Producer Andrew MacDonald was not surprised to hear the rumours that his new movie The Beach cost a whopping $100 million US.

"Once Leonardo DiCaprio signed onto The Beach, everything that was reported about the film was grossly exaggerated," says MacDonald, who also produced director Danny Boyle's earlier films, Shallow Grave, Trainspotting and A Life Less Ordinary.

"Danny and I always envisioned The Beach as a $20-million movie and it hasn't strayed very far," he says. "We brought it in for a little more than $25 million, but then we had to add on Leo's $20-million salary. We didn't make that deal with him. The studio (20th Century Fox) did."

MacDonald has nothing but praise for DiCaprio, who he says "is far more committed and behaves considerably better than actors who get paid a lot less.

"Leo had very few special requests. The only extra perk he asked for were plane tickets and accommodations for friends he flew into Thailand to visit him during our 13-week shoot."

DiCaprio's guests included his parents, longtime friend actor Tobey Maguire and model Kristin Zang, who DiCaprio was dating at the time -- though he insists that relationship is over. The Beach hits theatres on Feb. 11.

KAPALUA, MAUI -- Leonardo DiCaprio is feeling used, abused and a little bitter over the mud slung at his new movie The Beach.
 
 "I'm a little bitter, just because it is a lie and people's perception may be a little tainted," DiCaprio grouses in an interview here in Hawaii, where 20th Century-Fox has set up several days of interviews for the romantic adventure thriller, the first big movie DiCaprio has done since his megahit Titanic. It will be released Feb. 11.
 
 The young superstar is dressed down in grunge blue jeans and a simple black T-shirt. At 25, he still has his Jack Dawson babyface. Even his facial hair -- a sandy-coloured goatee -- is a mere wisp, barely noticeable. But when DiCaprio talks about the environment, he assumes the serious demeanor of a real adult, not just a reel one.
 
 "It had a lot to do with the political propaganda that was going on in the country," he says of the environmental protests mounted against the filming of The Beach in Thailand. The filmmakers -- producer Andrew Macdonald and director Danny Boyle of Trainspotting fame -- shot The Beach on an uninhabited and unsupervised island called Phi Phi Le, just off the coast of the Thai mainland from the city of Phuket. The island is a designated national park, but there are currently no enforceable restrictions on its use.
 
 After removing three tons of garbage left by other visitors, the film crew, with permission of authorities, planted 100 coconut palm trees and lowered two sand dunes to make the location more scenic for the camera. The trees have since been removed, the dunes resculpted and the island is back to a pristine state, according to the filmmakers.
 
 Macdonald and Boyle flew to Thailand and visited Phi Phi Le last Wednesday to check up on the location and meet with Thai officials. "Everything is absolutely fine," says Macdonald. "Everything is absolutely tip-top." Macdonald brought out a portfolio of before-and-after photographs to try to prove his point. He says that a $125,000 (U.S.) bond they posted will be refunded because locals are so pleased.
 
 DiCaprio says that few people want to believe that or understand what happened because both he, as a movie star, and 20th Century-Fox, as a Hollywood movie studio, are easy targets and good for gossip. The environmentalists in Thailand used them as a lightning rod for attention, he says.
 
 "We were used as a test case over the ability of the forestry department to rent out islands to movies or for anything else. We were targeted as this big Hollywood machine that came in and disrespected this island. A lie started and all of a sudden it just grew and grew and became something else and became widespread. That became the story, no matter what we said about it. There was no way we could contradict it. That's one of the unfortunate things that happened."
 
 DiCaprio's bitterness is about self-perception. He considers himself an environmentalist. He has hosted Earth Day activities. He has a portfolio of ethical investments that are sensitive to environmental issues. He is planning to buy a hybrid electrical-gas car in the next year. He says he cares.
 
 Boyle says that the fuss over shooting The Beach may not be in vain, even though he feels as strongly as DiCaprio and Macdonald that they were wrongly accused and targeted because of DiCaprio's post-Titanic fame.
 
 "Although the film suffered because of them, although Leo suffered because of them, they did raise the issue of the environment in Thailand -- and it previously had no profile whatsoever. It's such an aggressive economy that the environment is a very low priority. This island is meaningless compared to everything else that is going on in Thailand."

MAUI, Hawaii -- Fame is a monster, heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio told the Sun yesterday.
 
 But he's finally learning to handle the off-screen image the mega-hit Titanic brought him.
 
 Thanks to the James Cameron ocean-liner epic, he'd become the poster boy for a generation of young girls all over the world, but he told the Sun yesterday in Maui that he'd found his own way to cope.
 
 "It was a huge learning process," he said while promoting his latest film, The Beach.
 
 "No one had written a book that told me what to do to survive fame."
 
 What DiCaprio was soon to learn was that "fame is a monster you have no control over.
 
 "Everything I did mutated into something entirely different once the press got a hold of it."
 
 Many people advised the young actor to retreat and lay low, but that was not his style.
 
 "I refused to become a hermit. I decided to defy it all."
 
 This meant more public appearances, more parties and more beautiful models on his arms than ever before.
 
 "I'm not saying what I did was the best thing, but it was my process," DiCaprio said.

MAUI, Hawaii -- Leonardo DiCaprio could be promoted from king of the world to king of the universe.
 
 The Titanic star, in Maui yesterday to promote his new film The Beach, revealed that he has been in talks with director George Lucas about playing Jedi knight Anakin
 
 Skywalker in the next Star Wars prequel, due to begin filming in Sydney, Australia, this summer.
 
