A Robert DeNiro Y meryl streep They are not only united by three films or five decades living together in the same industry as legends of the seventh art. But also a friendship forged from the respect and admiration they feel for each other, and that they have shared with the world in Different occasions. As she did the actress at a University of Texas event celebrating her friend, admitting that since she saw her artistic ability in bad streets (1973) by Martin Scorsese knew she wanted to do the same as an actress, “with the same commitment, passion, skill and beauty that he applies”. And that since then, De Niro became “his guiding beacon for 50 years.”
However, this friendship is not only based on mutual respect and shared filming. They have lived moments of life together, as evidenced the gesture of generosity that De Niro had with her and her partner at a delicate moment in the 70s.
“He is a man whose presence in my life for 40 years has been a constant comforter.” Meryl continued from the stage before giving way to her friend at the event held in Austin on September 24. “I don’t see him very often. We do not talk. But I know that he is, without a doubt, always there for me and he always will be. He is a man who lives by loyalty to his ideals, to his country and to the people he loves.”. And with these words I couldn’t help but remember an anecdote that exemplifies that presence and protection that the star of The bridges of Madison.
Shortly after falling in love with the talent of Robert De Niro in bad streets, Meryl Streep began to climb positions in the theatrical circuit of New York. And in 1976, when she was 27 years old, she began a relationship with John Cazalean actor 14 years older than her, legendary among her professional colleagues, whom she had met when they starred together in the play Measure for measure. John Cazale was a character actor with an atypical appearance for the big screen but with a distinctive dramatic depth. He was the second son of Don Vito Corleone, the weak Fredo, in The Godfather and its sequel, whom Al Pacino would describe as his “partner in action. “I learned more from John’s acting than from anyone” said the actor on one occasion.
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Meryl and John fell madly in love and lived together in the actor’s loft in the Tribeca neighborhood of New York. Back then he was the more famous of the two – especially among the Big Apple’s Italian-American community thanks to The Godfather– but the praise they both received augured promising careers. And together. Until one day in 1977. Cazale had been feeling bad for a while to the point of missing several performances of a play he was representing. He went to the doctor and the blow would come with the diagnosis: terminal lung cancer. He was 42 years old.
According to the book her again, Michael Schulman’s biography of Meryl Streep, the actress kept an optimistic spirit, supporting him throughout the process while Al Pacino helped by taking him to radiation treatments. However, the medical care that Cazale required cost money and they needed to work.
And then the opportunity arose to appear in a movie together when they knew he didn’t have long to live. that movie was The hunter (1978), the one that would mark the first collaboration of the two with Robert De Niro, the actor Meryl had admired for several years.
However, as much as those responsible for the project wanted Cazale at all costs, the production company asked for his dismissal.. Basically because the costs to insure it were going to be huge and no one was going to want to finance a movie with a terminally ill actor.
Meryl and De Niro threatened to resign, and according to media such as New York Post, the actor covered the insurance costs out of his own pocket so that John could be in the film. And while Robert De Nino never denied or confirmed this information, he did say that Cazale “he was sicker than we thought, but he wanted me to be in it [la película]”.
They finally made the movie but the medical bills kept mounting, forcing Meryl Streep to take another job. The one with the leading role in the miniseries Holocaust that according she told herself on some occasion, he accepted out of sheer economic necessity. She had to spend about two and a half months shooting in Austria, shouldering the personal plight of being away from her fading boyfriend and filming an intense and dramatic story about the Holocaust in a real concentration camp.
At the end of the project, he returned home immediately, spending the next five months without leaving his side, until his death on March 12, 1978. That same year he became a star, winning an Emmy for Holocaust, an Oscar nomination for The hunter and the role that you would open the doors to all that was to come in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979).
Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep worked together again in Fell in love (1984) and then again in marvin’s room (1996), but with stories like the gesture of generosity that the actor had with his partner show that there are personal stories behind movie stars. As in the life of any ordinary mortal, they strengthen relationships and friendships that unite them forever.
Meryl married sculptor Don Gummer six months later and had four children, but in 2014 she told Karina Longworth for her book Meryl Streep: Anatomy of an actor, which did not get over John’s death. “I don’t want to get over it. No matter what you do, the pain is always there in some corner of your mind and affects everything that happens afterward. I think you can assimilate the pain and go on without obsessing over it.”
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Robert de Niro and Meryl Streep’s friendship goes beyond mutual admiration