His name is – now officially – Michael Caine.

The legendary British actor, born Maurice Micklewhite, has legally changed his name to the showbiz moniker he adopted in 1954 because of the rise in airport security checks prompted by Islamic State.

No more trouble at the airport … Michael Caine in The Italian Job. Photograph: Everett Collection/Rex Shutterstock

“An airport security guard would say, ‘Hi, Michael Caine,’ and suddenly I’d give him a passport with a different name on it,” Caine said. “I could stand there for an hour. So I changed my name.”

The 83-year-old began his acting career on the Sussex stage as Michael Scott. He was required to change his handle after moving to London, where another Michael Scott was already treading the boards. During a harried call to his agent he looked outside the telephone box and saw a poster for the Humphrey Bogart naval drama The Caine Mutiny.

“I was opposite the Odeon and I looked up, and my favourite actor is Humphrey Bogart, and there it was,” Caine said.

Caine, who had hinted he might retire after his appearance in the magician crime caper Now You See Me 2, has signed up to play General Anton Vincent in the US comedy Coup d’Tat. Vincent is a dictator who, after being ousted by his people, turns up on the doorstep of a US high-schooler who wrote to him as a homework assignment.

Further reading:

Michael Caine: the class act that enjoys the political fray