 "I did talk to George about Star Wars, but he didn't have a script at the time," DiCaprio said.
 
 "I don't know how much I'm allowed to say about our conversation, but we did talk about my playing Anakin Skywalker.
 
 "I don't know where I stand for that project because I haven't heard from George since our initial discussion."
 
 If he does get the role, it will no doubt add to the already incredible celebrity weightload DiCaprio's been under since starring in James Cameron's ocean-liner epic -- but it seems he's learning to cope.
 
 The unprecedented success of Titanic turned DiCaprio into one of the most famous actors on the planet.
 
 For a then-23-year-old, it was an amazing quantum leap.
 
 "No one could have predicted the success of Titanic, nor the effect it would have on me as an actor," DiCaprio told the Sun yesterday.
 
 He had flown to Maui with several of his friends, including actor Toby Maguire, for a bit of sun, sand, surf and promotion for The Beach, his first film since Titanic. It opens Feb. 11.
 
 DiCaprio plays a young American tourist who thinks he has found paradise on a remote island in Thailand.
 
 What he has really found is much closer to hell.
 
 It teams him with director Danny Boyle, whose films include Shallow Grave and Trainspotting.
 
 DiCaprio says he chose to go with The Beach over dozens of other films he was offered because "it meant I would not
 
 be playing another doomed romantic lover.
 
 "That was very important for me. I had to change the image Titanic had given me."
 
 DiCaprio, who was dressed in jeans, oversized T-shirt and sandals, arrived 45 minutes late for his interviews.
 
 When you're Leonardo, you don't offer an explanation and no one asks.
 
 What he wanted to make clear was that he is not trying to underplay his fame, or to run away from it.
 
 "I'm not going to be bitter about the position I'm in. That would be both ungrateful and foolish.
 
 "My celebrity has given me a world of opportunities that others can only dream of."
 
 Many of the most famous filmmakers in the world have approached DiCaprio to star in their projects.
 
 Apart from the Star Wars talks with Lucas, DiCaprio also confirmed he and Francis Ford Coppola spoke about working together on Godfather 4.
 
 "Godfather 4 is a project I would have dearly loved to do, but the death of Mario Puzo has put an end to that dream," he said.
 
 DiCaprio has committed to starring in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, which is scheduled to begin filming in Rome in March.
 
 "I play a young (Irish) man in the 1850s who returns to New York City to avenge the death of his father," he said.
 
 "It's a project Martin and I have been talking about for years now."
 
 Luckily, shooting schedules for Gangs of New York and the Star Wars film do not conflict, so if the opportunity arose, he would be able to do both.

LONDON -- Just when fans started suspecting Leonardo DiCaprio's new film was lost at sea, a date has been set for The Beach to surface.

The U.K.'s Guardian newspaper reports the film -- originally scheduled for a Christmas release -- will now hit theatres in Britain and North America on Feb. 11.

The Beach is DiCaprio's first film since 1998's The Man in the Iron Mask, aside from a small role in Woody Allen's Celebrity playing a spoiled young actor.

The movie was shot in Thailand, and is still making waves there, according to the Guardian.

Locals in Thailand protested during filming that production was damaging the local ecology. The newspaper quotes a Thai source as saying the beach in question is now a "forlorn scene of ugly bamboo fences and dead native plants."

- Calgary Sun

In "Titanic," Leonardo DiCaprio declared he was "King of the World" -- now he'll play one of the richest men the world has ever known.
 
 Director Michael Mann, whose true-life drama "The Insider" opens this weekend, told the Access Hollywood TV show that his collaboration with DiCaprio on the Hughes bio film is a definite go.
 
 The Mann film will deal with Hughes' early years as an industrialist and would-be Hollywood mogul. Warren Beatty and Johnny Depp are said to be working on their own Hughes projects at the same time.
 
 The Hughes story has been told many times on both TV and film -- from Jason Robards' portrayal in "Melvin And Howard" to Dean Stockwell's performance in Francis Ford Coppola's "Tucker: A Man And His Dream."
 
 Mann and DiCaprio had also talked about making a biopic on the life of James Dean, but Mann told Access Hollywood that idea is on hold for now.

HOLLYWOOD -- Larger-than-life actor Leonardo DiCaprio is about to get involved with larger-than-life reclusive billionaire, the late Howard Hughes.

After an unsuccessful attempt to collaborate on a movie about Hollywood legend James Dean, director Michael Mann and Di-Caprio have agreed to do a film portrait of Hughes for Disney.

The once-dashing billionaire aviator escorted a bevy of beautiful Hollywood actresses before he declined into a germophobic recluse.

John Logan, who wrote Oliver Stone's drama Any Given Sunday, is working on the Hughes script.

DiCaprio, who just starred in The Beach, and Mann have wanted to work together ever since they nearly teamed on a film about Dean.

Mann's latest film is The Insider, about tobacco whistle-blower Jeffrey Wigand, which stars Russell Crowe and Al Pacino and is scheduled for a November release.

DiCaprio isn't the only actor who wants to play Hughes. One rival project is set up at Universal with Allen and Albert Hughes (no relation to Howard Hughes) to direct and Johnny Depp to star. That project is based on Empire: The Life, Legend And Madness Of Howard Hughes, a book by Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele.

Warren Beatty also has long harbored aspirations to play Hughes, though there's no indication he's working on anything at the moment.

