Russell Crowe Gives an Oral History of Drunkenly Buying a Dinosaur Skull From Leo DiCaprio

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When you’re in the market for a dinosaur head in Hollywood, make Leonardo DiCaprio your first call. On Wednesday, Russell Crowe told Howard Stern the story of a dino skull that he just happened to purchase from his Body of Lies co-star. “I bought it for my kids, and you know, cut myself a little bit of slack here, there was a bunch of vodka involved in the transaction and it happened at Leonardo’s house,” Crowe told Stern. “[DiCaprio] started the conversation, he’s like, ‘I got this one, but there’s another one coming on the market that I really want so I’m trying to sell this one,’ and I said, ‘Well, I’ll buy it.’ I said ‘How much you want for it?’ He was pretty cool about it, he said, ‘Just give me what I paid for it,’ and I think he paid 30, 35 grand for it.” Crowe said his kids were obsessed with dinosaurs at the time, but admitted that the dinosaur itself — a Mosasaur — was never a very popular species.

Leo’s love of dinosaur skulls is well-documented, and he reportedly looked around at some more skulls at Art Basel in 2018 (though, at the time, a rep for the actor said “Leo never went to see the fossils while in Miami,” which is a frankly hilarious denial). Crowe sold the dinosaur head as part of his infamous divorce auction last year.