Robert De Niro Rages Against Trump at Francis Ford Coppola Screening While Director Touts Hiring Trumpers for Film
Marion Curtis/Starpix for Lionsgate/INSTARimages (Cover Images via AP Images)
Robert De Niro pivoted to politics and former President Donald Trump while taking part in a screening of Megalopolis, the latest film from De Niro pal Francis Ford Coppola, who ironically touted hiring pro-Trump artists to take part in the film.
De Niro and Spike Lee took part in a Q&A on Monday in New York to help promote the premiere of Megalopolis, which opens nationwide in theaters on September 27. Coppola independently produced the film, which cost more than $100 million. During the Q&A, De Niro made a sharp pivot to politics, Trump, and Republicans after Coppola was discussing the theme of cities falling and being rebuilt in his movie.
“I see the things in Francis’ film about that, the parallels and so on. To me, it’s not over ’til it’s over and we have to go at this wholeheartedly to beat the Republicans – those Republicans, they’re not real Republicans – and beat Trump. It’s that simple. We cannot have that type of person. Everybody has to get out there and vote,” De Niro said.
Coppola followed that answer up with more talk about Megalopolis, but when Lee joined in, he too spoke directly about the election.
“This election is going to be very, very close. I’m a big sports fan and, the expression you used, it’s not over ’till it’s over. We cannot just think that the game is over when it’s not,” Lee said, encouraging people to “vote and show up.”
Coppola followed this up by noting that he deliberately hired people to participate in the movie who hold different opinions. Coppola did not name these Trump backers, but one is Jon Voight. The actor and vocal Trump supporter has a supporting role in the movie. Coppola also touted hiring “canceled” actors who have found controversies and legal troubles keeping them from major studio work, like Shia Labeouf.
“I deliberately got people to make this film who disagree,” Coppola said. “I mean, there’s actors in the move that are voting another way and there are people in it who have been canceled this way and that and in the movie we all work together creatively and happily so it shows that — I didn’t want them to say, oh it’s some woke movie — we were above politics in the making of the film, I thought.”
De Niro pushed back on the idea a little, asking Coppola, who directed De Niro in The Godfather Part II, what Megalopolis would be like if Trump directed it.
“Just imagine Donald Trump directing this film,” De Niro said. “It’ll never go anywhere, from total craziness. He cannot do anything. He cannot hold anything together.”
The actor, arguably as vocally against Trump as Voight is for him, said the former president “wants to destroy the country” and is incapable of doing anything with “scructure.”
Coppola wrapped up the evening by recalling that both he and Trump attended New York Military Academy, but they did not interact because Coppola was older — and poorer.
“I was poor so I was a tuba player in the band and he was rich so he was in the headquarters where they could keep the lights on after Taps,” he said.
