Leonardo DiCaprio might sound like a stage name, but it actually isn't. Although most people don't call him "Leonardo," preferring the shorter "Leo," as he told ShortList, at one stage even that was considered too much. The actor recalled how, at the age of 11, when he was initially trying to launch his professional career and meeting with an agent accordingly, "They wanted to change my name to Lenny Williams." DiCaprio explained, "They felt my name was too ethnic and I wouldn't get as many jobs."
Sadly, it stopped his acting career in its tracks, at least for a while. By the age of 13, DiCaprio was finally ready to try again. Thankfully, he "got an agent to accept me with my name." And if you're wondering where his first name came from, the "Wolf of Wall Street" star regaled NPR with a story about how his parents were admiring a Leonardo da Vinci portrait during their honeymoon in Florence, when suddenly, "I started kicking furiously while my mother was pregnant."
He continued, "My father took that as a sign, and I suppose DiCaprio wasn't that far from da Vinci. And so, my dad, being the artist that he is, said, 'That's our boy's name.'"
