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Leonardo DiCaprio is remaining silent about his viral moment at the 2026 Golden Globe Awards.
At the Golden Globe Awards earlier this month, DiCaprio was caught on camera smiling and looking animated while talking to an unseen person. The clip was posted on the awards ceremony’s official TikTok page and quickly went viral.
Shortly after being nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for One Battle After Another on January 22 (diCaprio’s astonishing eighth Academy Award nomination to date), DiCaprio, 51, told Deadline that he was speaking to a “friend,” without providing further details.
“It was directed at a friend, but at the end of the day, you never know if this person I’m talking to wants me to say their name,” he told the outlet. “So, as the protagonist of A Bronx Tale would say, I’m not a rat.”
DiCaprio’s One Battle After Another co-star Teyana Taylor previously told Access Hollywood that DiCaprio and daughters Junie, 10, and Lu, 5, were “fighting” about liking the Netflix movie K-Pop Demon Hunters and “I didn’t know every moment was being captured.” But he later told The Tonight Show that he later realized DiCaprio was talking to someone else in the video.
“I was like, ‘You can’t talk to me, were you talking to me?’ Because I already told people what you were talking about to me. So apparently that night he had two conversations about KPop Demon Hunter, and KPop Demon Hunter was in his mouth all night,” Taylor joked to Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon.
“And I was like, ‘Who else is fighting like that?’ ‘Cause that’s literally the way we[talk with animated gestures],” Taylor said of her longtime friend DiCaprio. “So I felt a little bit of friendly jealousy. ‘Who else are you chewing invisible gum with?’ He couldn’t even remember who he was talking to. He was like, ‘I don’t even know.’ ”
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During a commercial break at the Golden Globes, DiCaprio was spotted making eye contact with someone nearby. He pointed at them and seemed to open his mouth, “I was looking at you, when the K-Pop thing happened, you were like, ‘Who is that?'”
He then began laughing while talking to fellow stars who were not featured in the video clip shared by New York Times reporter Kyle Buchanan.
One Battle After Another won four Golden Globe Awards, including Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy) and a Taylor Award for her role as Paphidia Beverly Hills. Both actors have been nominated for the 2026 Actor Awards, which will be held on March 1st, and the film has been nominated in a total of six categories.
More nominations for Paul Thomas Anderson’s thriller were announced Thursday morning. The film also received nominations for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor for Benicio del Toro and Sean Penn, Best Supporting Actress for Taylor, and Best Director for Anderson.
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This nomination marks a milestone for DiCaprio, who joins a rare group of actors who have won at least seven Oscars, including Ingrid Bergman, Jeff Bridges, Richard Burton, Robert Duvall, Jane Fonda, Dustin Hoffman and Kate Winslet.
“This is the ultimate tribute to this film,” DiCaprio told Deadline about the nomination. “I’ve watched this film myself many times, and I feel this is proof that Paul put incredible thought into this story.”
“For me, it’s really original filmmaking, it’s a really multifaceted world, and it’s about a subject that’s very relevant to the world we live in, the turmoil of the world we live in, hostility and extremism,” the actor continued. “Paul made a film that I look back on and am very proud of. I think he really has his finger on the pulse of America right now. I hope this film is remembered as such and lives on for many years to come.”
