INTERVIEW

De Niro storms out of "The Intern" interview, tells reporter "I’m not doing it, darling"

The actor reportedly became irritated after a journalist asked him questions that had a "negative inference"

Published September 22, 2015 3:28PM (EDT)

Robert De Niro (AP/Charles Sykes)
Robert De Niro (AP/Charles Sykes)

Today in actors angrily storming out of press appearances, Robert De Niro reportedly left an interview with the U.K.’s Radio Times promoting his new comedy "The Intern" because the reporter’s questions had a “negative inference.”

The journalist, Emma Brockes, told the Guardian that De Niro was unhappy with some questions she asked, about Tribeca (home of De Niro’s Tribeca Film Festival) being overtaken by bankers, and about how De Niro avoids going into “autopilot” on set.

Here’s what Brockes told The Guardian:

The actor then asked her to pause the recorder and got out of his chair, paced about “madly” before cutting the interview short because of the “negative inference” of what she had said.

“What, about the bankers?!” she asked. De Niro responded: “All the way through. Negative inference.” Brockes then asked where else he was referring to and he replied: “The whole way through and I’m not doing it. I’m not doing it, darling.” He then stuck his head out of the door to find someone to take him out of the room.

Brockes later told The Independent that, while she sympathizes with actors forced to sit through a string of repetitive junket interviews, she was irritated by the interaction. "I was expecting him to be a little quiet but the combination of hostility and condescension irritated me and I ended up losing my cool,” she said. "I certainly didn’t go in looking for an argument but when it happened I did think ‘at least he’s finally saying something.’"

While De Niro has long been known for being a difficult interview subject — a 1987 Vanity Fair piece observed that the actor “despises interviews and rarely gives them” — he seems to have been in a particularly ill temper during “The Intern” junket. Earlier, during a roundtable interview, De Niro's costar Anne Hathaway reportedly got teary-eyed while talking about how honored she was to work with the iconic actor. According to Brockes, De Niro responded by looking “baffled and vaguely appalled." Hathahate: Not just for laypeople anymore!


By Anna Silman

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