A final potential project, the David Koepp-scripted Mr. Hughes, about Clifford Irving's fabricated autobiography of Hughes, is apparently dead, though Nicolas Cage at one time wanted to star for director Brian De Palma.

- Toronto Sun

HOLLYWOOD -- Leonardo DiCaprio will leave The Beach and head for Dreamland.

The actor has bought the options for Kevin Baker's recently published debut novel, Dreamland, for an undisclosed sum, Variety says.

The book's story and social commentary have been compared to E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime.

It takes place in turn-of-the-century New York and follows the struggles of a large cast of characters, mainly Jewish, Irish and Italian immigrants, in the teeming Lower East Side ghettoes.

It was published last month by HarperCollins. Baker previously served as chief historical researcher for Harold Evans' book, The American Century.

DiCaprio will produce the picture, but won't get started on it until after he returns from starring in his latest film, The Beach, in Thailand.

- Toronto Sun

LONDON -- Leonardo DiCaprio is riled over accusations that production on his latest film is ravaging a Thai beach paradise.

"I don't want a bad reputation as somebody who endorses something hostile to the environment," said the Titanic star.

His first role since Titanic is in The Beach, which has started a row with Thai environmentalists. DiCaprio, in an interview published by Britain's Daily Telegraph newspaper, called the protests "a big waste of time."

The film was shot on Phi Phil Le Island where the filmmakers imported 60 palm trees, bulldozed sand-dunes and tore up bushes.

On the other hand, they have removed three tons of rubbish from the beach and promise to return it to its pristine state when filming is completed in April.

Di Caprio, 24, said: "I haven't seen any destruction of the beach. And I have been there every day ... I've seen everyone take the utmost meticulous care.

"In all this controversy, my name has been used as a symbol of what's going on. That's upsetting me."

- Toronto Sun

BANGKOK -- A Thai group is threatening to sue 20th Century Fox over a wrecked beach, Variety says.

The group claims filming for The Beach, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, was responsible for the destruction of a beach in a protected national park area.

Protesters have been camped out on the beach, several hundred miles southwest of Bangkok, watching the film crew since early December.

The Lawyers Society of Thailand agreed to take the protesters' case and requested an injunction against filming, which is set to begin next week.

Permission to shoot in Thailand was granted last July.

Fox then requested government permission to level several sand dunes, remove some natural vegetation and plant coconut trees re-located from the mainland to the island.

Permission again was granted, after Fox agreed to post a bond of 5 million baht ($139,000) against environmental damage.

In early November, residents of the island, along with 29 non-governmental organizations, protested the ruling.

An official statement issued by the protesters said, "This (Fox's actions) is actually a well-known method of forest encroachment by developers. It turns natural, ecologically varied sites into coconut plantations. This is not making a movie. It's an abuse of power."

It's the second spat with Thai officials for Fox recently. Last month, Fox moved production of Anna And The King from Thailand to Malaysia, after a Thai film board refused Fox permission to film in Thailand, saying the script didn't show sufficient respect to the Thai monarchy.

-- Toronto Sun

BANGKOK (AP) -- The 20th Century Fox movie studio was cleared Fridconomy, is an attempt to end an embarrassing episode in the life of the Mike Harris Tories at public expense, the opposition Liberals say.

"Mr. Harris is trying to get a quick out-of-court settlement, rather than have this matter proceed to court . . . which means the evidence becomes very public and it will all be very embarrassing to the government," Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty said.

"Al McLean has to take personal responsibility for his actions."

Thompson, a former special assistant to McLean, now 61, filed an $830,000 wrongful dismissal suit two years ago against McLean and the Ontario government.

She has accused McLean of firing her after she refused to have sex with him. Thompson says she reluctantly slept with him on four previous occasions in the Speaker's Queen's Park apartment before trying to end the relationship.

McLean, who did not respond to requests to be interviewed Friday, denied the allegations but quickly resigned his job as Speaker.

His replacement, Conservative Chris Stockwell, said Friday that a decision by Thompson to accept the settlement would put an end to at least half a dozen related lawsuits.

One is a $1-million suit filed by McLean against the legislature for constructive dismissal.

A deal would also call off a review of Thompson's sexual harassment suit by the Human Rights Commission, Stockwell said.

In a 3-2 vote, the board agreed Thursday to a deal that would give Thompson $150,000 for costs and $100,000 in damages. It would also pay McLean $130,000 for his legal costs.

The deal was hatched, despite complaints by the two opposition members of the board, and despite advice given by the government's own lawyers, Stockwell confirmed.

That advice, according to the Liberal member of the board, suggested allowing McLean's sex case to go to court. If he won the case, then taxpayers could cover his legal costs. But if the allegations were accepted by the court, then McLean himself should be liable.

"Mike Harris is disregarding the good advice of Ontario's lawyer that says taxpayers won't be held responsible for this," McGuinty said.

"What he's concerned about here are the political costs and he's prepared to put this matter behind him even if it costs taxpayers $400,000."

NEW YORK -- Miramax Films has optioned the rights to the story of late jazz trumpet legend Chet Baker for Leonardo DiCaprio.

Miramax outbid Universal and Paramount, which were looking to buy the rights for Brad Pitt and Jim Carrey, respectively.

DiCaprio will play the Oklahoma-born, California-reared Baker, a jazz phenomenon who helped popularize the "neo-bop" sound of the '50s.

Hired by Charlie Parker at age 22, Baker maintained a matter-of-fact attitude toward his music and his life, including his legal and drug woes.

