Tara’s Tribeca Blog: The Robert De Niro

Posted by Tara Settembre (tara@filmschoolrejects.com) on April 27, 2008

And a dream of mine has finally come true. While at the Tribeca Film Festival today covering the red carpet premiere of Tennessee I got to see stars like Mariah Carey and Ben Kingsley but nothing compared to seeing the great Bobby D, my favorite actor ever. I already finished my interviews and most of the press left the minute Mariah Carey went by. For some reason I was taking my time gathering my stuff and good thing because a last minute suprise arrival was in store for the remaining 15 or so press. Robert DeNiro came walking down, gray hair and in a nice suit. I swear I was stunned and I ran back to my spot to get a photo, however in my haste I stupidly hit the stop button instead of record. I’m kicking myself now because when I daringly yelled out “Bobby” to him, he looked right at me, smiled, nodded his head and continued on into the theater.

I was freaking out. My cameraman said I looked like a little girl and that my voice went all high pitch. I started crying after he walked by. I know this sounds pathetic, but I swear this is literally a dream come true for me and I cursed like a truck driver when I realized I messed up on the video. I would have had a video of him staring right at me, dammit!!! Anyway, it was still awesome. I’m so surprised he was even there since he’s known to be reclusive despite the fact that he was the founder of the festival and for rebuilding so much of the Tribeca area in Manhattan. I was hoping I would see him back in 2006 when I covered the festival, so I had given up hope this year and then bam!

For more coverage, check out our Tribeca Homepage and our Tribeca Photos on Flickr.

Read more articles by Tara Settembre