Famous People Born In Berkeley

Ben Affleck is actor, director, producer and screenwriter. He started as a child actor and attained fame after winning the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for writing ‘Good Will Hunting’ in 1997. He has been involved in a number of successful and critically acclaimed films. He’s had issues with alcoholism and has been accused by women of inappropriate behaviour.

Rebecca Romijn is an American actress whose skills and beautiful body were tailor-made for the role of Mystique, whom she portrayed in the X-Men film series. Renowned for her beauty, Rebecca Romijn started her career as a model, featuring on the cover of magazines like Glamour and Sports Illustrated. She has also been featured in advertising campaigns for popular brands.

The actor, comedian, writer and musician, Andy Samberg, is a member of the comedy music group The Lonely Island and has also acted in several films like Hot Rod, That's My Boy and Palm Springs. Plus, he has starred in television sitcoms like the Brooklyn Nine-Nine and has been part of Saturday Night Live as a featured player.

Ursula K. Le Guin was an American author. In a career spanning almost six decades, Ursula wrote about political and social themes like race and sexuality. Throughout her career, Ursula had a major influence on speculative fiction. Her book A Wizard of Earthsea is credited with inspiring ideas like 'wizard school', which was later popularized in the Harry Potter series.

A television personality, actress, writer, and fashion designer, Nicole Richie's professional success has been overshadowed by her off-screen controversies; she was arrested on a couple of occasions for reasons including a brawl, driving under the influence, and drug possession. However, her image is often revitalized by her philanthropic activities; she is associated with organizations like Red Cross and UNICEF.

Martin Eberhard is an American entrepreneur, inventor, and engineer. He is credited with co-founding Tesla, Inc. in 2002. He then served as the company's chairman and CEO. Martin Eberhard was inducted into the University of Illinois Engineering Hall of Fame in 2015.

A pioneer of psychedelic drug synthesis, Alexander Shulgin came to be known as The Godfather of Ecstasy, for reinventing the drug MDMA, or ecstasy, for medical use. The Harvard drop-out, who later studied psychiatry and pharmacology, would often experiment his newly invented drugs on himself, his wife, and his friends.

Alexi Pappas is a Greek-American runner, actor, writer, and filmmaker. In 2016, she set the national record for 10,000m at the Rio Olympics where she represented Greece. As a filmmaker, Alexi Pappas is credited with bankrolling and writing Olympic Dreams, the first fictional film to be shot in an Olympic village. 

Prominent environmentalist and world-class mountaineer, David Brower became aware of the environmental issues through his proximity to nature, eventually joining Sierra Club, serving it in different capacities over a long period before establishing several organizations of his own. Author of three autobiographies, he fought to keep dams out of the Grand Canyon and was thrice nominated for Nobel Peace Prize.  

The son of Nobel Prize-winning US physicist Luis Walter Alvarez, Walter Alvarez is remembered for his theory that dinosaurs died due to an asteroid impact, a theory he developed with his father. The theory stemmed from their discovery of an iridium-rich layer of clay, since iridium is commonly found in asteroids.