10 Hollywood stars who dropped out of high school: From Kate Winslet to Leonardo DiCaprio
10 celebrities who dropped out of school in pursuit of their Hollywood dreams
It is tough to get one's foot in the door in Hollywood and stars need to make several sacrifices - with education being one of the foremost - to establish their place in showbiz. Since some of the actors embarked on realizing their Hollywood dreams when they were mere teenagers, they were unable to complete their high school education. Here are ten such stars who dropped out of school to pursue their Hollywood careers.
1. Leonardo DiCaprio
Leonardo DiCaprio signed with an agent when he was just 14 years old and dropped out in his junior year of high school. Later, however, he earned his GED with the help of a tutor, per Us Weekly.
2. Jennifer Lawrence
Jennifer Lawrence once proudly shared that she has been "self-educated." During an interview with 60 Minutes in 2018, the Oscar winner shared that she dropped out of middle school to pursue a thespian career. The 'Hunger Games' actress revealed, “I dropped out of middle school. I don’t technically have a GED or a diploma,” before adding, “I am self-educated.” When she was asked whether she regretted the decision, she replied, “No. I really don’t. I wanted to forge my own path. I found what I wanted to do, and I didn’t want anything getting in the way of it.”
3. Johnny Depp
Johnny Depp dropped out of school at the age of 15 to become a rockstar. But destiny had different plans as the actor became known for his eclectic selections of roles in films including 'Pirates of the Caribbean', and 'Edward Scissorhands', among others. Nevertheless, he pursued his musical dreams as well and released two albums with his band Hollywood Vampires.
4. Kate Winslet
Not only Leonardo DiCaprio but his 'Titanic' co-star, Kate Winslet is also a school dropout. The actress shared during a December 2017 appearance on 'The Late Show With Stephen Colbert', "I left school at 16 and I went to work in a delicatessen to save money to get the train to London to go on auditions," before joking that people tend to think she is more educated than she is because of her accent.
5. Mark Wahlberg
Mark Wahlberg dropped out of school when he was in the ninth grade to pursue a career in acting. Nevertheless, the 'Fear' actor returned to study and earned his GED in 2013.
6. Katy Perry
Katy Perry dropped out of school when she was just 15, but not before she earned her GED. However, she was not satisfied with the level of education she received. During an interview with Yahoo! in 2014, the 'Roar' songstress shared, “I’m kind of bummed at this stage that I didn’t have a great education. … I was being pulled out of school even in the middle of school and sometimes being homeschooled. Sometimes we were sent to these really half-Christian, half-education, I-don’t-know-what-they-were schools.” She added, "I've learned to educate myself at this stage and how to continue my education at any age," per ABC News.
7. Robert Downey Jr
Hollywood's 'Iron Man' Robert Downey Jr dropped out of California's Santa Monica High School when he was 16. The Marvel star had similarly illustrious schoolmates, including the likes of Charlie Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Sean Penn, and Rob Lowe. Robert Downey Jr appeared in Lowe's 'Literally' podcast in January, where he shared, “I was in school as infrequently as possible,” adding “I actually managed to figure out how to climb the only super-tall fence, which led out onto Lincoln, because that was the only place that hall monitors weren’t looking for people trying to ditch school. It had to have been a 28-, 30-foot-tall fence," per Entertainment Weekly.
8. Emma Stone
The double-Oscar winner Emma Stone convinced her parents to allow her to drop out of school, and that she did in style. When in ninth grade, she made an elaborate PowerPoint presentation and explained to her parents why she needed to act as a full-time job. The best part is that her parents agreed. During a 2017 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, she exclaimed, “It’s nuts that they agreed to it,” before adding, “I don’t condone it. Everybody should go through high school and graduate.”
9. Ryan Gosling
Like Stone, her 'La La Land' co-star Ryan Gosling, too, has not completed his formal school education. The 'Barbie' actor left school when he was 17 to film the TV show 'Young Hercules' after spending one year being homeschooled by his mother.
10. Rihanna
The billionaire musician left high school at the age of 16 when she landed a record deal. The Grammy winner has since then expanded her entrepreneurial endeavors and started a successful clothing and makeup line apart from her tremendously successful music career.
