Everything about Robert De Niro totally explained
Robert Mario De Niro, Jr. (born
August 17,
1943) is a two-time
Academy Award- and
Golden Globe-winning
American film actor,
director, and
producer. Often regarded as one of the greatest actors of all time, Robert De Niro has also been called one of the most enigmatic actors of his time.
He is noted for his
method acting and portrayals of conflicted, troubled characters and for his enduring collaboration with director
Martin Scorsese. He is best-known for his roles as the young
Vito Corleone in
The Godfather, Part II; cabbie Travis Bickle in
Taxi Driver; boxer
Jake La Motta in
Raging Bull; mobster
Jimmy Conway in
Goodfellas;
Al Capone in
The Untouchables; and Michael Vronsky in
The Deer Hunter.
Biography
Early life
De Niro was born in
New York, the son of
Virginia Admiral, a painter, and
Robert De Niro, Sr., an
abstract expressionist painter and sculptor. De Niro's father was a
lapsed Catholic of
Italian and
Irish descent, and his mother was a
Presbyterian-raised
atheist of
English,
German,
Dutch, and
French descent. His Italian great-grandparents emigrated from
Ferrazzano, in the
province of Campobasso,
Molise. His parents, who had met at the painting classes of
Hans Hofmann in
Provincetown, Massachusetts, divorced when he was two years old. De Niro grew up in the
Little Italy area of
Manhattan. His childhood nickname was "Bobby Milk," due to his pale
complexion in his youth.
De Niro first attended the
Little Red School House and was then enrolled by his mother at the
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and Art in
New York, a division of which (officially named
The School of Performing Arts: A Division of the Fiorello H. La Guardia High School of Music and the Arts) was attended by fellow
Godfather II actor
Al Pacino. He dropped out at the age of 13 and joined a
Little Italy street gang. De Niro attended the
Stella Adler Conservatory as well as
Lee Strasberg's
Actor's Studio, and used his membership there mostly as a professional advantage. At the age of 16, he toured in a production of
Chekhov's
The Bear.
Early film career
De Niro's first film role and collaboration with
Brian De Palma materialized in 1963 at the age of 20, when he appeared in
The Wedding Party; however, the film wasn't released until 1969. He spent much of the 1960s working in theater workshops and
off-Broadway productions. He was an
extra in the
French film Three Rooms in Manhattan (1965) and made his official film debut after he reunited with De Palma in
Greetings (1968). He later reprised his
Greetings role in
Hi, Mom (1970).
He gained popular attention with his role as a dying
Major League baseball player in
Bang the Drum Slowly (1973). The same year, he began his fruitful collaboration with Scorsese when he played a memorable role as the smalltime hood "Johnny Boy" alongside
Harvey Keitel's "Charlie" in
Mean Streets (1973). In 1974, De Niro played a pivotal role in
Francis Coppola's
The Godfather, Part II, playing young
Don Vito Corleone. His performance earned him his first Academy Award for
Best Supporting Actor. He became the first actor to ever win an Academy Award speaking only a foreign language (Sicilian).
After working with Scorsese in
Mean Streets, he'd a very successful working relationship with the director in films such as
Taxi Driver (1976),
New York, New York (1977),
Raging Bull (1980),
The King of Comedy (1983),
Goodfellas (1990),
Cape Fear (1991), and
Casino (1995). They also acted together in
Guilty by Suspicion and provided their voices for the
animated feature Shark Tale.
In many of his films, De Niro has played primarily charming
sociopaths.
Taxi Driver is particularly important to De Niro's career; his
iconic performance as
Travis Bickle shot him to stardom and forever linked De Niro's name with Bickle's famous "
You talkin' to me?"
monologue, which De Niro improvised.
In 1976, De Niro appeared (along with
Gérard Depardieu and
Donald Sutherland) in
Bernardo Bertolucci's epic biographical exploration of life during
World War II,
Novecento (
1900), seen through the eyes of two Italian childhood friends at the opposite sides of society's hierarchy.
In 1978, De Niro played "Michael Vronsky" in the acclaimed
Vietnam War film
The Deer Hunter, for which he was nominated
Best Actor in a Leading Role. He was offered the role of "Cowboy" in director
Walter Hill's
The Warriors (1979), but turned it down.
Later film career
Praised for his commitment to roles (stemming from his background in
Method acting), De Niro gained 60
pounds (27
kg) and learned how to
box for his portrayal of
Jake LaMotta in
Raging Bull; ground his teeth for
Cape Fear; lived in
Sicily for
The Godfather, Part II; worked as a cab driver for three months for
Taxi Driver; and learned to play the
saxophone for
New York, New York. He also put on weight and shaved his hairline to play
Al Capone in
The Untouchables.
