Just another Jewish rags-to-riches story.
https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/ayn-rand-215.php
Ayn Rand was born as Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum on February 2, 1905 in Saint Petersburg. Her father, Zinovy Zakharovich Rosenbaum, was the owner of a pharmacy. Her mother’s name was Anna Borisovna (née Kaplan). She was eldest of her parents’ three daughters.
In the middle of 1926, Ayn Rand left for Hollywood, where she took up odd jobs to maintain herself. Then one day, as she was standing at the door of a studio, she spotted Cecil B. DeMille, one of Hollywood's leading directors, and kept on staring at him.
Cecil also noticed her and asked her why she had been staring at him. She told him that she was from Soviet Russia and had come here with the hope of becoming a screenwriter. Impressed, he appointed her as an extra in his on-going project, ‘The King of Kings’.