Kat Dennings has opened up about how her stage name was created.
The 2 Broke Girls alum revealed that she decided a name change was needed when she was just nine years old during an during an appearance on Kylie Kelceβs Not Gonna Lie podcast this week.
βMy real last name is Litwack β thatβs all you need to hear,β she told Kelce. βAt 9, I was like, βThis isnβt going to work for me. This is not going to work.ββ
βShe-slash-I was very ahead of her time,β she added, joking about the decision to go by a different name.
Dennings described the name change as a βCEO situation,β where she felt her real name couldnβt be seen on a βposter.β

The decision to chose βKatβ was inspired by Christina Ricciβs character of the same name in the movie Casper, which Dennings said was her βfavorite character at the time.β
Her new last name ended up coming from the wife of her motherβs friend, which was Janine Denni.
βI thought it would be a super sick idea if I took her name and made it different,β she said. βLiterally, that was the thinking. Thatβs as far as it went. So Dennings is from her.β
βSo I was like, βOkay, Kat Dennings. This is it, I can really picture it,ββ she added.
Despite changing her name, Dennings has previously revealed the cruel comments she faced about her appearance at the start of her acting career, also at nine years old.
Speaking to People back in January she recalled receiving some βextremely negative feedbackβ from casting directors via her agent including being told that she was βtoo fat.β
βIt was pretty crazy thinking about it. Iβm like: βHow can anyone say that about a little kid? This is insane,β she said. βI was 12. Iβd go into an audition and Iβd do it, and my manager would call me and Iβd be like: βHowβd it go?β And theyβd be like: βWell, they thought you werenβt pretty enough and youβre fat.ββ
βThe time that I was auditioning and starting to act, it was a very different environment than it is now,β Dennings reflected.
βThere was not a lot of inclusivity at all. It was very harsh. There was a lot of extremely negative feedback and people would not hold back,β the actor said.
Dennings, who went on to front her own sitcom, 2 Broke Girls, alongside Beth Behrs from 2011 to 2017, said she managed to retain her βstrong mindsetβ despite the negative comments.
βFor some reason, it didnβt break my spirit,β she said. βI was like: βIβll show them.β I guess props to my parents because they were like: βTheyβre idiots. Donβt listen to them.β And I was like: βTheyβre idiots, Iβm not.ββ
The 38-year-old actor revealed she thinks the entertainment industry is βmuch softerβ and βkinderβ today than the βcompletely insaneβ showbiz landscape she faced as a child.
βThereβs body positivity, thereβs inclusivity, thereβs representation, and there was none of that before. It was really gross,β she said.