For the record, Mahershalalhashbaz (Mah - her - shah - lahl - hash - bahz) [Ali] was born Mahershalalhashbaz Gilmore. For a while, he went professionally by Mahershala Ali, but recently decided to re-embrace his birth name in order to be truer to himself. He is an avid student of Islam and "hopes one day to be able to fully incorporate Muslim tenets into his everyday life," according to NBC.