He died in 1988 at age 58 in an early-morning fall from an Amsterdam hotel room.

HOLLYWOOD -- Tobey Maguire, whose films include The Ice Storm and Deconstructing Harry, is in no hurry to become a celebrity.

He's seen what fame has done to his best friend Leonardo DiCaprio.

"Dealing with fame is a test of who you are. I've watched Leo handle a lot of dumb, inappropriate, disturbing stuff.

"The paparazzi say such ugly things to him to try and get him to react violently, so they'll have a photo they can sell.

"We've gone out for a meal and not been able to eat because of all the cameras flashing and people asking him for autographs."

Maguire has just finished filming Ang Lee's new Civil War movie Ride With the Devil and begins work on the film version of John Irving's epic novel The Cider House Rules with Paul Rudd, Michael Caine and Charlize Theron.

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Leonardo DiCaprio settled his lawsuit Monday against Playgirl magazine over nude photographs of the young actor.

Terms of the settlement were not released.

Linda Goldman, DiCaprio's attorney, confirmed the deal but declined further comment, citing the confidential terms.

"The parties amicably settled their differences," Playgirl attorney Kent Raygor said.

The "Titanic" star sued the magazine in March to prevent it from publishing the photographs in its July issue. DiCaprio also claimed the pictures were being used to promote Playgirl's Internet site.

Neither side would say whether the pictures are in the July issue.

The suit claimed publishing the photos would be "offensive and objectionable," and a "reasonable person of ordinary sensibilities (would) not want to disclose in a nationally published magazine ... his completely naked body, including full frontal nudiy."

The lawsuit sought unspecified damages for invasion of privacy and emotional distress.

DiCaprio was the second Hollywood actor to sue the magazine over publication of nude pictures. Brad Pitt sued in July to prevent 2-year-old pictures of him from being published. A judge later prohibited further distribution of the magazine.

He may have been snubbed by the Oscar nominating committee, but Leonardo DiCaprio has apparently nabbed himself a dandy consolation prize.

An industry insider says the cunning DiCaprio asked for a percentage of Titanic's box-office take.

To the tune of 5%.

Back in November before Titanic was released, it looked as if DiCaprio wouldn't see much more than pocket change.

But all that's changed.

Titanic has already grossed $1 billion US worldwide and is showing few signs of slowing down. It pulled in another

$17 million last week, out-grossing Leo's new movie, The Man in the Iron Mask.

If this is true, it means the 23-year-old teen idol could easily see a paycheque in excess of $50 million US before Titanic finally sinks at the box-office.

DiCaprio is reportedly demanding a $20 million US payday for his next movie.

It's an astute move.

DiCaprio has only to look at the career of Brad Pitt. Two years ago, Pitt was white hot.

When he turned the dark thriller Seven into a runaway box-office hit, studios concluded he could do no wrong, so they gave him first choice of all major projects and $15 million US just to sign on the dotted line.

His two choices, The Devil's Own and Seven Years in Tibet, were major box-office disasters.

The same will happen to DiCaprio.

It's only a matter of time.

The one constant all celebrities have to accept is that fans are fickle. Leo is striking while his irons are hot.

It's still not certain whether DiCaprio will attend Monday's Oscar ceremony.

He's the big reason women are returning to screenings of Titanic week after week, yet he is the only major artist associated with the film not to be recognized by the academy.

Kate Winslet is up for best actress, James Cameron for best director, Gloria Stuart for best supporting actress and the film's designers, cinematographer, editors and composer are also nominated.

  There are two Leonardo DiCaprios.

There is the star of Romeo & Juliet, Titanic and Friday's Man in the Iron Mask, who is worshipped by fans all over the world.

Then there is the young man who plays video games and beachball with a gang of childhood friends.

"I never wanted to be a celebrity and I never saw myself as a celebrity even when others did, but this whole celebrity thing is encroaching on my real life,'' DiCaprio has admitted in interviews.

Wherever DiCaprio goes, from Hollywood hot spots to film premieres in Tokyo to museums in France, he is beseiged by fans.

"It's not something I'm entirely ecstatic about. I'll have to deal with the consequences but I won't ever become a weird recluse.''

With the money he made starring as the doomed young artist aboard the Titanic, DiCaprio bought himself a $3.5-million US Hollywood mansion just down the street from Elizabeth Taylor's home.

It's the first time in his 23 years that he has not lived with his mother and grandmother in a rather seedy area of Los Angeles.

"There were sex shops and motels near by. It was a rough neighborhood but a cool one to grow up in. I saw real life from a very early age. I think that has helped me as an actor.''

DiCaprio's parents, George and Irmelin, divorced before he was two years old.

"My parents were both there for me. They're the coolest parents in the world and I feel proud to be their son.''

The young actor is famous for his loyalty. He has a group of five childhood friends, including actor Tobey Maguire (The Ice Storm) and personal assistants Jonah Johnson and Ethan Suplee who travel with him everywhere.

He has it written into his movie contracts that the studio will fly his friends first class to his film sets if he is shooting on location.

When he goes club-hopping or takes one of his girlfriends to an exotic resort, his friends accompany him.

DiCaprio has dated a succession of models and actresses, including Canadian Natasha Henstridge, Helena Christensen and Amber Valletta, but usually for short periods.

His longest relationship was a 15-month fling with model Kristin Zang.

Most recently, DiCaprio spent a week in Cuba with his friends and Canadian music superstar Alanis Morissette who he insists "is just another really good friend.''

