Who Are They Really? What Are Their Real Names?

When you are famous, you have to give up something. You may get special invitations and free stuff, but you have to give up your privacy. People want to know everything there is to know about you, and they feel like they have a right to do so. But before getting famous, sometimes personal details, like a birth name, need to be changed. It could be because their first name wasn’t exciting enough, or because someone else had the same name, or just because they wanted something different. No matter why, these celebrities are among the few who no longer use their birth names.

1. Meghan Markle

Yes, Meghan Markle is not her real name. She used to be an actress on the TV show “Suits.” Rachel Meghan Markle is her real name. Her first name is Rachel, and Meghan is her middle name. We don’t know why the name was changed, but the double M might have made it more interesting. But before you think that Harry yells “Rach!” around their California home when he needs her, he recently told James Corden that he calls her “Meg” and she calls him “Haz.” Seems like people like to change their names a lot. From 2011 until 2013, Markle was married to the American film producer Trevor Engelson. When she got married to Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, in 2018, she stopped acting and became known as the Duchess of Sussex. They stopped being important members of the royal family in January 2020 and moved to her home state of California. They started Archewell Inc. In October 2020. It is an American public organisation that works on non-profit and creative media projects. Archie and Lilibet Mountbatten-Windsor are their children.

2. Emma Stone

Emma Stone is a well-known actress with ginger hair. Her real name is Emily Stone, but when she first started acting, she couldn’t use it. Emily Stone had already been signed up by another actress. She first wanted a completely different name, “Riley Stone,” but she said it was too hard to tell it was her right away (which was pretty funny and embarrassing), so she went with “Emma,” which was close to the original name. We couldn’t picture her being different. Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter said of her work in The Help that she is “one of our very best young actresses.” She is known for being in both big-budget Hollywood movies and low-budget independent movies. Daniel D’Addario of Time calls the latter a “substantive risk,” and he says that being in them gives her a chance to “try something new and gain credibility.” Jessica Kiang of IndieWire wrote that Stone “usually [plays] the approachable, down-to-earth, girl-next-door type, [and] in person she shows many of those qualities as well as an absolute refusal to take herself too seriously.”

3. Anne Hathaway

Anne Hathaway said on Jimmy Fallon’s talk show recently that her real name is not Anne. Well, her birth certificate says that her name is Anne, but no one in her life seems to call her this. She cleared things up by saying that her name is Annie and that everyone in her life calls her that. Her mother is the only person who ever calls her Anne, and that’s only when she’s in big trouble. Even so, we think Annie fits her better. But it’s funny that Anne never seemed to mind that she had the same name as Shakespeare’s wife… Hathaway has also done voice work for the TV show The Simpsons, for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award. She has also sung for soundtracks, performed on stage, and hosted events. She gives money to a number of good causes. She is on the board of the Lollipop Theatre Network, a group that shows movies to kids in hospitals, and she is a UN Women goodwill ambassador, which means she works for equal rights for men and women. Hathaway is married to businessman and actor Adam Shulman, with whom she has two sons.

4. Bruno Mars

Bruno Mars has a name that sounds as jazzy and funky as his music, but it’s not his real name. Bruno’s real name is Peter Gene Hernandez, which is not nearly as cool as his stage name. So, the name Bruno came about because his father wanted to honour the boxer Bruno Sammartino by calling him that. Bruno says that a lot of girls told him he was “out of this world,” so the name Mars just seemed to fit. We’ll be honest: now that we know this guy’s story, we love him even more, if that was even possible. Mars grew up in a musical family and was influenced by a wide range of music. His first performance was with his father’s band in Hawaii when he was only five years old. Mars moved to Los Angeles to start his own career. He got a job at Atlantic Records as a house songwriter and producer.

5. Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys chose the name “Keys” because she loves playing the piano. Her real name is Alicia Augello Cooke, but she didn’t like it because it was too long. She wanted a short, catchy name. At first, she thought she’d call herself Alicia Wild, but her mother put a stop to that (we agree with mom). Then she thought of Keys as being like piano keys, which made sense. Once you know, it’s pretty cool.

6. John Legend

John Legend, who can’t be stopped, is the last name on our list. We’ll be honest: we didn’t know that this wasn’t his real name, but now that we do, we feel a little silly for not figuring it out sooner. After all, “Legend” is just too cool of a last name to be real. John Roger Stephens is John Legend’s real name, but some of his friends started calling him Legend as a joke, and the name stuck. Well, first he got the name, and then he really did become a legend. It looks like things turned out well in the end. Legend worked as a management consultant at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) after he graduated from college. He also started producing, writing, and recording his own music. He put out two albums on his own: a demo called “Self-Titled” in 2000 and “Live at Jimmy’s Uptown” in 2001. He sold copies of both albums at his shows. After that, he started to work on his demo and started sending it to different record labels.