58+ Authentic De Niro Quotes That Will Unlock Your True Potential

As an actor there's a lot of scrutiny and, even when you've had success, it becomes about sustaining that success. A friend of mine described it as a peakless mountain. Even for Robert De Niro there's Al Pacino and for Pacino there's De Niro.

I got a chance to work with Stallone and De Niro - pretty much sums it up for me. You can tell where you're going in your career by the company you keep.

Well I'd really love to work with Robert De Niro, because he's still the most talented actor out there.

Once you get older, you get a little closer to yourself, intimate.

I've always been very aware of that, more conscious of who I am, how I fit in the thing as opposed to trying to emulate someone else. Though, sometimes I try to emulate De Niro all the time, who is someone I could never be.

De Niro was a hero of mine. And Sean Penn. But I've realized I can't operate at that level of intensity. That's okay for movies. On TV, when you live with horror day in and day out, you have to protect yourself.

I would love to have a part opposite a great actor - like, say, Pacino or De Niro or Hoffman. And to work with a top director. That's my dream.

I think there's a lot of mythos about what's required in acting.

The way that actors talk about acting is generally quite punishing, and I think actors want to put forward the idea that they do all of this work because, you know, it's a post-De Niro world, when, largely, in fact, it's almost never true.

In fact, when they wake up in the morning, they're Jack Nicholson or Robert De Niro or Josh Brolin. And it's built-in, but they think it's all this other stuff. But it's not. They'd be great if they didn't think about their part or if they did think about it.

It's no stretch to picture me standing next to Al Pacino or Robert De Niro.

Those are ethnic New York men. I'm an ethnic New York girl. Everybody has their limitations. I mean, I should never be cast as Queen Elizabeth.

I want you to know how I feel about my Italian heritage, so I'd like to say a few words in Italian: Verdi, Pavarotti, DiMaggio, Valentino, De Niro, Giuliani. . .

It's something that people relate to - and I hope my kid doesn't relate to - but there's a level of believability in playing complex characters. You know, Christopher Walken has done some hilarious comedies, De Niro. There's great room for complexity and darkness to do well in comedies.

I had started off, before I ever got an acting job, working at Robert De Niro's Tribeca Productions as a reader. I was always interested in that side of the camera.

There are people who do De Niro and Walken impersonations.

If De Niro wants to spend the twilight of his career as the McDonald's of master thespians, we can't stop him.

I would love to work with Robert De Niro or Al Pacino. I think they're wonderful actors.

It's interesting to help someone find their vocabulary.

There would not have been a De Niro without a Scorsese.

I don't think more concentration is required for Robert De Niro to do what he does as for Jim Carrey to do what he does.

Impressionists have to paint with a very broad stroke because you've got to see it within a couple of seconds. You go, "That's a really funny Robert De Niro." As an actor, though, you look at different aspects of a character. I try to completely surround myself with the assignment. It's like being in a big cloud and then some of it rains through.

People say I'm into black women. Robert De Niro is into black women. I'm just into women who are real, and they happen to be black.

What's nice about my dating life is that I don't have to leave my house.

All I have to do is read the paper: I'm marrying Richard Gere, dating Daniel Day-Lewis, parading around with John F. Kennedy, Jr., and even Robert De Niro was in there for a day.

I would have to say honestly I was very pleased to be in a film whether it was good or bad with De Niro, Norton and Brando even if I don't have any scenes with them, I thought it was pretty good company to keep.

Like De Niro. He's one of the best character actors we have ever had.

Nobody is more truthful when he's acting than De Niro.

Robert De Niro... It seemed like a pretty cool thing to do to put his name on my resume next.

Take characters that Nicholson or De Niro play: they're not always tough.

With acting, it's all about internalizing the character for me and doing all the preparation you can. So the day you first step into your wardrobe, you can walk like the person. That's really the moment where the light bulb goes off. You're nervous; any actor will tell you that. Robert De Niro will probably tell you the same thing. He may not want to share that with you, but he probably goes through it. That's why actors are so neurotic.

If I'm intimidated, I shouldn't be directing a movie.

I gotta treat 'em as characters, not as stars. It's hard to not treat Marlon Brando as a legend, a star, it's difficult not to treat Robert De Niro as a star, but that had to go away very fast after I knew them, because I had to work with them. I'm the director, I'm the boss. They're looking to me for guidance.

Just watching Robert De Niro was all the words of wisdom I really needed.

Robert De Niro inspires me as a young actor;

even at that age and even with that success you have to come to work fully prepared and ready to dive into it, it doesn't matter how far in your career you are. And that's what he did. It was a real wake up call for me because I know actors who let success get to their head and then it affects their work.

I think I've had my taste.I got to work with Sam [L.Jackson]. I can say I did it. I had my shot. I'd love to do something with [Robert] De Niro or Dustin Hoffman or Al Pacino. Those are guys I grew up watching. That would be wonderful. Now that I've gotten a taste working with a bona fide movie star, I think I'd be more prepared to go head to head with some of the big boys.

With Robert De Niro, you're thinking, suddenly he'll do something you don't expect, or he appears and he's kind of slow to get there but then he gets there in a way that nobody does. Everybody is just really, extremely different.

Robert De Niro is just evolved as a human being.

He's a very kind guy. Age has been good for him, in terms of just, he's very kind.

Robert De Niro, even though I've been in two other movies with him, I never really got to know him at all. But on this movie ["The Big Wedding"] I did.

[I was filmed] against a blue screen [in the Star Wars].

All the rest came later, in Lucasland. They did have me take gun lessons, though. I went to the same guys who taught Robert De Niro for Taxi Driver.