'Glee' star Lea Michele: 'I changed my name due to bullying'

Lea Michele has revealed that childhood bullies were the reason behind her change of surname.

The Glee star's real name is Lea Michele Sarfati, but she dropped her surname at her first audition following taunts from classmates.

"Sarfati. That's my real last name," she told Jay Leno. "I don't use it a lot because I got 'Lea So-fatty', 'Lea So-farty' at school.

"So when I was little and I went on my first audition they were like, 'And may we have your name,' and I was like, 'Lea Michele'. And I've been Lea Michele ever since.

"It's Sephardic, which is Spanish/Jew."



Michele added that she looks forward to the Christmas season, especially as she gets to eat lots of pasta cooked by her mother rather than turkey.

"Every year it's like, 'Where are we going to go for the holidays?' and it's like, 'We're going to go to my mum's side'. Because then I get these big bowls of pasta, and that's what I want! Turkey is like a side-dish, we have pasta," she said.

Michele can be seen in New Year's Eve opposite Ashton Kutcher, whom she declared "out of her league" recently.

> Glee stars support Lea Michele at New Year's Eve premiere: Pictures

Watch the trailer for New Year's Eve below: