Robert De Niro pays tribute to "really great" Gene Hackman following Hollywood icon's death

19 March 2025, 12:33

Robert De Niro pays tribute to "really great" Gene Hackman following Hollywood icon's death

They are two of Hollywood's most iconic leading men, but they surprisingly never worked together on screen.

Robert De Niro and the late Gene Hackman had met several times and were good friends, but they never had the opportunity to star opposite each other.

Gene Hackman died last month at the age of 95. He was found dead along with his wife, Betsy Arakawa, at their home in New Mexico. He is thought to have died of heart disease complicated by advanced Alzheimer's disease, a week after Betsy died from a rare respiratory disease.

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Speaking exclusively to Gold Radio's Kirsty Gallacher, legendary actor Robert De Niro said that Gene was a "really great" man, and that he was saddened to hear what happened to him.

"He was great," he said. "We were doing a movie near where he lived. He lived in New Mexico, and we were trying to get together through a mutual person, and they had gone away or something couldn't happen. This is about five years ago, so we never [did].

"We had dinner 20 years ago in Montreal. We were both doing a movie there. But no, he was great. He was really great.

"That was sad that that happened."

Kirsty also asked Robert about his iconic "you talkin' to me?" line from Taxi Driver, following director Martin Scorsese implying that it may have been Bruce Springsteen who came up with the quote.

"No. We worked the scene and I improvised that," he cleared up.

"Martin remembers better, but he wasn't. Bruce, maybe in his head somewhere, he thought of that, but no, it was just me doing this stuff in the mirror."

The Alto Knights | Official Trailer

Robert appeared alongside his current co-star Debra Messing to chat to Kirsty about their exciting new film The Alto Knights, in which Robert plays the dual roles of 1950s mob bosses Vito Genovese and Frank Costello.

Watch the full interview above or on Global Player here.