11. Matt Damon

Winning an academy award for an exercise written for an English class certainly gets you a spot on our list of brainiacs.

Matt Damon may be a Harvard drop-out, but he did write an early screenplay for “Good Will Hunting”, which won him and lifelong pal Ben Affleck an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, in addition to being nominated for nine other Academy Awards.

Damon studied English at Harvard before he decided to quit school and pursue acting. His breakthrough roles came in 1997 with “Good Will Hunting” and “The Rainmaker”.

Damon started acting and role-playing in high school with Ben Affleck, who always got the “biggest roles and longest speeches”, according to the actor.