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Artist
Dweezil Zappa (born September 5, 1969, in Los Angeles, California) is a heavy metal guitarist. He is the son of Gail Sloatman and Frank Zappa and the second of four siblings: his older sister, Moon Unit, and his two younger siblings Ahmet and Diva Zappa. Dweezil's registered birth name was Ian Donald Calvin Euclid Zappa, although this occurred only because the hospital at which he was born refused to register him under the name Dweezil. The name was a nickname coined by Frank for an oddly-curled pinky-toe of Gail's. His father instead used the first names of his bandmates to form a name. He was always called "Dweezil" by his family and was unaware that this was not the name on his birth certificate. Upon this discovery at the age of five, he insisted on having his nickname become his legal name. Gail and Frank hired an attorney and soon the name Dweezil was official. In the 1980s, Dweezil worked as a MTV VJ. He also recorded some solo rock albums, as well as playing guitar for other artists. Dweezil can be seen in the music video for Don Johnson's top 40 song, "Heartbeat." Dweezil has said that Eddie Van Halen was his favorite guitar player, and he began copying Van Halen's distinctive guitar style. He also had a part in the futuristic Arnold Schwarzenegger movie The Running Man as Stevie ("Don't touch that dial!"), and gave his most famous cameo role in Molly Ringwald's brat-pack movie Pretty in Pink as Andi's friend, Simon. In the mid 1990s, he voiced the character Ajax