Celebrity names everyone mispronounces

He didn't start his career until he was 30 (he told The Independent that he'd previously spent 10 years as a dancer), but the Danish actor is known worldwide for not just his unearthly performance in Hannibal (2013-15) but for his roles in two of the biggest franchises in the world: Marvel and Star Wars. In spite of all that fame, almost everyone gets his name wrong.

When Mikkelsen spoke with the National Post, the first thing he wanted to get out of the way was his name. According to him, it's pronounced "Mass," but he doesn't get offended when people mess it up. "I don't mind, I think it sounds kind of cool," he said.

A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., this unlikely celebrity has a background as blue-collar as it gets. The son of a sanitation worker and a waitress, Buscemi counts dishwasher, furniture mover, ice cream truck driver, gas station attendant, and firefighter among his many jobs. He dropped out of community college, and he told The Guardian that taking acting classes simply seemed like "the logical thing to do."

Today, everyone knows him, and everyone says his name not technically wrong, but absolutely unlike the pronunciation he was raised with in Brooklyn. "I can't say 'Boo-shemi,'" he told talk show host Scott Rogowsky (via BuzzFeed). "Because I didn't grow up that way." While the actor pronounces his last name as "Boo-semi," he goes on to say that in his family's native Sicily, it's pronounced "Boo-shay-mi," so even Steve's taking some poetic license with his surname.

Irish actress Saoirse Ronan found fame in the States with Brooklyn (2015), the story of an Irish immigrant forging her way through 1950s America. It earned the young Carlow native her second Oscar nomination, and it also earned her complete phonetic confusion among American fans.

In January 2016, she discussed her name with talk show host Ellen DeGeneres and laughed about the difficulties many were having with her traditional handle. "It makes no sense," she said, and while she didn't know anyone else personally who shared the name, she did say that it means "freedom," and God knows, Americans love that. DeGeneres proceeded to make Ronan a sandwich board to help those struggling with the pronunciation. It read, "Hello. My name is Sur-sha."

He's starred in both the Star Wars and Harry Potter movie franchises, yet his name remains a challenge for most of the world outside of Ireland. Born in Dublin, the red-headed son of actor Brendan Gleeson says he's been referred to by names that aren't even remotely close to his actual handle. He told Entertainment Weekly he'd once been dubbed "Downhill Gleeson."

Fortunately, his name is actually deceptively easy to pronounce. "It's like 'tonal' with a 'd' instead of a 't'," he told Entertainment Weekly. "The 'm' is just there to confuse Americans."

The versatile actress has made her mark in Hollywood playing an incredible array of characters, and it's made her a household name. Unfortunately, most of those households are actually pronouncing her name wrong. When Theron went on The Tonight Show, she was thrilled when host Jimmy Fallon got her last name right. "It's like music to my ears," she said of Fallon's correct pronunciation. It's "their-in", but she says, "Everyone screws it up."

If you get it wrong, rest assured you're in good company. Fallon told her that even Liam Neeson, her co-star in A Million Ways to Die in the West (2014), had absolutely no clue how to accurately say her surname.

This London-born lady started acting in college and eventually landed a role that turned out to be very personal. In Denial (2016), she played a professor named Deborah Lipstadt who defeated one of the world's most notorious Holocaust deniers in a landmark court case. For Weisz, it was a chance to look back on her own family history. She told People that her parents lived through the anti-Semitic atmosphere of pre-war Austria. Her mother and father escaped Austria and settled in England with the help of a family friend, outspoken writer and historian Rev. James Parkes.

It was only when she went to America that Weisz found people were having a lot of trouble with her last name, which is correctly pronounced "Vice."

"I learned to be polite," she said at a 2009 screening of The Brothers Bloom (2008). "I have been here for eight years, but now I am going to start correcting people."

It seems like this should be a pretty straightforward one, but according to the actress, it's anything but. Amanda Seyfriend went on the record with a Hollywood.com correspondent about the constant mispronunciations of her last name, saying one of the worst gaffs is when she gets called "Siegfried." She even argues with her sister over the correct pronunciation.

According to the Les Misérables (2012) star, it's "Sigh-fred," though her sister insists it's "Sigh-freed."

The British actor has starred in a string of Hollywood blockbusters such as Selma (2014) and Interstellar (2014), but his name still makes people stumble. There's a good reason for that, and when Oyelowo went on The Tonight Show to chat with Jimmy Fallon, he talked about how difficult the true pronunciation is, and why he absolutely doesn't expect anyone to get it 100 percent right.

