Leonardo DiCaprio Gets Smokin' on the Set of Django Unchained—but What's the Catch?

Star plays a sadistic plantation owner in Quentin Tarantino's period piece about a freed slave out to save this captive wife

By Alexis L. Loinaz May 04, 2012 6:25 PMTags
Leonardo DicaprioRyan Miner / Splash News

We'd never describe Leonardo DiCaprio's career as puff—the acting heavyweight has scored three Oscar nominations, has Scorsese on speed dial and helped make Titanic box-office history.

But he's clearly puffing away while working on his next role!

DiCaprio was snapped yesterday on the New Orleans set of his new flick, the Quentin Tarantino-helmed Django Unchained, and in between takes, he took a drag on a cigarette. It wasn't just any ordinary cig, though…

DiCaprio was reportedly smoking an electronic cigarette!

Let's give the guy huge props here: He's obviously trying to kick a nasty habit that's plagued him for years. He's reportedly tried to quit before—c'mon, he even smokes while riding a bike!—and in 2010, he explained to a website why he couldn't use nicotine patches.

"When I took a nicotine patch when I was trying to quit smoking," he said, "I [had] bloodcurdling nightmares of murder, mass murders, and I woke up in the middle of the night and had to take them off."

Yikes!

He'll need to keep lighting up for Django Unchained, though: Early stills from the period film, about a former slave out to save his captive wife, shows DiCaprio's character, a sadistic plantation owner named Calvin Candie, puffing away.

With a top-notch cast that includes Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson and Sacha Baron Cohen, you can bet the movie will be anything but a drag.