“I’m very, very proud!” : This casting director launched Leonardo DiCaprio’s career

With a career spanning more than 30 years, casting director Avi Kaufman has built an impressive resume. Over the years, he has appeared in a variety of projects, including the Emmy-winning HBO shows Succession and Mare of Easttown, as well as the Academy Award-winning films King Richard, The Blues of Ma Rainey and Lincoln. He has also been involved in the casting of memorable projects such as Tár, The OA, Scream 4 and the upcoming Rustin. Although each work on which Avi Kaufman Benefiting from outstanding casting, one actor in particular stands out: Leonardo DiCaprio.

In an interview with Collider, he said he was very proud to have helped advance the legendary actor’s career with the biopic The Basketball Diaries (1995), which also starred Mark Wahlberg and Lorraine Bracco, among others.

How did leonardo dicaprio top basketball diaries? If anyone watched The Basketball Diaries right now: How great were he and Mark Wahlberg together? break your heart Oh my god, a group of people I’m very, very proud of, but saying the names makes me feel weird.

The casting director also shared a memorable moment between him and the young actress during which he realized she would go far in the industry. Although they didn’t know each other very well, she had noticed certain aspects of him since childhood, especially a certain “sensitivity”.

“Even when he was a young boy, he–I don’t know him, you know? I knew him for two seconds. I remember he was smoking and he told me not to tell my mother. And I said: “Don’t tell my husband!” There is sensitivity in it. There’s probably still a little boy in him because he was becoming a man, lost souls finding their way, it was, “Mommy, do you hear me?”“

Leonardo DiCaprio now

This year, Leonardo DiCaprio has reunited with Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon, which hits our screens on October 18. The film, which made headlines at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, is based on a true story and depicts the devastating murders of the Osage people in 1920s Oklahoma that sparked an FBI investigation.

The actor will rejoin Scorsese for the adaptation of the bestseller Wager Shipwrecks and is also in the running to star in a Jim Jones biopic, though no further details have been released. a little while ago, Leonardo DiCaprio Also distinguished himself as a producer for projects such as Flower Moon AssassinsThe animated film Ozi, the sound of the forest or the series Shining Girls with Elisabeth Moss.

Watch the full interview with Avi Kaufman below: