would write speeches.”
Michele has previously played along with the joke. In February of 2023, she shared a playful TikTok about her excitement to read Barbra Streisand‘s memoir, My Name Is Barbra. The post featured Michele appearing overwhelmed while displaying a screenshot of the book announcement, captioned: “265 days to learn to READ!!!!”
However, her feelings about the joke are complicated. When Shane inquired whether she loved or hated it, the Funny Girl star admitted that “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. 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.”
Michele shared that her maternal family came from humble beginnings in the Bronx, being “extremely poor” and “not very well educated.” Her parents relocated to New Jersey specifically to provide her with better educational opportunities. “For someone to minimize that, it’s so sad and so frustrating,” she explained. “It’s wild. It’s really wild. It’s a crazy thing.” Though Michele earned acceptance to New York University’s prestigious Tisch School of the Arts, she opted not to attend due to her burgeoning career.
Michele recounted the first time she encountered the rumor. “I’ll never forget—the same day that that all came out, Donald Trump said he was gonna punch John McCain in the face or something like that,” she said. “It was 2015 and he said something so wild, but what was trending online more was ‘Lea Michele can’t read.’” She then received a call from Glee producer Ryan Murphy. “Ryan Murphy called me and he was like, ‘Have you heard this rumor?’ And I was like, ‘No, what’s going on?’”
Determined to prove her literacy once and for all, Michele grabbed Shane’s notecards and began reading them out loud. She playfully stumbled over one word, then immediately addressed the inevitable skepticism: “Oh my gosh, here come the theories,” she quipped. “They’ll say, ‘Jake totally prepped her. This proves nothing. She memorized everything. She saw the cards beforehand. This isn’t real evidence.’”
She brought up her bestie and Spring Awakening co-star Jonathan Groff, referencing his defense of her in a previous interview: “Jonathan did this podcast where someone asked, ‘Can Lea actually read?’ and I loved his response. He was like, ‘Seriously? You think she can’t? What does that say about you?’” Michele added with a laugh: “Plus, I have a photographic memory. How else do you think I nailed all those Rachel Berry monologues?” Lea Michele can read. End of story.
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