The bizarre time Robert De Niro joined Queen
If there’s any band that belongs to the West End, it’s Queen.
This isn’t a good thing. Ever since Ben Elton blighted the world with his We Will Rock You horror in 2002, the scourge of the jukebox musical has seized theatres and even the silver screen with their plastic singalong dross. Many artists, or their legacy estates, have eagerly offered their songbooks up to score such singalong nonsense. Rod Stewart, The Four Seasons, Michael Jackson, Tina Turner, and the entire gloop of glam metal in the silly Rock of Ages have all fancied themselves as the successor to Elton’s musical pap.
Yet, it’s Queen’s logical conclusion. Throughout their tenure, from hard rock through to progressive chamber pop, then deep diving into ‘One Vision’s martial electro before frontman Freddie Mercury’s death in 1991, a whiff of West End artifice has always curdled their work, even when they hint at greatness. Their musicianship is undeniable, Mercury’s commanding charisma is effortlessly bold, but their most celebrated cuts sit alongside anything from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s song standards, something to clap your hands to in a matinee showing rather than ever garnering emotional resonance.
Queen and Elton had struck box office gold, however. While critically derided, We Will Rock You became a minor phenomenon, touring the world and standing as one of the West End’s longest-running productions, its first run at the Dominion Theatre ending in May 2014. Years before, the stage show’s genesis found an enthusiastic and unlikely supporter from ‘New Hollywood’ star Robert De Niro.
Before settling on Elton’s idea of a stodgy dystopian theme inspired by The Matrix, De Niro’s theatre arm of his Tribeca Productions company had expressed interest in developing the project with the band, pushing the treatment away from the earlier Mercury biopic drafts toward the sci-fi bluster we know today. Reportedly, De Niro had even mooted the idea of a screenplay for the big screen, a prospect surprisingly unrealised considering the mammoth success of the likes of Mamma Mia! or Jersey Boys.
De Niro has made brief remarks over the years about admiring Queen’s work, but an authentic connection to popular music has never been overly apparent. Despite serving as an influence for Bananarama’s ‘Robert De Niro’s Waiting’, the twice Academy Award winner remains tight-lipped on any musical heroes, offering teases of fandom for Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift, and Sabrina Carpenter over the years.
The late 1990s/early 2000s saw an explosion of projects De Niro was attached to. No longer the selective actor from 20 years before who would carefully pick a role or project to acclaim, De Niro took starring roles in dire misfires like The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle or Showtime, saying yes to anything to fund his Tribeca operations. It’s likely We Will Rock You came along in this spirit, De Niro simply needing a musical to birth his production company’s theatre appendage.
Still, De Niro remained fairly committed to the show, making a cameo appearance at the Dominion Theatre in 2012 for We Will Rock You’s tenth anniversary show, along with Queen guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor.
