Guess Which Oscar Winner This Adorable Baby Grew Up To Be!
Can you figure it out?
getty Everyone loves looking at throwback photos — that's why Facebook has that memory function, right? It can be even more fun to see throwback photos from famous people. Guessing who celebrity baby pictures are is one of the best games on the internet.
This little bundle of joy was a cutie-pie back when he was hanging in his high chair. Little did he know then that he would graduate from baby bottles to raising a champagne glass in one of the most meme-worthy movie stills ever.
Yes, that's none other than Leonardo DiCaprio in that photo. We wouldn't have guessed it either. Let's dig a bit into Leo's childhood, shall we?
1. DiCarpio was named for a famous artist.
DiCaprio's mother Irmelin was allegedly looking at a painting by the Italian artist Leonardo DaVinci when she first felt her baby kick, so she decided to name him after the painter. DiCaprio was born in 1974 in Los Angeles. Mis mom split up from his father, comic book writer George DiCaprio, when he was a year old and he and his mother moved around a lot. He says he never really liked school and was more interested in going on auditions than going to class. He actually dropped out of high school and got his GED instead.
Leonardo DiCaprio then and now.
2. He started out in TV and commercials when he was 14 years old.
DiCaprio's first attempt at being on TV was when he was five. He got a chance to be on the children's show Romper Room but had to be removed from the set for being too disruptive. As a young teen, he started getting booked in commercials and did some TV roles. He did a spot on the daytime soap Santa Barbara in 1990 and had an uncredited appearance on Roseanne in 1991. He also did recurring roles on the TV series Parenthood from 1990-1991 and on Growing Pains from 1991-1992.
3. His first film role was opposite Robert De Niro.
In 1993, De Niro personally cast DiCaprio in This Boy's Life, and the young actor played De Niro's stepson in the acclaimed film. His next movie role was as a mentally disabled young boy in What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, with Johnny Depp and Juliett Lewis. His performance was so arresting that he got both a Golden Globe and Oscar nomination for the part.
4. Stardom came along big time in 1997.
DiCaprio continued doing smaller budget films and turning in stellar performances in movies like The Basketball Diaries and Romeo + Juliet. Then in 1997, he became one of the biggest stars in the world when James Cameron asked him to play Jack in Titanic. The scene where DiCaprio stands on the prow of the ship yelling "I'm the king of the world" will forever be associated with the actor but that wasn't in the script. In an interview, James Cameron explained how that scene evolved.
"I was in a crane basket and we were losing the light, and we had tried this and tried that, and tried this line and tried that line and nothing was really working, " Cameron recalled. "I said, 'All right, I’ve got one for you, just say I’m the king of the world, and just spread your arms out wide, and just be in the moment, and just love it and celebrate the moment.’"
DiCaprio kept saying "What?" about the proposed line but Cameron insisted. "I said, 'I’m the king of the world, just say I’m the king of the world, but you’ve got to sell it.' And [DiCaprio] goes, 'What?' I said 'Just f*cking sell it.'"
He sold it and we're glad he did.
5. Being a heartthrob wasn't his major goal in life.
Even after Titanic turned him into the most crush-worthy actor of the decade, DiCaprio was more focused on making movies that he found interesting. "I have no connection with me during that whole Titanic phenomenon and what my face became around the world," he said in 2000. "I'll never reach that state of popularity again and I don't expect to, he says. It's not something I'm going to try to achieve, either."
What he achieved instead was a series of films that were not only popular but critically acclaimed. From biopics like The Aviator to the screen adaption of the literary masterpiece The Great Gatsby, DiCaprio has been drawn to complicated characters. He has frequently worked with legendary directors like Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino. In 2018, he finally won an Oscar for The Revenant.
6. He cares deeply about the environment.
Since the late 1990s, DiCaprio has been active on conservation causes, founding an eponymous foundation to fund environmental initiatives. The foundation has joined forced with Earth Alliance in order to "focus on addressing the intertwined threats of climate change and biodiversity loss through its global work to protect ecosystems and wildlife, ensure climate justice, support renewable energy, and secure indigenous rights to the benefit of all life on Earth." In addition, DiCaprio has been involved with making documentaries about the climate crisis such as Virunga, a film about people trying to save endangered mountain gorillas and The Ivory Game, about elephant poaching.
Instead of selfies, DiCaprio uses his Instagram account to raise awareness about the environment.
7. He tries to keep his personal life private.
Being a heartthrob means everyone wants to know who you're dating. DiCaprio doesn't like to talk about his love life but he definitely has one. Over the years, he has been linked to a lot of different women, most of them models. He was with Giselle Bundchen from 2000 to 2005 before she married Tom Brady. After that, he and Israeli model Barr Rafaeli were together for five years. he spent a year dating a German model named Toni Garrn in 2013. Most recently, he has been linked to model and actress Camila Morrone, who is 23 to his 45 years.
Rebekah Kuschmider has been writing about celebrities, pop culture, entertainment, and politics since 2010. She is the creator of the blog FeminXer and she is a cohost of the weekly podcast The More Perfect Union.