6 celebrities who lived double lives

The famed burlesque dancer loved her adopted home of Paris so much that she became a spy for the French Resistance during World War II, using her beauty and charm to gather secrets and travel freely without arousing suspicion.

Josephine was born in the US and had dreams of the stage, yet faced constant discrimination due to her race. She decided to take the leap and move to France to pursue her burlesque career, before going on to become one of Europe's highest-paid entertainers. 

When World War II broke out in 1939, French military intelligence quickly recruited Josephine for their cause and began sending her on covert missions

"Of course I wanted to do all I could to aid France, my adopted country, but an overriding consideration, the thing that drove me as strongly as patriotism, was my violent hatred of discrimination in any form," she later told Ebony of her reason for accepting the job.

During the war, Josephine hid refugees and resistance members at her home, helped secure passports for Jewish people fleeing the country, smuggled documents and information inside her clothes and in invisible ink on sheet music, and gathered secrets from high-profile parties.

After the war ended, Josephine was recognised for her incredible work and was later named a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1961.

Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen built an empire off the backs of their careers as child actresses in the sitcom Full House, and went on to create merchandise, a slew of films and even a production company.

Their true passion didn't lie in Hollywood, though; instead, it was in the world of fashion and business. And so, the famous twins launched their fashion brand, The Row, in 2006.

“We were 18 years old,” Ashley told i-D of their decision to leave the film industry. “And I think what we did know was that we wanted to take that time to take a break from what we were previously doing and to explore things that interested us, and explore what life has to offer.”

“We wanted to explore making something of ourselves,” she added. “[The Row] really was kind of just a passion project.” The brand has gone on to become one of the fashion industry's most respected labels, with stars like Jennifer Lawrence, Hailey Bieber and Sofia Richie wearing their designs.

Mary-Kate and Ashley opted to step back from the spotlight as a duo in the late '00s and focus on building their brand. 

"We didn’t want to be in front of it,” Ashley said. “We didn’t necessarily even want to let people know it was us…It was really about the product, to the point where we were like: Who could we get to front this so that we don’t have to?"

Hedy Lamarr was one of the most beautiful stars to grace the screen in the '40s, and stole the hearts of many with roles in Algiers, White Cargo and Samson and Delilah. But behind the scenes, the Austrian-American actress was a keen scientist with an incredibly innovative mind.

When she wasn't busy starring in the next Hollywood hit, Hedy was developing a radio-guided communications system that utilised frequency hopping to prevent radio signals from being intercepted or jammed.

She patented the idea alongside her friend, composer George Antheil, and hoped that the US Navy would utilise their invention to help win World War II, but the Navy ultimately rejected it. 

Despite this setback, their work laid the foundation for integral modern inventions like Wi-Fi, GPS and Bluetooth, and allowed people to understand that Hedy was far more than just a pretty face.

Rock Hudson led a double life in that he presented himself as a hyper-masculine movie star to the world, but behind closed doors, he was forced to hide his true self. 

Rock was a gay man, and while this fact became somewhat of an open secret in Hollywood, he tried to mitigate rumours by marrying Phyllis Gates, his agent's secretary.

It wasn't until Rock revealed his AIDS diagnosis to the world in 1985 that his secret was well and truly out. "I am not happy that I am sick. I am not happy that I have AIDS. But if that is helping others, I can at least know that my own misfortune has had some positive worth," he wrote in a telegram sent to a fundraiser. 

The actor's bravery in revealing his illness woke people up to the AIDS crisis, as biographer Mark Griffin explained in the 2023 documentary Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed.

"Because everyone knew Rock Hudson, now everyone in the world knew somebody who had AIDS. And suddenly, there was public interest," he said. 

"It was Rock's own physician who said, 'Rock Hudson was the single most influential AIDS patient in history, because he changed the way that the disease was perceived.'" The 59-year-old died in October 1985.

Ken Jeong is best known for his scene-stealing roles in The Hangover, Community, Knocked Up and Crazy Rich Asians, but before he was a comedy force, the actor worked as a physician for several years.

He received his medical degree from the University of North Carolina in 1995 and did his residency in New Orleans before moving to Los Angeles to work in internal medicine at Kaiser Permanente.

Ken was a doctor by day and pursued his stand-up comedy passion by night, before landing his star-making role in 2007's Knocked Up. "I was so intense as a doctor, and I was always stressed out; patients were surprised I did stand-up comedy on the side," he once shared on a press tour.

He gave up medicine for good in the mid-'00s and went full-time as an actor and comedian, but Ken never let his license lapse and can technically still practice as a doctor.

The French electronic music duo formed in 1993, and early on in their careers, they decided to hide their identities from the world in order to live a peaceful life out of the spotlight.

Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter wore a costume of robot helmets and futuristic suits whenever they performed, in a bid to keep their personal and professional lives separate.

"We’re not performers, we’re not models – it would not be enjoyable for humanity to see our features," Guy-Manuel told Rolling Stone. "But the robots are exciting to people…We’re interested in the line between fiction and reality, creating these fictional personas that exist in real life."

"We want the focus to be on the music. If we have to create an image, it must be an artificial image," Thomas said in an interview. 

"That combination hides our physicality and also shows our view of the star system. It is not a compromise. We’re trying to separate the private side and the public side."