<\/p>\n
Nicolas Cage is not just a stage name.<\/p>\n
The Oscar-winning actor, who was born Nicolas Coppola and is the nephew of Francis Ford Coppola, revealed he legally changed his name to Nicolas Cage.<\/p>\n
The name was originally inspired by the Marvel Comics character Luke Cage and the composer John Cage. Asked in an interview with\u00a0Variety<\/a>\u00a0if it\u2019s \u201cstrange\u201d to still go by a stage name, the actor said, \u201cNo. I am Nick Cage.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI changed my name legally last year,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m Nick Cage in life, and I\u2019m Nick Cage on camera.\u201d<\/p>\n Cage said he prefers forging his own identity with his family rather than be on the outskirts of another.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Tis better to be the patriarch of my own little family than the clown cousin on the margins of someone else\u2019s, so I decided I\u2019m going to bring it on and be \u2018Cage,\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Reflecting on the origin of the name, Cage said he was looking for something \u201cshort and sweet,\u201d like James Dean.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Cage\u2019 is a name that I liked coming across in the comics \u2014 I just thought he had a cool name \u2014 and I grew up in a very avant-garde, artsy family and there was talk about John Cage and the experimental compositions that he did,\u201d the actor said.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought, well, I\u2019ll keep the name \u2018Nicolas\u2019 because my father named me Nicolas \u2014 with French spelling, which has always frustrated me, because everyone adds an \u2018h.\u2019 I don\u2019t know why he gave me the French spelling! But he did,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Cage has been open about why he decided not to use the name Coppola during his career. In 1982\u2019s \u201cFast Times at Ridgemont High,\u201d he was credited as Nicolas Coppola, but people kept connecting him to his uncle and one of the famous lines from his movie \u201cApocalypse Now.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPeople would not stop saying things like, \u2018I love the smell of Nicolas in the morning\u2019 because of \u2018Apocalypse Now,\u2019 when Robert Duvall said, \u2018I love the smell of napalm in the morning,\u2019\u201d Cage\u00a0told Wired<\/a>\u00a0in 2022. \u201cAnd it made it hard to work and I said, \u2018I don\u2019t need this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Cage will make the jump to the small screen in his newest project, playing Ben Reilly\/The Spider in \u201cSpider-Noir,\u201d now available on Prime Video. He previously voiced Spider-Man Noir in the 2018 movie \u201cSpider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.\u201d<\/p>\n Cage will also star in the upcoming biopic of late NFL head coach and color commentator\u00a0John Madden<\/a>.<\/p>\n