Famous People Who Play Dungeons & Dragons

Although it was widely seen as a relic of the past until "Stranger Things" catapulted it back to the forefront of popular culture, "Dungeons & Dragons" never really went away. The iconic roleplaying game was co-created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson in 1974, and by the early '80s, it had become a genuine phenomenon, much to the concern of worrisome parents. The organization Bothered About Dungeons & Dragons (BADD) sprang up, and authorities began to link the tabletop fantasy game to occult practices (the so-called Satanic Panic was in full swing in the States, and baseless accusations were aplenty). The media continued to point fingers at "D&D" throughout the '80s, embarking on what Gary Gygax described as "nothing but a witch hunt" during an episode of "60 Minutes."

By 1985, up to four million people were playing "Dungeons & Dragons" on a regular basis. Many defected to video games as home consoles improved during the 1990s — but not all of them. As "D&D" faded from the limelight, groups of dedicated players kept it alive, running their campaigns and keeping up with the latest editions of the game. Some of these players now live in Hollywood, where "Dungeons & Dragons" has become popular again in recent times. The fact that a roleplaying game is gaining traction in a town full of actors isn't particularly surprising, but many of the names on this list will no doubt shock you. The following famous people are all mad about "Dungeons & Dragons."

Joe Manganiello runs the "Dungeons & Dragons" campaign that everyone in Hollywood wants in on. A longtime lover of the game, the actor was involved in the development of a Dragonlance screenplay back when Warner Bros. owned the "D&D" movie rights. It never got off the ground, but that didn't dampen his passion for the game — Manganiello got back into "D&D" big-time while working on the project, and word quickly got around. "All of my other friends found out I was playing again," he told Variety. "I'm working out with my trainer, and he's like, 'You know that I was huge into Dungeons & Dragons?'"

It got to the point where so many people were asking about it that he decided to become Dungeon Master (DM), the player who runs and narrates the game. Over time, the number of his party grew, and so did the number of props in his game room, aka the Gary Gygax Memorial Dungeon. Manganiello has even been on the super popular "D&D" web series "Critical Role," where he made a couple of guest appearances as his character, Arkhan the Cruel, in the show's first campaign (which was subsequently adapted into an animated series, "The Legend of Vox Machina"). "A lot of people I get a chance to work with who are in the entertainment industry are either relatively new or wanting to be introduced to it," "Critical Role" DM Matt Mercer said of Manganiello. "He's from old stock."

A man who is "on the Mount Rushmore of guitar players of all time," according to Joe Manganiello, Tom Morello joined the actor's "Dungeons & Dragons" group not long after The Big Show. Like the former WWE Champion, Morello was stunned by Manganiello's epic game room. "You would not believe Joe's dungeon," he told Variety. "There's nothing that could occur in the game that someone could come up with on the spur of the moment that isn't in some box." According to Morello, you could turn your character into a weasel if you wanted, and Manganiello's response would be: "What color weasel?"

Morello revealed that "D&D" is always on his mind in the days leading up to the next game — he can't help but wonder about what new twists and turns the DM may come up with. A game of "Dungeons & Dragons" at Manganiello's house is "similar to what a high stakes poker game might be like," the Rage Against the Machine member said. "It's a game where friends gather, that's taken deadly seriously and is a lot of fun — but it's serious. It's very serious. We're on an adventure that I think about a lot during the week." The guitarist often sets aside time for "looking stuff up," he admitted, keen to absorb as much new "D&D" knowledge as he possibly can before reentering the fray.

Widely known for her turn as Karen Page in the hit Marvel series "Daredevil," Deborah Ann Woll fell in love with "Dungeons & Dragons" after becoming a star. "My whole life is exposed in some way because of my career, and 'D&D' was this comfort zone where no one could judge me," the actor told D&D Beyond in a 2018 interview. She quickly became comfortable in the role of DM, enjoying the lack of barriers that come with traditional acting. "Not even like in great live theater are people in the palm of your hand like that for storytelling," she said, adding that there's "something so visceral and exciting about it."

Woll now co-hosts a web series called "Relics and Rarities," which focuses less on the action-heavy side of "Dungeons & Dragons" and encourages more use of the imagination. Rather than weapons, players start with seemingly everyday items that come complete with unique magical traits. "For me, it's creativity," Woll told Inverse. She later added: "I like the idea that you get a spool of thread, it has a minor magical property that allows it to be extra special. That is all I wanted. I wanted to say, 'These are the items, and they're only powerful in the way you use them.'" Daredevil himself Charlie Cox took on the role of a half-elf rogue arcane trickster when he appeared as a guest on one episode to play "D&D" for the first time. (Cox and Woll discuss this in a Geek & Sundry interview, available on YouTube.)

Joe Manganiello was already starting to worry about the size of his "D&D" party when Tom Morello came to him with another suggestion. "One day he said, 'Hey, there's this guy in my kid's carpool that wants to play,'" the actor recounted to Variety. "I said, 'I don't know, man, the group's getting kind of big, who's your friend?' He said, 'His name's Dan, he co-created 'Game of Thrones.'" That was more than enough to secure Dan "D.B." Weiss a place at the table, and he did what any good partner would do. "While we were playing one night, Dan was on his phone," Manganiello said. "I kinda get testy when people are on their phones when I'm DMing, so I kinda looked over, like, 'Hey man, what's up?'"

On the other end of the phone was David Benioff (the other guy behind "Game of Thrones"), and he was threatening to "divorce" Weiss if he didn't wrangle him a seat at the table. Benioff was welcomed with open arms, and, like Weiss, he brought a wealth of "D&D" knowledge to the group. Weiss once told The Hollywood Reporter that he "played compulsively for years" and that "Dungeons & Dragons" helped him figure out what he wanted to do in life. "It was my first experience with world-building," he said. "You'd see hundreds of 'what if' scenarios play out in real-time as players attempted to achieve their various goals."

An actor by trade, Ashley Johnson is the only person on this list who is actually more famous for her "Dungeons & Dragons" exploits than she is for her onscreen ones. She got her first taste of performing as a child, playing the part of Chrissy Seaver on the ABC sitcom "Growing Pains." She went on to appear in shows like "Roseanne," "ER," and "Ally McBeal," and she also played the daughter of Nick Marshall (Mel Gibson) daughter in the 2000 rom-com "What Women Want." By this point in time, Johnson was voicing the character Gretchen Grundler in the hit cartoon "Recess," and it was her skill as a voice actor that led her to fame via the huge "D&D" web series, "Critical Role."

Johnson was a total "D&D" novice when she joined "Critical Role" (which raked in just under $10 million on Twitch between August 2019 and October 2021, a leak revealed). "I think at first I didn't really know how much roleplay was involved with 'D&D,'" Johnson told D&D Beyond. "Maybe that was just our particular game ... I was thrown in with this amazing group of people that just throw themselves into their characters, and I think to start, I was just kind of playing me and figuring things out and figuring out what a cleric is." Johnson's cleric character, Pike Trickfoot, went on to become one of the fan favorites from the highly successful first campaign.