According to DiCaprio, the only live-in companion at his Hollywood home these days is his pet dragon lizard.

Unlike most young actors, DiCaprio hasn't dated his co-stars.

Claire Danes, who was his on-screen Juliet, feels DiCaprio is "charismatic, intelligent and charming.

"He's certainly easy on the eyes but he's more like the guy at school you'd hang around with rather than date," says Claire.

"He always seemed more interested in his video games than anything else.''

Kate Winslet, who plays his love interest in Titanic, says the actor is "a really kind, wonderful person.

"I was expecting he'd be just another self-centred stud but he's not at all, even though he is absolutely gorgeous.

"He's the kind of person who can party all night and then roll out of bed the next morning looking stunning.''

On Friday, DiCaprio stars as twin brothers in the swashbuckling action movie The Man in the Iron Mask.

He plays the evil King Louis XIV of France and his brother, Phillipe, who has been locked for six years in a dungeon, his face hidden by an iron mask.

Of all the projects that came to him in the wake of Titanic, DiCaprio chose The Man in the Iron Mask to work with writer/director Randall Wallace.

"Randy's Braveheart is one of my favorite films in recent years and his new script has all the same themes of valor and passion as opposed to the typical machismo thing you see in a lot of films these days.''

DiCaprio also jumped at the opportunity to work with co-stars Gabriel Byrne, Gerard Depardieu, Jeremy Irons and John Malkovich.

The one thing DiCaprio hadn't counted on was spending so much time in the iron mask.

"It definitely gets claustrophobic. After 10 minutes in the mask, I was almost bashing my head against walls out of pure frustration.

"I realized if I was going to survive, I had to make the mask part of my body. I wore it around for hours all the time fighting off the urge to scratch my face off.''

Upcoming, DiCaprio also has a small role in Woody Allen's next film, playing a spoiled Hollywood movie star.

  HOLLYWOOD -- Since he turned 21 two years ago, Leonardo DiCaprio has watched his life gradually slip away from his control.

"I used to think I was in complete control of my life, but there have been incidents recently that clearly demonstrate that's not always true," concedes DiCaprio.

One of those incidents occurred last month when Titanic had its world premiere in Tokyo.

DiCaprio's limo had to be rerouted because more than 3,000 screaming fans were challenging the 250 police in riot gear who were trying to keep them away from the red carpet their idol was meant to grace with his presence.

DiCaprio was taken through sidestreets into the back entrance of the cinema.

James Cameron, who wrote and directed Titanic, points out that "he's known to his fans and increasingly more so in the industry simply as Leo.

"That's a hint at his popularity."

Earlier this year when DiCaprio was in France filming The Man in the Iron Mask, he was mobbed in the Louvre Museum while he and his friends were trying to catch a glimpse of the Mona Lisa. Security guards had to rush to his assistance.

DiCaprio admits "this kind of celebrity is not something I ever wanted or courted.

"Realistically though, it's not the worst thing that could happen to a person. These fans don't mean me any harm. They just want to take my picture or get my autograph.

"It's definitely an intrusion into my life and it's something I'm going to have to learn to deal with. It's a good thing I have such great friends. They help keep every thing in perspective."

DiCaprio's friends -- or his posse as they have been tagged -- go with him everywhere.

In addition to his $5-million salary, he has it written into his contracts that his friends will be flown first-class to the locations of his films.

"We party and play video games. We're all a bunch of daredevils so we're always challenging each other to things like bungee jumping or sky diving. It's how I keep my head straight. They were so important to me on the (Mexican) sets of Romeo & Juliet and Titanic."

Next to the five male friends DiCaprio grew up with in Hollywood, he counts supermodels as his best friends.

He attends most of the big fashion shows in L.A., New York and Paris and mingles backstage with the models. He dated model Kristen Zang, Nicolas Cage's former girlfriend, for a little over a year, but is a bachelor once again.

DiCaprio has received a Golden Globe nomination for his role as the struggling portrait painter who falls in love with Kate Winslet's wealthy socialite in Titanic.

If the tide of popular opinion continues to build, DiCaprio could find himself with an Oscar nomination.

The irony in his Titanic nomination is that DiCaprio resisted even auditioning for the role.

"I saw it as just another doomed lover role, and I had just completed Romeo & Juliet. I wanted to try something really different."

DiCaprio agreed to meet with Cameron, who he says "kind of goaded me into taking the part. He suggested that I'd only ever played misfits and that I was afraid to tackle someone as normal as Jack Dawson in Titanic."

Normal is hardly a word that applies to DiCaprio's upbringing. His parents divorced when he was still a baby but jointly raised their son. He still lives with his mother and grandmother.

"Both of my parents are like my limbs. I couldn't see myself functioning without either of them," DiCaprio says. "Friends and family are really who I am. Everything else is hype or fabrication. If my fans really knew me, they wouldn't be impressed.

"They're reacting to my screen personas, not the real me."

 HOLLYWOOD -- Leonardo DiCaprio managed to get on one of the first lifeboats leaving James Cameron's Titanic.

He has washed ashore in Paris to begin filming the title role in The Man in the Iron Mask.

This costume epic based on the Three Musketeers was delayed because Titanic ran into rough waters and, as one of the film's stars, DiCaprio could not get shore leave.

In The Man in the Iron Mask, DiCaprio plays evil King Louis XIV and his twin, a man languishing in the castle dungeon.

No one knows the identity of the prisoner because his face is encased in a mask.

