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Leonardo
Wilhelm DiCaprio (born November
11, 1974) is a three-time
Academy Award-nominated and
Golden Globe Award-winning
American actor well known for
his roles in blockbuster movies
such as William Shakespeare's
Romeo + Juliet (1996), Titanic
(1997), Catch Me If You Can
(2002), Gangs of New York
(2002), The Aviator (2004), The
Departed (2006), and Blood
Diamond (2006), and was, as a
young man, famed for his global
celebrity influence dubbed as
"Leomania" in the late 1990s
following his role as
heartthrob protagonist Jack
Dawson in Titanic.
More recently,
he has worked regularly with
director Martin Scorsese which
has led some to compare their
partnership to that of Scorsese
and actor Robert De Niro.
The move from 'star' to
'superstar' came when DiCaprio
played Jack Dawson in Titanic
(1997). The highest grossing
movie ever (in nominal terms -
adjusted for inflation it is
the sixth highest in the United
States, while remaining the
highest grossing movie
worldwide), it received eleven
Academy Awards.
Over the course
of the next few years he would
become a household name
worldwide, synonymous with
labels such as 'teenage
heart-throb' and sex symbol.
With a status that spawned
fantasy crushes and hysteria
worldwide, E! Online described
him as the most gorgeous
celebrity on the planet, while
his co-star Kate Winslet said
she agreed with others in
deeming him the "most beautiful
man on Earth."[citation needed]
People Magazine placed him in
their annual Most Beautiful
People issue on numerous
occasions.
At the peak of
his celebrity in 1998, DiCaprio
fronted scores of magazine
covers ranging from Vanity Fair
to Rolling Stone, and was once
the most searched for
personality in the early years
of the Internet.
DiCaprio agreed
to play the spoof role of his
real life 'teen idol' persona
during this period, in Woody
Allen's satirical parody,
Celebrity.
Perhaps overrun or overhyped by
fame from what became known as
'Leo-Mania' the world over -
from the shores of Thailand all
the way to Afghanistan (where
the Taliban government there
banned 'DiCaprio style'
haircuts amongst the youth) and
Australia (where in
Tullamarine, Victoria, a
restaurant called "DiCaprio's"
was established in
1998[citation needed]), what
came apropos with fame were
tales in the tabloids of
excesses and indulgence. In the
Japanese media, he was referred
to as Leo-sama, with the "sama"
suffix in its context given to
mean either someone who has
done great things and is
revered and respected or is a
member of royalty. Time
magazine summed up the fame
superhighway and its trappings
in an interview with the actor
in 2000, reporting: DiCaprio
still thinks of himself as an
edgy indie actor, not the Tiger
Beat cover boy. "I have no
connection with me during that
whole Titanic Phenomenon and
what my face became around the
world," DiCaprio commented,
adding, "I'll never reach that
state of popularity again, and
I don't expect to. It's not
something I'm going to try to
achieve either."
Nonetheless, the headlines and
controversy failed to let up,
peaking when he starred in a
project by Danny Boyle based on
Alex Garland's backpacker
culture classic, The Beach that
year. Because of clashes with
the Thai authorities over the
use of the island of Ko Phi Phi
in 1999, the film garnered more
bad press than expected. It was
reported that permission
granted to the film company to
physically alter the
environment inside Phi Phi
Islands National Park was
illegal. In the end, the film
also did not score as well as
expected at the box office,
losing mainstream commercial
appeal due to its content.
Source
: Some of the information
on this page came from a
Wikipedia
article and is
licensed under the GNU
Documentation License.
©2008
www.geneticmatrix.com.
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Leonardo
DiCaprio - Projector
- Biography