His name is Nigerian, and he says that even though there's one pronunciation that he considers correct for those living in Europe and America, it's not good enough for his father, who is continuously mortified by the public's inability to get the name right. Even after saying it (and warning Fallon to not even make an attempt), Oyelowo poked fun at his father's inability to get names like "Tom Cruise" completely right.

If you're looking for the easier version, try this sing-along led by Brad Pitt (who was the producer on Selma). Pitt claims the acceptable way to say Oyelowo's name is "oh-yellow-oh."

The 2013 Academy Awards saw an epic match-up in the best actress category. Up for the award were both the oldest actress ever nominated (Emmanuelle Riva for Amour) and the youngest actress ever nominated. According to MTV News, Quvenzhane Wallis was just 5 years old when she tried out for Beasts of the Southern Wild, lying about her age to get into the 6-and-up audition. She was 9 by the time she walked into the Oscars, and even though she didn't win, her cinematic career is clearly promising.

Now may be a good time to start practicing her unique name, which is reportedly a combination of her parents' names. Her mother, Qulyndreia, reportedly combined her name with her father's name, Venjie, and added "shane," from the Swahili word meaning "fairy," reported Deadline Hollywood. The last name is easy, just like it sounds. Her first name, though? According to the actress, it's "Kwa-vehn-zhan-ay."

Over the course of his incredible career, David Bowie reinvented himself numerous times. That makes it even more appropriate that when he was interviewed by Jeremy Paxman in 2000. he admitted that he had lost track of just what the proper pronunciation of his name actually was. Bowie adopted the now-famous moniker in place of his birth name to avoid being confused with another up-and-coming singer, Davy Jones, of the Monkees. David Jones became first (and briefly) Tom Jones, and finally, David Bowie.

Mispronunciations have included "Boo-ey," like the knife, "Bow-ie" (like "Cow-ie"), and "Bough-ie." Even when his death made headlines in 2016, it seems the press could not agree on a pronunciation.

According to that 2000 interview, Bowie said, "I don't even know how to pronounce it anymore, I've lost track. I always thought it was 'Bough-ie,' I thought, this is a Scottish name, it must be 'Bough-ie.' But no one in Scotland pronounces it like that." In the early 1990s, the rock star appeared on MTV to introduce his videos and pronounced his own name "Bough-ie," which seems to settle the matter.

When Cork-born Cillian Murphy moved his family back to Ireland, he told The Guardian it was because he wanted his children to grow up Irish and know their grandparents. Raised in a family of educators, he grew up in a traditionally Irish home, playing rugby before heading off to university. His name is quintessentially Irish, too, and at a glance, it's an easy one.

It's the "C" that's the problem. The proper way to pronounce this Irish lad's name is "Kill-ee-an."

M. Night Shyamalan became a household name in 1999 with The Sixth Sense, only a few years after he graduated from New York University. Born in Mahe, Pondicherry, India, he and his family moved to Philadelphia when he was young. The name moviegoers know him by is a bit simplified from his birth name, Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan, but the easier version is still a bit of a challenge.

It might be tempting to insert the "shy" part of his name as it appears when it's spelled, but it's actually pronounced "Sha-ma-lan."

It's always tough for TV shows to keep going after they lose actors that have been synonymous with the series itself, and that was the case when George Clooney said farewell to ER (1994-2009). Unlike many shows who struggle to find replacements, ER successfully stunned audiences into continuing to watch with the casting of Goran Visnjic. According to The Telegraph, his real-life personality is everything—and more—than what he seems on screen, and his break into Hollywood was particularly impressive, given that even after months on ER, he still wasn't incredibly fluent in English.

Visnjic grew up in the little Croatian village of Sibenik, was acting in local dramas by the time he was 9, and continues to speak Croatian at his home in California. While his family might not struggle with his name, it's a tough one for American eyes. (When his character introduces himself to an injured child in ER, Dr. Luka Kovač even comments on his "funny" name and "thick" accent.)

As for the pronunciation of his real name? It's "Gor-in Vish-nick."

With a resume that includes movies like 12 Years a Slave (2013), Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens (2015), and Marvel's Black Panther (2018), it's no wonder that Lupita Nyong'o gets a bit annoyed when people still get her name wrong. Holding tightly to her heritage even in the face of fame, she told Vogue that she still regularly returns to her family's home near Lake Victoria in Kenya.

In 2014, she was named People's Most Beautiful Person, and that announcement came with a lot of clips of very, very embarrassed journalists who should have been briefed ahead of time on the right pronunciation of her name. They likely should have watched the video she made specifically to clear up any confusion, and if they'd listened to her, they would know that it's "Loo-peeta Ne-yawng-o".