When Leonardo DiCaprio almost quit acting for breakdancing: “I’ve since lost my moves”
The list of breakdancers-turned-successful actors is a surprisingly long one, but the biggest name of all would have been missing from the list had Leonardo DiCaprio followed through on his pledge to ditch thespianism for busting movies.
Jean-Claude Van Damme was in Breakin’, Vin Diesel recorded instructional videos on how to break, Alfonso Ribeiro ended up in a Pepsi ad with Michael Jackson, Debi Mazar was in Madonna’s music videos, and Cuba Gooding Jr was known for popping and locking, all before they found fame on the screen.
Admittedly, it’s hard to imagine DiCaprio abandoning his lifelong dream of making it in the movies in favour of shimmying around and spinning on his head, but his passion for breakdancing makes much more and much funnier sense knowing that his nickname was ‘The Noodle’.
Even though he’d been notching roles in commercials and TV shows since he was a tyke, and acting was the one thing he always wanted to do, there was a time when he was caught in between his two great loves. One of the best actors in Hollywood quitting at the beginning of their career to pursue breakdancing sounds preposterous, but he confirmed to Oprah Winfrey that it was true.
When she sought to verify the whispers that he’d genuinely come close to ditching performing for a completely different gig, he verified the scuttlebutt. “Yes, because I was a breakdancer,” he acknowledged. “Now, don’t ask me to breakdance, because I’ve since lost my moves, but I was a break-dancer, and I had a choppy, sort of punky haircut.”
Naturally, DiCaprio had come second in a contest held in Germany, which was enough to convince him that perhaps his future lay away from the silver screen. Obviously, it did not, and it’s enough to make you wonder who would have ended up as Martin Scorsese’s modern muse had his most frequent collaborator since Robert De Niro pursued another vocation, one that presumably doesn’t pay a fraction as well.
Reflecting on his time as breakdancing sensation, ‘The Noodle’, long before he became the cinema sensation, Leonardo DiCaprio, he was almost overcome with nostalgia. “That’s from way, way back when I was a little kid, in my pop-locking days.” Those days are over, though, with the youngster wisely deciding that acting was the better bet.
He’d always loved performing, but breakdancing came with less rejection. In a conversation with Ingrid Sischy, the Oscar winner recalled being crushed after being overlooked at an audition, bursting into tears and telling his father, “Dad, I really want to become an actor, but if this is what it’s about, I don’t want to do it.” Was the other option a better one? Not really, and he ultimately made the right one in the end.
Maybe it’s like riding a bike, and when the time comes for a dark and gritty reboot of Breakin’ that needs a big-name star to deliver an awards-baiting performance, they’ll call on DiCaprio to bring both of his first loves to the fore.
