Leonardo DiCaprio Was The First Actor Robert De Niro Ever Recommended To Martin Scorsese

When Leonardo DiCaprio introduced the Life Achievement Award at the Screen Actors Guild annual ceremony in 2020, he recalled his father taking him to the cinema to watch "Midnight Run" when he was 13 years old. During the film, his dad said to him:

"If you really want to be an actor and get into this profession, if you want to understand what great acting is, you watch that man on screen."

No, he wasn't talking about Charles Grodin; he was referring to the actor honored that night for his legendary career, Robert De Niro. A few years after that trip to the movie house, DiCaprio found himself starring alongside the legendary actor in "This Boy's Life." It was a major break for the teenager after roles in "Critters 3" and "Poison Ivy," and he more than held his own against the two-time Oscar winner playing a young man suffering abuse at the hands of his mother's violent new husband.

The same year, DiCaprio received Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Supporting Actor for his turn in "What's Eating Gilbert Grape?" While the performance is still well-regarded as a depiction of autism, it might not fly today with the ongoing discussion about whether able-bodied actors should ever play such a role. Nevertheless, it marked DiCaprio as a young talent of startling ability, and by the end of the '90s he was one of Hollywood's brightest stars after the double-whammy of "Romeo + Juliet" and "Titanic." Bigger things were undoubtedly to come from DiCaprio, so it was little surprise when he took the lead role in Martin Scorsese's "Gangs of New York." No doubt he was on the director's radar already by that stage, a recommendation from his previous move might have also been at the back of his mind.

Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro are arguably the greatest director-actor team in American cinema. It was magic from the moment De Niro swaggered into a bar to "Jumpin' Jack Flash" in "Meant Streets," and they went on to make seven more films together before Leonardo DiCaprio eventually superseded him as the director's go-to actor.

Not all of them were hits. "New York New York" received mediocre reviews and "The King of Comedy" was a massive flop that many people didn't get at the time, only becoming regarded as another Scorsese classic after critical reappraisal. Despite the odd wobble, their partnership has provided De Niro with some of his most memorable roles, such as Travis Bickle in "Taxi Driver" and Jimmy Conway in "Goodfellas," and won him his only Best Actor Oscar to date for "Raging Bull."

Their collaborations took a 24-year hiatus (not counting the $70 million promo "The Audition") after "Casino" in 1995, which, incidentally, was the year that De Niro had his famous sit-down over coffee with Al Pacino in "Heat." The scene marked the first time that the actors, perhaps the most gifted of their generation, met together onscreen. When De Niro finally reconvened with Scorsese, it was also with Pacino again for "The Irishman." The film was a welcome return to form for the two actors, giving us a reminder of why they are so revered.

De Niro had kept himself busy since the turn of the century, but, like Pacino and some other big names from the '70s, his roles were largely a dim shadow of his previous heights. For every nice turn like his performance in "Silver Linings Playbook," there were quite a few duds like "Showtime" and "Dirty Grandpa." In the same period, Leonardo DiCaprio established himself Scorsese's new muse.

Leonardo DiCaprio's talent was apparent to everyone by the time he was announced as the lead in "Gangs of New York," and Robert De Niro had alerted Martin Scorsese to his potential 10 years earlier while making "This Boy's Life." The director recalled (via Deadline):

"After 'Goodfellas,' he [De Niro] did 'This Boy's Life.' We were talking on the phone, about what I'm not quite sure. He said, 'I'm working with this young boy. You must work with him sometime.' That was the first time I heard him recommend somebody to me. 'The kid is really good.' he said."

The casting of DiCaprio in a Scorsese picture seemed like a true stamp of approval, but it wasn't quite successful. The actor looked uneasy in the chaotic sprawl of the film, hampered by a bad Irish accent and upstaged by Daniel Day-Lewis's deliciously hammy performance. It was perhaps a movie too soon for DiCaprio, but he soon settled into his role as Scorsese's new go-to lead actor in four more features before this year's highly anticipated "Killers of the Flower Moon," where he reunites with Robert De Niro onscreen for the first time in 30 years.

It could have happened far sooner. Scorsese asked De Niro if he was interested in playing Bill the Butcher in "Gangs of New York," but the actor wasn't feeling it. He also offered him "The Departed," but the actor didn't want to do that, either. Now we have "Killers of the Flower Moon," and the promise of seeing De Niro and DiCaprio onscreen together again after three decades is a cinematic meeting to rival that of De Niro and Pacino's chat in "Heat." In a roundabout way, we may have De Niro's tip-off to Scorsese about DiCaprio's talent to thank for all the anticipation.