One of Noel Gallagher’s favourite stories to tell concerns a long lunch he and Robert De Niro shared in the south of France. The acclaimed actor had never heard of Oasis then – but told NME in a new interview that he is more familiar these days, though he still hasn’t dived into the band’s back-catalogue.
Gallagher first shared news of their meeting on Instagram in 2016. Alongside a picture of the two sat at a table seemingly in deep discussion, he wrote: “So we’ve been down to The South Of France for a few days and at a 17 hour lunch at our friends house THIS..THIS.. Actually happened!!!”
Later, Gallagher told TalkSport that the lunch took place at a mutual friend’s house (reportedly U2 frontman Bono’s) – and that they’d sat together for “a good couple of hours” while he “bombarded” De Niro with questions about Raging Bull, Goodfellas and more of his most famous movies. They also discussed Donald Trump, with De Niro “slagging off” the then-US presidential candidate (Trump would go on to be elected later that year). When the (at the time) 73-year-old left around 9pm, Gallagher said, De Niro asked him to “write down the name of that band that you were in again”.
In a new interview to promote upcoming mob drama The Alto Knights, out today (March 21), we asked if De Niro went away and listened to Oasis at Noel’s suggestion. “No!” he answered, before bursting into laughter. Watch the full video interview above.
Though he hasn’t caught up on the likes of ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll Star’ and ‘Talk Tonight’, De Niro said he was aware that Noel and famously estranged brother Liam have reconciled for a huge reunion tour beginning this summer – which NME exclusively revealed the Oasis band line-up for last week.
“I heard about it through a friend who knows him,” the double Oscar winner revealed. “He said that they were getting back together and it’s a big, big deal.”
It’s unsurprising De Niro isn’t au fait with the Britpop era, because he namechecked classic American singers Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Nat King Cole as his go-to artists of the moment. “I used to like to listen to rock and roll when I was a kid, a teenager,” he added, but has turned to older icons recently: “I don’t know why, it feels nostalgic.”
Debra Messing, who was also in the interview and co-stars as De Niro’s on-screen wife in The Alto Knights, a fresh retelling of the violent feud between New York City gangsters Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, paid tribute to Barbra Streisand’s 1964 album of the hit Broadway musical Funny Girl.
“This might disappoint your readers,” she said, “but Streisand was the reason that I believed I could become an actress. When I was living next to a farm when I was a kid, I saw that movie and I was like ‘I can do that’.”
‘The Alto Knights’ is in cinemas now