Robert De Niro has played an adorable prank on one of his oldest friends and most frequent collaborators in a viral moment from this week.
The legendary actor, 81, decided to drag his long-time creative partner and Hollywood legend Martin Scorsese, 82, into an ongoing TikTok trend.
In recent weeks, the wholesome hashtag #goodnightbro has been doing the rounds on the video-based social media platform, reaching millions of users.
As part of the trend, young men are being encouraged to phone up their male friends and wish them a good night’s sleep – and maybe they’ll chuck in a ‘sweet dreams’ if they’re feeling mushy.
However, wholesome as it might be, #goodnightbro is still a prank, and the recipients of the calls are often not expecting to receive good night wishes from their pals.
And filmmaker Scorsese was the unwitting recipient of such a call from De Niro, who has starred in 10 of Scorsese’s films since their first collaboration in 1973.
A video has emerged of Goodfellas director Scorsese looking confused after receiving a call from the legendary actor – the Kundun director was encouraged to answer the call by his daughter Francesca, 25.
In the clip, Francesca videos Scorsese answering his phone and asks her dad to ‘say hello’ to whoever is calling – a request he adheres to before a booming voice (De Niro) says ‘Hello?’ on the other end.
After Scorsese asks if it’s ‘Bob?’ calling, De Niro chuckles to himself, says ‘Just calling to say goodnight and sleep tight,’ and asks if Scorsese wants to jump on FaceTime.
The two them jump on FaceTime and De Niro shows Scorsese a brief glimpse of what he’s been watching on TV, before the pair make arrangements to meet up the next day at 6.15 (hopefully PM).
Fans have worked out that the Killers of the Flower Moon actor is watching The Wiggles with his two-year-old daughter Gia, whom he shares with his 45-year-old girlfriend Tiffany Chen.
Scorsese then says ‘Okay, thank you, my love – bye!’ before De Niro affectionately blows kisses through the phone while the person recording starts to laugh.
After the call is over, the Taxi Driver director speaking to Francesca – who has kept the camera rolling – and admits to finding the whole thing a ‘mystery’.
When he’s told that it’s just a TikTok trend for laughs, Scorsese, exasperated, exclaims: ‘That’s what that was? A trend thing?’
The two first worked together on the 1973 film Mean Streets, which was directed by Scorsese and starred De Niro in the leading role.
Throughout the 1970s, their working relationship produced films such as Taxi Driver and New York, New York – the latter being a musical drama.
In the following decade, the pair worked together on 1980’s Raging Bull and the 1982 film The King of Comedy before taking a break from each other for eight years.
That hiatus ended in 1990 when they combined for the seminal gangster film Goodfellas, and they soon picked up again for Cape Fear in 1991 and Casino in 1995.
In more recent years, the pair have worked on The Audition from 2015, The Irishman in 2019, and most recently in 2023 for the Leonardo DiCaprio movie Killers of the Flower Moon.
Despite being one of the most famous and decorated actors of all time, De Niro recently admitted that he’s only just realised how good he might be on screen.
Speaking to Metro, he said: ‘Most of the time you’re just sort of looking and [squirming], but it’s possible. Especially if you have many, many years distance between the time that you did it and the time you’re seeing it.’
As for Scorsese, he’s admitted that while he’s putting plans together for his next film, he’s not entirely clear on what shape his next project will take, saying to USA Today that he’s still going to ‘get going’.
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