The wild method acting stories of Robert De Niro
As the New Hollywood movement ushered in innovative filmmakers such as Martin Scorsese and Brian De Palma, it also welcomed a fresh batch of promising actors like Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.
Rising to prominence in the 1970s with roles in Mean Streets, The Godfather Part II, and Taxi Driver, De Niro is one of the industry’s most well-known stars. He has earned eight Academy Award nominations and won two, alongside a string of other prestigious accolades.
The actor has appeared in many critically acclaimed movies over the years, often turning to method acting to execute a successful performance. He goes to extreme lengths to prepare for a role, from gaining extensive amounts of weight to shaving his teeth down.
The topic of method acting has been widely debated, with some actors, like Mads Mikkelsen, criticising the practice as “pretentious”. Others, like Daniel Day-Lewis, are big advocates for the acting style, using it to achieve various Oscar nominations and wins.
De Niro’s method acting skills have ranged from mild to incredibly crazy, with one of the most intense instances occurring during the production of Scorsese’s The King of Comedy. The movie was a box office flop, although De Niro’s performance was still acclaimed. To prepare for his stalker role, the actor met with one of his own stalkers to better understand the mindset of someone with such an intense obsession. Moreover, the actor tried his own hand at stalking – targeting his autograph hunters.
Less impressively, De Niro also riled up his co-star Jerry Lewis before a pivotal scene to get an intense reaction from him. Before the cameras began rolling, De Niro got into character and spewed obscenities at the actor. Lewis recalled some of the insults being antisemitic, with De Niro later telling Playboy, “I don’t know if I said anything antisemitic. I might have said something to really bust his balls.”
Before The King of Comedy, De Niro worked with Scorsese on several other films, such as Taxi Driver and Raging Bull. For both, he engaged in extensive method acting, losing 35 pounds to play Travis Bickle in the former and gaining 60 pounds for the latter. He also got into his respective characters by obtaining a taxi driving license and embarking on real shifts, as well as committing to intense boxing training and participating in matches to play Jake LaMotta.
In 1991, De Niro reunited with Scorsese yet again for Cape Fear, in which he played a vengeance-seeking rapist looking to inflict torture on the lawyer who sentenced him to years behind bars. He spent $5,000 to get his teeth sharpened and $20,000 to get them back to their original shape.
However, outside of his work with Scorsese, De Niro has also engaged in method acting for other directors. When he starred in Brian De Palma’s The Untouchables, he fully transformed into Al Capone by getting the same silk underwear made as the gangster. He also dramatically altered his weight yet again, gaining 30 pounds to resemble his character more closely.
Finally, De Niro’s small role in Terry Gilliam’s Brazil proves that even when he’s not leading a film, he’ll still go to extreme lengths to get into character. To play the heating engineer, De Niro observed brain surgeons, believing that the same level of intricacy is required for both jobs. No matter the part, De Nito is always prepared, and whether you agree with his methods or not, he has earned significant success from his controversial acting style.