To the rescue comes D'Artagnan, played by Gabriel Byrne, and his fellow Musketeers John Malkovich, Jeremy Irons and Gerard Depardieu.

This latest version of the Alexandre Dumas classic is being directed by Randall Wallace, who also wrote the screenplay. Wallace was nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay for Mel Gibson's Braveheart.

 NEW YORK (AP) -- Leonardo DiCaprio is just now getting around to looking back and taking stock of his life -- at the ripe old age of 21.

"I've just been jolting along from one film to another," he said in Sunday's Daily News. "I've never really looked back. Now, it's sort of a shock to realize what I've done at 21."

DiCaprio's portrayal of a retarded boy in What's Eating Gilbert Grape, earned him an Oscar nomination. He also starred in This Boy's Life, with Robert De Niro, The Basketball Diaries and The Quick and the Dead, with Sharon Stone and Gene Hackman. Currently, he stars with Claire Danes in William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet.

But DiCaprio says he doesn't let his film credits go to his head.

"One day you're hot, and one day you're not. It's easy to fall into the trap of believing all the hype that's written about you. I'm trying to avoid it. Who knows? In a couple of years you might find me in the loony bin."

 HOLLYWOOD -- The movie industry likes their seasoned veterans to come with a huge helping of youthful vitality.

That's why the movie studios always need Leonardo DiCaprio.

He's only 21, but he has an Oscar nomination to his credit for What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, and has worked with the best. He was Robert De Niro's son in This Boy's Life, and will be seen soon as Meryl Streep's boy in Marvin's Room.

He's currently filming the mega-budget movie Titanic, and is soon to be seen as Romeo in Baz Luhrmann's version of William Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet, opening tomorrow.

No question, DiCaprio is bound for glory.

"As long as I can maintain a clear head and remain sane," he says, "I'm going to keep doing what I do."

His problem has been trying to sort out what's best for him to do as an avalanche of scripts descends on him.

Luhrmann, for instance, had to be diligent in his pursuit of DiCaprio.

Being the director of the loopy Strictly Ballroom helped sway the always-in-demand actor. So did Luhrmann's highly stylized take on the classic love-conquering-evil Romeo And Juliet.

"If it hadn't been written in a sort of modern-day fantasy world," DiCaprio admits, "I probably wouldn't have done what has been done before. We've all seen that flowery, staring-up-at-the-stars version."

Luhrmann's exotic, quixotic take on the play actually inspired the rebellious Romeo in DiCaprio, who eventually recommended Claire Danes for the Juliet part. In the end, DiCaprio was allowed to be cool and do Shakespeare too.

He grins: "Yeah, something along those lines." For instance, there is a scene in this wacky Romeo And Juliet that suggests Romeo is tripping on LSD. "It's defintely one of those ga-ga drugs," he says innocently.

Innocently? Rumor has it that DiCaprio is anything but innocent when it comes to experimenting with substances, although he denies the gossip.

"I've never come close to what any of my characters have done," says DiCaprio, who played a heroin addict in The Basketball Diaries and the wild-living poet Rimbaud in Total Eclipse.

Anyway, he doesn't like talking trash. But he will come clean about a lifestyle transition: He moved out of his mother's house.

One of these days he might even live in his new home -- "It's a weird adjustment, man" -- if he ever gets off a set. "I have to slow down soon," he says of his hectic schedule.

That won't be soon. The Titanic shoot, in and around Baja California in Mexico, should last another three months.

"It's my first commercial attempt," says DiCaprio, who plays an artist on the doomed passenger ship. "Yeah, I fall in love, then the ship goes down."

He's chuckling. "Sorry," he says still smiling. "Some people don't get it when I'm being sarcastic."

You think that's oddly ironic, what about the planned Broadway musical focusing on the Titanic.

DiCaprio's laughing again. "I don't understand how that can happen," he says. "What will they do, sing choruses of Jump all the way through?"

MIAMI -- Being 17, Claire Danes, the Juliet in William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet, is torn about many things. One is Shakespeare, whom she considers "truly a genius." She knows he's considered uncool.
 
"I saw Romeo & Juliet with a friend of mine, and he was like, `Forget Shakespeare! This movie is so cool, you shouldn't even mention him. It'll keep people away.'"
 
"And I guess I want people to know this movie has nothing to do with anything scary or academic or boring."
 
Well scary, maybe. Teen gangs, warring clans, gunplay, a beachside 'hood, cops, police helicopters, armageddonish news reports, a bleak urban battle zone...
 
Something tells me we're not in Verona anymore, Toto. We're in Verona Beach, a parallel universe from Australian director Baz Lurhmann (Strictly Ballroom).
 
But soft! What light through yonder tradition breaks? This Romeo & Juliet (Leonardo DiCaprio and Danes), plus sundry Montague and Capulet homeboys, speak Elizabethan English. Every "thee, thou" and "methinks" is from the tale of tragic lovers from "two households, both alike in dignity (who) from ancient grudge break new mutiny, where civil blood makes civil hands unclean."
 
To facilitate the update (which opens Friday) while preserving the play, Luhrmann created a bizarro universe, with the trappings of modern times, but an Elizabethan sense. The Entertainment Tonight-type TV talking heads, hotly touting a gala soiree at the Capulet's, blather in iambic pentameter. Even the street signs and commercial billboards are in-jokes (Prospero Whiskey, The Shylock Bank, Rosencranzky's, The Merchant of Verona Beach, products touted as "Such stuff as dreams are made on").
 