De Niro's brand of Method acting includes employing whatever extreme tactic he feels is necessary to elicit the best performance from those he's acting with. An example of De Niro's Method acting occurred during the filming of
The King of Comedy, in which De Niro directed a slew of anti-Semitic epithets at costar
Jerry Lewis in order to enhance and authenticate the anger demonstrated by his onscreen character. According to
People magazine, the technique was successful. Lewis recalled, "I forgot the cameras were there... I was going for Bobby's throat."
In 1984, he starred in
Sergio Leone's last film, a four-hour-long epic period gangster movie titled
Once Upon a Time in America. The film was heavily edited for U.S. theaters and was underplayed both with critics and audiences alike .
Fearing he'd become typecast in mob roles, De Niro began expanding into occasional comedic roles in the mid-1980s and has had much success there as well, with such films as
Brazil (1985) (in which he'd a small role); the hit action-comedy
Midnight Run (1988); the melodrama
Awakenings (1990), with
Robin Williams, where De Niro plays a catatonic patient brought to life by medication;
Showtime (2002), opposite
Eddie Murphy; the film-and-sequel pairs
Analyze This (1999) &
Analyze That (2002) and
Meet the Parents (2000) &
Meet the Fockers (2004).
Other films include
Falling in Love (1984),
The Mission (1986),
Angel Heart (1987),
Heat (1995),
Wag the Dog (1997), and
Ronin (1998). In 1997, he reteamed with
Harvey Keitel and
Ray Liotta along with
Sylvester Stallone in the crime drama
Cop Land. De Niro played a supporting role, taking a back seat to Stallone, Keitel, and Liotta.
In 1993 he also starred in
This Boy's Life, featuring then-rising child actors
Leonardo DiCaprio and
Tobey Maguire.
In 1995, De Niro starred in
Michael Mann's
Heat, along with fellow actor
Al Pacino. The duo drew much attention from fans, as both have generally been compared throughout their careers. Though both Pacino and De Niro starred in
The Godfather, Part II, they shared no screen time. In May 2007,
Variety.com reported that De Niro and Pacino will once again appear in a film together as police investigators hunting a serial killer in the crime thriller
Righteous Kill.
In 2004, De Niro provided the voice of Don Lino, the antagonist in the
animated film
Shark Tale, opposite
Will Smith. This was De Niro's first experience with
voice acting. When interviewed about his role in
Shark Tale, De Niro said that participating in an animated cartoon was one of the funniest aspects of his Hollywood career. He also reprised his role as Jack Byrnes in
Meet the Fockers. Both films were very successful at the
box office but received mixed reviews.
De Niro had to turn down a role in
The Departed (
Martin Sheen taking the role instead) due to commitments with preparing
The Good Shepherd. He said "I wanted to. I wish I could've been able to, but I was preparing
The Good Shepherd so much that I couldn't take the time to. I was trying to figure a way to do it while I was preparing. It just didn't seem possible."
In De Niro's next project, he directed and costarred in
The Good Shepherd (2006), also starring
Matt Damon and
Angelina Jolie. The movie also reunited him onscreen with
Joe Pesci, with whom De Niro had starred in
Raging Bull,
Once Upon A Time in America,
Goodfellas,
A Bronx Tale, and
Casino.
On
June 7,
2006, it was announced that De Niro donated his film archive—including scripts, costumes, and props—to the
Harry Ransom Center at
The University of Texas at Austin. De Niro has said that he's working with
Martin Scorsese on a new project. "I'm trying to actually work... [screenwriter] Eric Roth and myself and Marty are working on a script now, trying to get it done." but the role was given to
James Caan. When
The Godfather, Part II was in preproduction, the director,
Francis Ford Coppola, remembered De Niro's audition and cast him to play the young Vito Corleone. De Niro is one of only five people to win an Academy Award for working in a foreign language, as he primarily spoke
Italian, with very few phrases in English.
De Niro is acting in the role of a mobster in
Paramount Pictures' upcoming movie,
Frankie Machine.
Directorial efforts
In 1993, De Niro made his directorial debut with
A Bronx Tale. The film, written by
Chazz Palminteri, was about Palminteri's turbulent childhood in the Bronx. De Niro agreed to direct the film after seeing Palminteri's one-man off-Broadway play. De Niro also played Lorenzo, the bus driver who struggles to keep his son away from local mobster Sonny, played by Palminteri.
De Niro didn't direct another film until 2006's
The Good Shepherd, which starred
Matt Damon and
Angelina Jolie. The Good Shepherd depicts the origins of the
CIA, with Damon portraying one of the top counterintelligence agents during World War II and the Cold War. De Niro has a small role as General Bill Sullivan, who recruits Damon's character into the world of counterintelligence.
Personal life
De Niro has a son, Raphael, with first wife
Diahnne Abbott. He also adopted Abbott's daughter (from a previous relationship),
Drena. In addition, he's twin sons, Julian Henry and Aaron Kendrick (conceived by
in vitro fertilization), from a long-term live-in relationship with former model
Toukie Smith. Raphael, a former actor, now works in New York real estate.
