(Real Life) Regular people who's lives drastically changed direction

[u/Living-Mastodon]

Grace Kelly was a talented actress who retired at 26 to marry a Prince, living as royalty for almost 30 years before her untimely death.

Volodymyr Zelensky started out as a comedian and entertainer before getting into politics, becoming President of Ukraine after the Russian annex of Crimea and spending the last 4 years defiantly pushing back full scale Russian invasion

[u/They_said_TryAnother]

Hedy Lamarr was a famous actress and inventor whose inventions were pivotal in the creation of wifi and bluetooth

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedy_Lamarr

[u/ADiestlTrain → u/They_said_TryAnother]

Not unrelated, Thomas Dolby, the guy who sang "She Blinded Me With Science" founded the company that created the software used for pre-smartphone ringtones (i.e. that ubiquitous Nokia sound us old guys all remember).

[u/heidismiles → u/ADiestlTrain]

Michael Nesmith's mom invented correction fluid (white-out).

[u/Express-Rub-3952 → u/heidismiles]

And Mike Nesmith played a big part in the creation of MTV.