While changing their names before starting their career is common for celebrities, some of them took a big risk of losing their brand by switching their monikers at the height of their career.
- June 5, 2022
AceShowbiz - Mahershala Ali also went through a name change after becoming famous. The "Moonlight" actor, whose parents christened him Mahershalalhashbaz Gilmore, discussed the reason behind his name change in a 2017 interview. He revealed that after he converted to the Ahmadiyya faction of Islam in 2000, he decided to drop the last name Gilmore and adopted Ali instead.
Following the alteration, the "Green Book" star claimed that he faced discrimination though he was kind of expecting it. "If you convert to Islam after a couple of decades of being a black man in the U.S., the discrimination you receive as a Muslim doesn't feel like a shock," he told Radio Times. "I've been pulled over, asked where my gun is, asked if I'm a pimp, had my car pulled apart. Muslims will feel like there's this new discrimination that they hadn't received before - but it's not new for us."
