Robert De Niro has spent more than six decades building one of the most celebrated acting careers in American cinema, from Mean Streets and Taxi Driver to Goodfellas, Heat and Joker.
Born August 17, 1943, in New York City, De Niro discovered acting as a child and left high school at 16 to pursue it professionally, as he studied with Stella Adler and Lee Strasberg before landing early film roles in Greetings, Bloody Mama and Hi, Mom!
Robert De Niro says his Gotham speech was censored and some anti-Trump comments removed
His breakthrough came in 1973. De Niro starred in Bang the Drum Slowly and began his landmark collaboration with Martin Scorsese in Mean Streets. A year later, Francis Ford Coppola cast him as the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather Part II.
His role and performance saw De Niro win his first Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and marked one of the rare cases that many people consider the sequel of a movie to have eclipsed its predecessor.
He then won his second Oscar in 1981 for Raging Bull, portraying boxer Jake LaMotta. The performance established a pattern that would define his career: intense preparation, physical transformation and an ability to tackle demanding roles.
De Niro went on to earn Oscar nominations for Taxi Driver, The Deer Hunter, Awakenings, Cape Fear, Silver Linings Playbook and Killers of the Flower Moon. He also earned a Best Picture nomination as a producer of The Irishman.
De Niro became closely associated with hard-edged dramas, appearing in classics such as The King of Comedy, Once Upon a Time in America, The Untouchables, Goodfellas, Heat, Casino and Jackie Brown.
He also showed a different side of his range through comedies including Midnight Run, Analyze This, Wag the Dog, The Intern and the Meet the Parents series. His later work included Joker and the HBO film The Wizard of Lies, in which he portrayed Bernie Madoff.
Robert Di Niro (L) and his long-time collaborator, Martin Scorcese (R)
Robert De Niro: “Time goes on. So whatever you’re going to do, do it. Do it now. Don’t wait”
His career has even extended beyond acting as De Niro directed A Bronx Tale and The Good Shepherd. He also set up a production company named, TriBeCa Productions, with Jane Rosenthal in 1989 and later co-founded the Tribeca Film Festival.
Through all of this, one theme is abundantly clear: De Niro takes the opportunities given to him and more than 60 years after beginning his career, he continues to work across film and television.
Offering strong words of advice to those sitting on the fence about an opportunity and perhaps afraid of change, De Niro reminds everyone of the simple mortality that faces humanity as he sums up his attitude by saying, “Time goes on. So whatever you’re going to do, do it. Do it now. Don’t wait.”
That philosophy has seen him recognized with the AFI Life Achievement Award, Kennedy Center Honors, Cecil B. DeMille Award, Presidential Medal of Freedom and Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award.
In 2025, he received an Honorary Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and six of his films have been selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry, while five appear on the American Film Institute‘s list of the 100 Greatest American Films.
