DiCaprio, now 18, didn’t get serious about acting until he was 14 (“I was too involved with being a kid”). He played a homeless boy on TV’s “Growing Pains” and a lead role in the movie “Critters 3,” which he’d rather not discuss. He read for " Boy’s Life" seven times, but once cast, DiCaprio says, he felt “an immediate connection” with director Michael Caton-Jones. “He has this amazing ability to convey quite complex emotions,” says Caton-Jones. “All I wanted him to do was be a kid. He did that magnificently.”
Many scenes, including a fight with De Niro, were draining. “I got a couple of bruises from big old Bobby D,” says DiCaprio, who acquired his first name when his pregnant mother felt a hard kick while looking at a painting by Leonardo da Vinci. “But he was very careful and very nice about it. You get emotionally distraught doing scenes like that. But you know it’s acting and you know the pain is temporary and film is forever,” DiCaprio also knows he can’t play kids forever. He just finished “Gilbert Grape,” portraying Johnny Depp’s mentally retarded younger brother, and is looking for his next project. “I’ve got to turn into a man,” he says. “There are a lot more roles for young men than old teenagers.
