People are just learning how Lady Gaga got her stage name

Lady Gaga’s real name is Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta

Dozens of actors and musicians have opted to go by stage name for a host of different reasons.

Michael Keaton, for example, isn’t actually called Michael Keaton. The Beetlejuice star is actually called Michael Douglas, but because that name was already used by someone in Hollywood, he decided to choose a different moniker to go by.

Emma Stone was in a similar situation when she started acting.

The Poor Things star is actually called Emily Stone, but this name was already registered with the Screen Actors Guild – thus, Emma Stone was born.

This wasn’t the case for Lady Gaga though, as the ‘Poker Face’ hitmaker already had a pretty unique name: Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta.

Arguably, Lady Gaga is an even more memorable name though; but how did the star come up with it?

Apparently, it’s a way of paying homage to Queen’s hit song ‘Radio Ga Ga’.

Her music producer, Robert Fusari, alleged that he was the first person to call her ‘Ga Ga’.

Gaga is believed to have confirmed this in a 2010 interview with Flybe magazine.

Lady Gaga’s real name is Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)

“He started to call me Gaga when I’d come into the studio,” she said.

“When we were getting ready to really start performing, I decided that I’d been playing under my real name for so long I wanted a new way to reinvent myself.

“So I said, ‘What about Lady Gaga?’ because Gaga is sort of crazy and Lady has such connotations.”

Over the years, Fusari has disputed that the singer came up with the ‘Lady’ part of her name, however.

Around the time of her comments, Fusari sued Gaga for $30.5 million, claiming he invented her stage name and discovered her talent.

In the documents, he said that when he went to text the singer, autocorrect changed ‘Radio Ga Ga’ to ‘Lady Ga Ga’, and she loved it, allegedly opting to use it as her stage name.

The producer later dropped the suit against her.

Gaga is now one of the biggest names in both the music and film industry (Stefania D’Alessandro/WireImage)

While Gaga created the name to use in the music industry, she has continued to use the moniker in Hollywood too, having starred in blockbuster films such as A Star Is Born and House of Gucci.

Explaining why she doesn’t go by Germanotta, the ‘Just Dance’ singer previously told entertainment journalist Kevin McCarthy: “The reason I decided to be credited at Lady Gaga is because Lady Gaga is my stage name, and it’s also the part of me that I created to exist in the art world.”

She added: “I didn’t want to leave something behind and express something to the world that I don’t believe to be true – that Lady Gaga was some sort of mask that I wanted to avoid or shed myself of in order to be a ‘real’ actress.”