"Are you kidding me?!” Sheryl Lee Ralph stunned after learning Samuel L. Jackson is a distant cousin

Sheryl Lee Ralph has just learned she is a cousin of actor Samuel L. Jackson. The Abbott Elementary actress appeared on the latest episode of the hit PBS series, Finding Your Roots. While her family's history made her emotional, she was amazed to learn about her connection with the Avengers actor.

In the episode aired on April 1, show host Henry Louis Gates Jr. told Ralph she is a distant cousin of Jackson. According to People, Gates told Ralph that:

The two actors share a "long stretch of DNA on their 16th chromosomes." He added: "This means that they have a common ancestor somewhere in their family trees."

Ralph was amused on seeing a photo of Jackson. She asked, laughing:

"Are you kidding me?" She went on to add: "And I like him so much!"

Ralph revealed that she did feel Jackson had a likeness to her brother Timothy.

She said that he "reminds me of my brother Timothy ... for whatever reason, I don't know why," the People report stated.

At the end of the episode, she joked that her head was exploding after the revelation.

Ralph is not the only Hollywood star who is related to Samuel L Jackson. Last year, Janet Jackson said on BBC Radio 2 Breakfast Show that along with the Pulp Fiction actor, she was a cousin of Tracy Chapman and Stevie Wonder on her mother's side.

Sheryl Lee Ralph learns about her family roots

Besides getting to know about her celebrity cousin, the episode of Finding Your Roots was an emotional experience for Sheryl Lee Ralph. NBC News sourced information from Today.com to report that many of Ralph's family had been enslaved, though her great-great-grandfather, George Thomas Ralph, was a free man who became a farmer and got educated.

"He became a farmer. Raised a family. And perhaps most impressively, somehow found a way to obtain an education in his old age, despite having been denied one as a child," Gates said.

Documents revealed that Sheryl Lee Ralph's great-great-grandfather had agreed to serve as a white farmer's apprentice and was provided with shelter and food in return, but not the right to be educated. Still, he found a way to learn how to read and write later in life.

Ralph became emotional on hearing her family's history, and, describing her ancestors, said:

"good people, and I come from people who never gave up, and kept right on."

She added:

"They plant the seeds that are still growing now."

She proudly said she was,

a "free man's child."