It is, if nothing else, the weirdest take on the Bard many moviegoers will have ever seen -- and, director Luhrmann argues, the most faithful.
 
"I hated Shakespeare when I was a kid," says Luhrmann. "I was like, `This is impenetrable.'
 
"This changed later when I saw a production of Twelfth Night by this quite brilliant man in Sydney. There was a point near the end when I found myself in a sweat. It was like opening the curtain onto the power of the word. I want the same for others who have the curtain closed."
 
How much sense will Elizabethan English make to the Gen X'ers that the studio wants to attract? "Possibly as much sense as street rap makes to me -- and yet I dig those films," Luhrmann says.
 
"Remember, Shakespeare was a street-language writer. He invented a quarter of the language that he used; words like `bubble' were just things he made up."
 
"Our beliefs of the `right' way to do Shakespeare are 19th century. Elizabethans spoke like Americans."
 
His first movie after the 1992 hit Strictly Ballroom (the lively-and-sentimental ballroom dance love story that grossed $100 million worldwide), Romeo & Juliet was supposed to be an easy ride.
 
Luhrmann dropped out of the film biz after Strictly Ballroom. He spent time as media strategist for then-Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating. He directed operas -- including a production of Benjamin Britten's adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. The latter was, creatively or perversely, set in India, with characters recast as deities from Hindu scripture. It debuted at the Edinburgh Festival "where it was fantastically well-received. I was surprised," Luhrmann says.
 
"For my return to movies I just thought I wanted to do a project that wouldn't take a great deal of time. So I decided I would do Shakespeare, because I love Shakespeare and the script is already written for me."
 
Key to the film was DiCaprio (What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Basketball Diaries) -- Hollywood's new "it" kid.
 
"At the time I decided he had to be Romeo, Leo was being offered the income of a small nation to do certain other movies. I rang him up and I'm sure he and his dad thought I was fairly mad. But I said, `No commitments, Come down to Australia, go diving in the Barrier Reef -- 'cause they'd never done that -- and then we'll spend a week and we'll work on it. So he flew coach, spent some time in a hotel with his dad and was very interested in my ideas and how they could work."
 
Even after DiCaprio said yes, the studio wasn't biting. "So I brought him to Australia again, and we shot three scenes on video with actors and we screened it for the studio. I remember D (DiCaprio) comes out of his car dressed in a suit and goes, `Thibald, reason had I to love thee...' And all these executives are like, `I know what he's saying!' Luhrmann got his green light.
 
Then came the parade of Juliets, a process by which Danes, of the defunct TV series My So-Called Life, edged out sweet-young-thing Natalie Portman. "I keep reading Leo saying that I looked him in the eye at the audition and it was a romantic/dramatic thing. But I think what happened was that Leo was really tired because he'd auditioned, like, five girls already. He really didn't want to be there. So I just sort of seduced him with my acting, like `I'm having fun, don't you want to have fun?' It shook him up, and he recommended me."
 
The movie went through preproduction in Toronto (where veteran producer Gabriella Martinelli lives), and considered shooting sites in Toronto, Vancouver, Miami and Sydney. They settled on Mexico City because of its Old World contrast between rich and poor.
 
"Everybody was sick," says Danes. "We all got hit with Montezuma's revenge. I was camped out over the toilet for a day. I asked my mom, can you die from this? I was dead serious.
 
"But it was worth it. I'd have done anything for this movie."

THE ROMEO & JULIET FILE

BEVERLY HILLS -- O Leonardo, Leonardo! Why for art thou Romeo?
 
In the contemporary version of Romeo And Juliet, which opens Friday, Leonardo DiCaprio plays Shakespeare's young star-crossed lover.
 
No tights, doublet or sword for this young Montague.
 
DiCaprio's Romeo is a punk warrior growing up in a strife-torn modern city who marries the daughter of his family's worst enemy.
 
"If this hadn't been a contemporary spin on Romeo And Juliet, I wouldn't have done it. I didn't want to be jumping around in tights," he insists.
 
It was Australian director Baz Luhrmann (Strictly Ballroom) who came to DiCaprio with the offer.
 
"When Baz and I first talked, his concept was just a bunch of jumbled ideas but they were pretty intriguing," says DiCaprio.
 
Luhrmann set his R&J in the fictitious city of Verona Beach and took his cast and crew to Mexico to create this world of gangs, guns, ribald parties and young lovers.
 
"It wasn't difficult getting into the proper mindset once we got to Mexico. Mexico City is a violent, chaotic city. It was Shakespeare's world come to life," recalls DiCaprio.
 
"I had to have a bodyguard the whole time I was down there. Our hairstylist got kidnapped and held for ransom and one of my friends who came down to visit got into a serious brawl outside a club."
 
DiCaprio and the rest of the cast and crew of R&J also had to deal with that nasty Mexican bacteria.
 
"Everyone on the set got sick at one time. We caught every revenge disease Mexico has to offer. There were days I could hardly stand."
 
DiCaprio says he chose Claire Danes to be his Juliet.
 
"I auditioned with dozens of actresses (including Alicia Silverstone, Liv Tyler and Natalie Portman). Most of the actresses did all these flowery, mooning kind of things. It turned me off.
 
"I wanted some one who would be firm and assertive with my Romeo. Claire gave us that right away."
 
The young star of such films as What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, The Basketball Diaries and This Boy's Life says he didn't look inside his own soul to play Romeo.
 
