If there’s one movie fans will always connect with Leonardo DiCaprio, it’s The Wolf of Wall Street. The 2013 blockbuster, directed by Martin Scorsese, turned Wall Street greed into a wild three-hour dark comedy — and gave audiences some of DiCaprio’s most unforgettable performances.
From Margot Robbie’s fearless breakout role as Naomi Lapaglia to Jordan Belfort’s outrageous antics, the movie is packed with legendary moments. But one scene stands out as pure cinematic chaos: DiCaprio’s quaalude-fueled crawl down the stairs.
The Scene That Took Days to Perfect
DiCaprio recently revealed on the New Heights podcast with NFL stars Travis and Jason Kelce that filming that infamous sequence wasn’t quick at all.
“I gotta say about that quaalude sequence, I didn’t know when I was shooting it but we were there for three or four days,” DiCaprio admitted.
What he thought would be a short gag turned into an epic production. Scorsese wanted every stumble, crawl, and car struggle captured in detail. “I thought it was a couple shots, and [Scorsese] had 50 shots of me crawling around, up and down the stairs, falling, getting in the car,” the actor explained.
The Real Belfort’s Coaching
To make the scene authentic, the real Jordan Belfort actually coached DiCaprio on what being high on quaaludes looked like.
Belfort told the New York Post back in 2018: “I showed him what it looks and feels like when you are high on quaaludes. I started crawling around. We were both on the floor, drooling. His father walked into the room and asked us what the f*** we were doing.”
That collaboration paid off — the scene has since become one of the most talked-about moments in the movie.
From Tased to Quaaludes
On the podcast, DiCaprio compared the infamous crawl to a scene from his latest project, One Battle After Another, where his character is tased. Surprisingly, that sequence took only 20 minutes to film. Compared to four days of drugged-up crawling, it was a walk in the park.
The Stage Name He Almost Took
Elsewhere in the conversation, DiCaprio shared another surprising detail about his career. Early on, his agent suggested he change his “too ethnic” name to something more Hollywood-friendly, like Lenny Williams.
But his father refused to let that happen. Thanks to him, the world got Leonardo DiCaprio — a name now etched in movie history.
Conclusion
The legendary stair-crawling scene in The Wolf of Wall Street may have looked like a chaotic improvisation, but it was actually the result of days of hard work, dedication, and Scorsese’s perfectionism. DiCaprio’s revelation only proves one thing: behind every iconic movie moment, there’s a story of persistence — and sometimes a whole lot of crawling.
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