Since 1989, De Niro has been investing in the
TriBeCa neighborhood in
lower Manhattan. His capital ventures have included cofounding the film studio
TriBeCa Productions; the popular
TriBeCa Film Festival; and finally
Nobu (the now-defunct Layla restaurants that usually needed advance reservations) and TriBeCa Grill, which he co-owns with Paul Wallace and Broadway producer
Stewart F. Lane.
In 1997, De Niro married his second wife, Grace Hightower (a former
flight attendant), at their estate near
Marbletown in
upstate New York (De Niro also has residences on the east and west sides of
Manhattan). Their son Elliot was born in 1998, and the couple filed for divorce shortly after his birth, although the action was never officially finalized.
In February 1998, during a film shoot in
France, he was taken in for questioning by French police for nine hours and was then questioned by a
magistrate over a
prostitution ring. De Niro denied any involvement, saying that he'd never paid for sex, "...and even if I had, it wouldn't have been a crime." The magistrate wanted to speak to him after his name was mentioned by one of the call girls. In an interview with the French newspaper
Le Monde, he said, "I will never return to France. I'll advise my friends against going to France," and he'd "send your
Legion of Honour back to the
ambassador, as soon as possible." French judicial sources say that the actor is regarded as a potential witness, not a suspect. In 2003, Robert De Niro, with film director
Woody Allen, jazz musician
Wynton Marsalis, and writer
George Plimpton joined a pro-French tourism campaign as a direct response to
anti-French sentiment in the U.S. related to the
2003 Iraq invasion.
In 2003, De Niro was diagnosed with
prostate cancer. The prognosis for De Niro (who was 60 at the time) was good, according to his publicist, Stan Rosenfield. "Doctors say the condition was detected at an early stage because of regular checkups," Rosenfield says. "Because of the early detection and his excellent physical condition, doctors project a full recovery." Rosenfield declined to give further details about the actor's condition or course of treatment. De Niro's father, painter Robert De Niro, Sr., died of cancer in 1993 at age 71.
De Niro was due to be bestowed with honorary Italian citizenship at the
Venice Film Festival in September 2004. However, the
Sons of Italy lodged a protest with Italian Prime Minister
Silvio Berlusconi, claiming De Niro had damaged the image of Italians and
Italian-Americans by frequently portraying them in criminal roles. Culture Minister Giuliano Urbani dismissed the objections, and the ceremony was rescheduled to go forward in
Rome in October. Controversy flared again when De Niro failed to show for two media appearances in Italy that month, which De Niro blamed on "serious communication problems" that weren't "handled properly" on his end, stating, "The last thing I'd want to do is offend anyone. I love Italy." The citizenship was conferred on De Niro on
October 21,
2006, during the finale of the Rome Film Festival.
De Niro is a staunch supporter of the
Democratic Party, and vocally supported
Al Gore in the
2000 presidential election. Filmmaker
Michael Moore's
documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 includes a clip of De Niro standing next to Gore at a rally; Moore identifies him as "that
Taxi Driver guy." De Niro publicly supported
John Kerry in the
2004 presidential election. In 1998, he
lobbied Congress against impeaching President
Bill Clinton. De Niro also narrated
9/11, a documentary about the
September 11,
2001 attacks, shown on
CBS and centering on video footage made by
Jules Naudet and Gedeon Naudet that focused on the role of
firefighters following the attacks. De Niro was reportedly a supporter of the invasion of Iraq, but his comments on
February 4 corrected that speculation when he made a speech that included the following endorsement: "He [Obama] wasn't experienced enough to vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq... That's the kind of inexperience I could get used to." While promoting his movie
The Good Shepherd with costar
Matt Damon on the
December 8,
2006 episode of
Hardball with Chris Matthews at
George Mason University, De Niro was asked whom he'd like to see as President of the United States. De Niro responded, "Well, I think of two people:
Hillary Clinton and
Obama." On
February 4,
2008, De Niro supported Obama at a rally at the
Izod Center in
New Jersey before
Super Tuesday.
Filmography
Awards and nominations
BAFTA Award
Nominated: Best Newcomer, The Godfather, Part II (1976)
Nominated: Best Actor, Taxi Driver (1976)
Nominated: Best Actor, The Deer Hunter (1980)
Nominated: Best Actor, Raging Bull (1982)
Nominated: Best Actor, The King of Comedy (1984)
Nominated: Best Actor, Goodfellas (1990)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama, Taxi Driver (1976)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, New York, New York (1978)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama, The Deer Hunter (1979)
Won: Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama, Raging Bull (1981)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, Midnight Run (1989)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama, Cape Fear (1991)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, Analyze This (2000)
Nominated: Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, Meet the Parents (2001)Further Information
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