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Randolph Mantooth refused to change his name when he became a television star
The actor took pride in his name.
William Shakespeare once asked, "What's in a name?" For some, a name can be everything; identity, origin, who you are at your core. For others, a name isn't the most important thing in life. It really just depends on where we find meaning in our lives.
During an interview with The Sacramento Bee, Randolph Mantooth explained that he and his name had been through quite a lot. The Emergency! star explained that he was often bullied for his last name as a child, leading to several scraps in the schoolyard.
"When I was a kid I obviously had a lot of problems with that name," said the actor.
"It's an easy name to make fun of and I was Womantooth, Babytooth, Tigertooth - you name it. Being that I grew up in forty-six different states, it was a never-ending problem. All of a sudden I'd be down on the floor wrestling, just over my name. I became a fighter and a bluffer."
It's not uncommon for actors to change their names when they join the entertainment industry. However, when the option was offered to Mantooth, he refused. The actor had spent his entire childhood fighting for his name; he certainly wasn't about to quit now.
"When I became an adult and it was suggested I would have to change my name and all of a sudden I got a flash of that old feeling," said Mantooth. "It was going to be that same thing again, down on the floor. I had to fight over it since I was a kid, I was damned if I was going to change it."
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