Sharon Stone was so keen to sign up a then-unknown Leonardo DiCaprio for her 1995 western The Quick and the Dead, she agreed to cover his salary.

The actress reveals in her new book, The Beauty of Living Twice, studio bosses weren’t sure about casting DiCaprio as Stone’s young sidekick, but she was blown away by his audition.

Stone, who was a producer on the movie, writes: “This kid named Leonardo DiCaprio was the only one who nailed the audition. In my opinion he was the only one who came in and cried, begging his father to love him as he died in the scene.”

But her fellow producers were unimpressed.

“The studio said if I wanted him so much, I could pay him out of my own salary,” she explains. “So I did.”

Sharon, who played a mysterious gunslinger in the movie, also fought to have Sam Raimi direct the movie when studio heads felt he wasn’t up to the task.

“Getting a producer credit as an actress is often thought of in my business as a vanity deal, meaning they pay you for the job but shut the f**k up and stay out of the way,” she adds. “I won’t accept a vanity deal and let them know that upfront.”

– Cover Media