Nicolas Cage addresses wild rumours during first talk show interview in 14 years

Eccentric actor Nicolas Cage faced some of the wildest claims about him head-on in his first talk show interview in 14 years.

A two-headed snake, gambling for orphans, nude cave exploration and mime stalkers are just a few of the bizarre urban legends Nicolas Cage is finally ready to debunk – or admit to – after decades of myth building.

The “thespian” – don’t call him a mere “actor,” folks – is back on the talk-show circuit for the first time in 14 years, promoting his new movie Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent.

The Leaving Las Vegas Oscar winner, 58, stopped by Jimmy Kimmel Live to reveal the truth behind rumours that have circled the cult icon for years.

Kimmel, 54, asked Cage about the story of him gambling at the Atlantis resort in the Bahamas about 20 years ago with just $200.

Cage explained that he played roulette at the casino and the money turned into 20,000 big ones.

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Nic Cage chats to Jimmy Kimmel.

While trying his lucky hand at the roulette wheel, he decided to keep playing the same numbers.

“It was one of those nights where you feel like the mojo was with you, and nothing was going to go wrong,” Cage said.

Rumour had it that he gave all of his winnings to an orphanage in the area. Indeed, Cage confirmed, after he won the cash he went to the children’s centre where he slapped the $20,000 into the hand of the headmistress and was sent on his way.

The Moonstruck leading man told Kimmel he’s never laid down bets again as he feels it would ruin the “magic” of gambling.

Another wild rumour that Cage clarified was that he is in possession of a two-headed snake.

The answer: He did have one at one point.

Kimmel pulled out the star’s recent GQ cover spread, where he’s hugging a snake, and he asked Cage if he ever owned the reptile.

It was Cage’s first talk show appearance since 2008.

“I did and it’s weird,” Cage admitted. He went on to note that there was one night that he was dreaming about two-headed eagles. The next day, his manager at the time got a call from someone saying they had a two-headed snake and they thought Cage might like it.

The chilling takeaway here: Cage noted the animal cost four times the amount of cold, hard cash he gave to the orphanage.

Meanwhile, Cage admitted the snake was too much for him to handle – and the two heads would often fight each other. The Hollywood royal (born Nicolas Coppola, he’s the nephew of legendary Godfather director, Francis Ford Coppola) eventually decided to give the animal to a zoo, where he lived for 14 years.

Kimmel relayed that when Cage’s National Treasure co-star Diane Kruger was recently on the chat show, she divulged that during shooting for the early-2000s adventure film series, he almost bought a cave filled with bats so he could go spelunking while nude.

Cage at the LA premiere of his latest film The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent, which is getting great reviews. Picture: Getty

Cage dished that the cavern he wanted to buy was “beautiful [with] milky white crystalline walls”. He did want the hideaway so he could go exploring – bare-bottomed – with his wife at the time. But this fantasy never came to fruition, with the star walking away from the sale.

Another piece of gossip that has swirled around Tinseltown for years was that Cage kept a foul-mouthed African pied crow as a pet.

He quipped that the crow was “well-dressed” with black and white feathers that made him “look like he was wearing a tuxedo.”

“He likes to say hi to me when I walk in the room, and when I leave he says bye. I don’t teach him the words. He came with the vocabulary,” Cage said. “And one day he called me an ‘a**hole’ and I don’t know why.”

The last urban legend that the actor got real about was the “weird experience” of being targeted by a pair of mimes.

The silent stalkers were following him around and caused him to ask the “proverbial questions of ‘Why?’ and ‘Who are you people?’” Cage said.

He asked them politely to go away, and they left without saying a word. “We’re all being stalked at times. I think I was their only audience,” Cage said.

This story originally appeared on Page Six and is republished here with permission