Robert
DE NIRO, Chart
Born August 17, 1943
at 3:00 AM in Brooklyn Heights, NY (USA)
Robert Mario De Niro Jr., credited professionally as Robert De Niro (born
August 17, 1943), is a highly acclaimed, two-time Academy Award-winning
American film actor, director, and producer.
He is noted for his portrayal of conflicted, troubled characters, and for his enduring collaboration with director Martin Scorsese, and early work with director Brian De Palma. He is considered by many to be the greatest actor of his generation and one of the world's greatest living actors.
He is the son of the noted painter Robert De Niro, Sr.
Early film career
At the age of 20, in 1963, came De Niro's first film role and collaboration
with Brian De Palma, when he appeared in The Wedding Party; it was not
released until 1969, however. 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) and 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 his memorable role as the smalltime Mafia 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 of Best Supporting Actor.
After working with him in Mean Streets he had a very successful working relationship with Scorcese 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).
In these films, De Niro has primarily played 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 himself.
"You talkin' to me?" Alone in his apartment, De Niro as Travis
postures and practices his moves in front of the mirrorIn 1976 De Niro
appeared, along with Gerard Depardieu, 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 for Best Actor in a Leading Role .
He was offered role of Cowboy in director Walter Hill's The Warriors (1979) but turned it down. The role went instead to Tom McKitterick.
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, 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 is acting with. During the filming of The King of Comedy, De Niro directed a slew of anti-Semitic epithets at co-star Jerry Lewis. An enraged Lewis claims he was “going for Bobby’s throat”.
Fearing he had become typecast in mob roles — another of which was Jewish gangster David "Noodles" Aaronson in Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America (1984) — De Niro from the mid-1980s began expanding into occasional comedic roles, and has had much success there as well with such films as Brazil (1985), in which he had a small role; the hit action-comedy Midnight Run (1988); and the film-and-sequel pairs Analyze This (1999) and Analyze That (2002), and Meet the Parents (2000) and Meet the Fockers (2004).
Other films include Falling in Love (1984), The Mission (1986), The Untouchables (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 proved he was able to play a supporting role taking a back seat to Stallone, Keitel and Liotta.
De Niro is considered
De Niro had to turn down a role in The Departed (Jack Nicholson taking the role instead) due to commitments 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."
De Niro directed Angelina Jolie and Matt Damon on the set of The Good
ShepherdIn De Niro's next project, he directed and co-starred 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, GoodFellas 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 is working with Martin Scorsese on a new project. "I'm trying to actually work..Eric Roth (screenwriter) and myself and Marty are working on a script now, trying to get it done."
De Niro has won two Academy Awards: Best Actor for his role in Raging Bull; and Best Supporting Actor for The Godfather Part II.
De Niro with Al Pacino on the set of The Godfather Part II. De Niro and
Pacino never shared any screen time together during the film.De Niro and
Marlon Brando are the only actors who won Academy Awards for portraying
the same character: Brando won for playing the elderly Don Vito Corleone
(though he declined the award) in The Godfather while De Niro later won
the award for playing the young Vito in The Godfather Part II. Brando
and De Niro did not work together on screen until The Score (2001). De
Niro actually auditioned for the role of Sonny in the first Godfather
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's performance
is one of only four to win an Academy Award for working in a foreign language,
as he primarily spoke Italian, with very few phrases in English ("I
didn't come here to fight with you" and "I make him an offer
he can't refuse").
Source : Wikipedia
