The joys of fatherhood. Nicolas Cage gushed about his daughter August Francesca Coppola, 6 months, who he shares with wife Riko Shibata, at the premiere of his new movie, Renfield.
“She’s singing really good songs. Her first song — I was very happy about it — naturally, it was about me,” Cage, 59, told Entertainment Tonight at the Los Angeles movie premiere on Tuesday, March 28.
He joked, “She went, ‘Da da da, oun ja, oun ja.’ I thought it was a great song. I’m gonna steal it and I’m gonna get rich off my daughter’s song.”
The actor said that watching his daughter try things for the first time is the best part of fatherhood. “Reliving the experience of childhood brings it all back, and seeing how she’s discovering new experiences. I can’t wait for her to try lobster and see what it looks like,” he quipped.
Cage also revealed that the family refers to August by a nickname. “We call her Augie,” he said. “She’s August Coppola the Second.”
Cage and Shibata, 29, welcomed baby Augie in September 2022. “Nicolas and Riko are happy to announce the birth of their daughter,” the couple said in a statement on September 7. “Mother and daughter are doing fine.”
The Oscar winner and the model said “I do” in February 2021 after meeting in Japan while Cage filmed Prisoners of the Ghostland. Us confirmed in January 2022 that the model was pregnant with the National Treasure star’s third child. The following March, he opened up about wanting to honor his family with the little one’s name and were considering Akira Francesco for a boy and Lennon Augie for a girl.
“Augie was my father’s nickname,” the Face/Off star explained to GQ at the time. “And my uncle [Francis Ford Coppola] has decided to change his name to Francesco. … [The baby] is like a little edamame. A little bean.”
Cage is also dad to two sons. He shares Weston, 32, with ex-girlfriend Christina Fulton, and he welcomed Kal-El, now 17, with ex-wife Alice Kim (to whom he was married from 2004 to 2016).
The actor was also previously married to Patricia Arquette from 1995 to 2001, the late Lisa Marie Presley from 2002 to 2004 and Erika Koike for four days in 2019. However, Cage said that he believes Shibata is The One.
“I am a romantic, and when I’m in love, I want to give that person everything I can,” the California native explained to GQ in March 2022. “It’s my expression of saying, ‘I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.’ And this is it for me. … This is it. This is it.”
