The Extraordinary Connection Between Julia Roberts And Martin Luther King Jr.'s Family

Julia Roberts revealed to Gayle King that when her family was unable to pay the hospital bill when she was born, Martin Luther King Jr. and his wife, Coretta Scott King, stepped in to cover the fees. While the act was undoubtedly gracious, it was also a way for the Kings to return a kindness the Roberts family had  extended to them. 

As Roberts explained in her interview, her parents, Walter and Betty Lou, were the heads of the Actors and Writers Workshop in Atlanta. "One day, Coretta Scott King called my mother and asked if her kids could be part of the school cause they were having a hard time finding a place that would accept her kids, and my mom was like, sure, come on over,'" she said. 

Roberts recalls the moment lightly, but at the time, it was anything but. Society was still very much segregated in 1960s Atlanta, and the desegregation of the Actors and Writers Workshop was not received well in the area. Nevertheless, the Roberts family refused to treat the Kings any differently, even casting their eldest daughter, Yolanda, as the love interest of Phillip DePoy, a white workshop attendee.