"No tragic love lost story here," he says. "But I do see Romeo as a rebel."
 
DiCaprio himself is a bit of a rebel. He refuses to live his life in the kind of fishbowl his publicists might prefer.
 
"I love to hang out and party with my friends. I love to be wild and erratic.
 
"I've managed to keep a clear head and remain sane in this business because I remain a kid off camera. I get rid of all my tensions the way any 21-year-old does.
 
"I don't do drugs but I like to party. That has always confused a lot of people. They don't think you can do one without the other in Hollywood."

 NEW YORK -- When Leonardo DiCaprio was growing up, as a gangly, goofy, awkward kid from a seedy Hollywood neighborhood he calls Scumville, his school chums dubbed him Leonardo Retardo.

When he emerged as one of - if not the - hottest young actors in Hollywood, it was his fearless portrayal of a retarded boy in What's Eating Gilbert Grape that served as his catapult, flinging him into the maelstrom of fame.

Even his own parents (who have been separated for 19 years but are both working full time in their son's career) figure he is weird, although wonderful. "We think he's actually an alien," his father, George DiCaprio, told the New York Times. "There's something going on in him that we don't understand."

From Gilbert Grape, DiCaprio garnered an Oscar nomination as best supporting actor and heard accolades that included praise as extreme and laudatory as "the best actor of his generation" and, from Sharon Stone, "a genius." There are several hundred scripts piled up in his mother Irmelin's garage in Los Angeles (the 20-year-old DiCaprio still lives with his mom, although, thankfully, they are no longer in Scumville). The scripts are the basis of Hollywood movie offers that are designed to exploit his odd appeal and ride his rocket to the stars.

But DiCaprio confounds the obvious. He is in his denial stage, even though he obviously enjoys the attention. "I feel it's sort of separate from me, even though I live in the heart of it," DiCaprio says, flipping his limp brown hair out of his eyes, shuffling slightly in his seat but looking and sounding calmer than the manic, nervous kid I met two years ago in Toronto when he emerged playing Robert De Niro's son in This Boy's Life.

"It sounds sort of contradictory because I live in Hollywood and I'm around this sort of people all the time," he says of the professional career-makers who want a piece of him, "but I really don't take them seriously for some reason."

The first movie role he grabbed after the Oscars was as a cocky young gunslinger in Sam Raimi's gonzo western farce The Quick And The Dead. It was a secondary supporting role in what turned out to be a throwaway film, and now he seems lukewarm, even slightly hostile, about the memory. "It was all right, you know. It was a good time, I suppose. From not working for a year since Gilbert Grape, bam, I was there and I had to sort of adjust to that. I had a good time doing the character. I mean, who couldn't? That kid was just a nut job."

The next role he took was playing a 17-year-old loser from the streets of Manhattan, a young man who butchers his own promise as a high school basketball star by sliding into the horrors of heroin addiction. The film is The Basketball Diaries (set for Toronto release April 21) and it's based on the true story of the childhood of poet-musician Jim Carroll, who beat his addiction, wrote about his experiences and turned them into The Basketball Diaries, a book which defined growing up senselessly in the '60s.

"I fell in love with the book," says DiCaprio of his motivations in shooting Diaries with former MTV music video director Scott Kalvert, who makes his feature film debut. "It was such a brilliant book. And the script captured a lot of what the book was about, so I wanted to do it."

Since he wrapped up shooting Diaries, the busy DiCaprio has filmed Total Eclipse, a European production from veteran Polish director Agnieszka Holland in which DiCaprio plays notorious French poet Arthur Rimbaud. The story is a fictionalized version of his love story with another poet, Paul Verlaine (played by English actor David Thewlis of Naked fame).

For the future, DiCaprio is negotiating to play James Dean, a legendary actor DiCaprio is occasionally, if recklessly, compared to by critics. "Scary!" DiCaprio says of any such comparisons. "A little much! To tell you the truth, I can't even look at my acting for real because I know it's all fake."

Playing Dean, however, would be exciting, he says. "I'm interested in James Dean just for the fact that he can be such a damn challenge."

So are all the roles he is shooting now. DiCaprio is a risk-taker walking on the dark side. The Basketball Diaries, with its relentlessly bleak saga of drug addiction, petty crime, seedy prostitution and personal degradation, certainly is a risk. It was also an exploration, a learning curve. Despite growing up near Hollywood's notorious House of Billiards, in the middle of a drug- and prostitution-infested area, DiCaprio is still naive, if knowing.

He had a lot to learn to play Jim Carroll. DiCaprio says he has never tried any drugs himself (although the Times reported that his mother lit up a joint during an interview at her house). "I've been little mister goody two-shoes as far as that goes," DiCaprio says of drug use. "I've always been clean. (But) I've always known what this stuff can do for you and it wasn't some big lesson I learned after seeing the movie."

What he did have to learn is specifically how using different drugs would affect his actions, his motions, his emotions and therefore his performance in The Basketball Diaries. "We had a specialist who had taken most of the drugs in the world come in and give us the rundown on each of them, with the effects on your body."

DiCaprio has no idea if The Basketball Diaries will be a boon or a bust in his career. He cares - but not to the point of paralysis. He tries to be philosophical.

"I don't want to have a big expectation on me to be great in every film I do," DiCaprio reflects, struggling to come to terms with the fame he embraces and rejects simultaneously. "I want to have room to make mistakes as well. I think that's where you learn the most. I'm just taking it how it comes right now."

The LEONARDO DiCAPRIO File