Lea Michele
Michele in 2011, kathclick/bigstock.com
Birth Name: Lea Michele Sarfati
Place of Birth: The Bronx, New York City, New York, U.S.
Date of Birth: August 29, 1986
Ethnicity:
*Sephardi Jewish (father)
*Italian (mother)
Lea Michele is an American actress, singer, songwriter, and author. She is known for her roles in the films New Year’s Eve and Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return, and on the shows Glee and Scream Queens, and for her Broadway performances.
Lea is the daughter of Edith Thomasina (Porcelli) and Mark David Sarfati. Her father is a Sephardi Jew, from a family that moved to the U.S. from Turkey and Greece, and had originally left Spain, likely in the 1400s. Lea’s mother is of Italian descent, and is Catholic. Lea stated on Inside the Actors Studio, 2012, that she was raised in her mother’s Catholic faith.
Lea is married to clothing brand president Zandy Reich, with whom she has two children. Zandy is Jewish.
Lea’s paternal grandfather was named Albert Sarfati (the son of Yomtov Sarfati and Sol/Celia). Albert was born in New York, to Sephardi Jewish emigrants, from Turkey.
Lea’s paternal grandmother was Celia/Sylvia Veissy (the daughter of Moise Joseph “Morris” Veissy/Veissey/Veissi/Vaisha and Benuta/Benouta/Benoueta “Bessie” Kouenkas/Cohenka). Celia was born in New York, to Jewish parents, from Thessaloniki, Greece. Moise was the son of Joseph Veissy and Dona. Benuta was the daughter of Isaac/Issac Shemtov Couenca/Cohenka/Kouenkas and Meriam/Miryam/Miriam Arania. Meriam was killed in the Holocaust, in Auschwitz.
Lea’s maternal grandfather is surnamed Porcelli. His family was from Rome.
Lea’s maternal grandmother is surnamed Mariano. Her family was from Naples.
Sources: JVibe interview about Lea’s heritage – http://archive.is
Information about Lea’s appearance on Who Do You Think You Are?, 2016 – http://ancestraldiscoveries.blogspot.ca
Genealogy of Lea Michele – https://www.geni.com
Lea’s paternal grandfather, Albert Sarfati, on the 1940 U.S. Census – https://familysearch.org
She is spanish, turkish and italian
yikes
Stfu. She’s Turkish Jewish & Italian. She has no Spanish in her.
She doesn’t claim to be Jewish, she says her father’s family are Sephardi Jews
She isn´t ethnically Spanish, she is sephardi.
Elia Kazan was of non-Jewish, Greek, background.
You mean Lainie Kazan, not Elia Kazan.
She doesn´t look White. Actually, when I saw her on the early Glee trailers, I thought she was East Indian. I´m confused about her ethnicity, I can recall last time I check this website it was stated that she was half-Jewish Spanish, now she´s half-Jewish Turkish?
Jews who didn’t convert to Catholicism were expelled from Spain in 1492, and Jews didn’t live openly in Spain again until fairly recently. She is likely descended from Jews who left Spain around 1492 (as she says), but they most recently lived in Turkey.
Thank you very much!
I also thought she was part Indian
Gladly? Sorry, but that’s f’d up, even to say that.
Why not? If he married a catholic woman
SHE IS 100% WHITE,HER NOSE WAS SMALL AND HER SKIN IS VERY LIGHT.
WTF does that mean? Sounds racist to me.