Ready for a mind-blower? They’ve never had a formal conversation about acting. Ever. Not once. They’ll talk about baseball, the weather, or why the coffee is cold, but never about method acting. Also, Pacino is terrified of flying, so he drives a van across the country for filming—and De Niro once drove with him for six hours, and they just listened to jazz. Silence. Beautiful, awkward silence.
The iconic role Robert De Niro blackmailed Al Pacino into playing
Who’s the Better Actor? Nobody Knows.
You can’t pick a winner. Pacino is a firecracker with a scream; De Niro is a glacier with a twitch. One wins Oscars for yelling into a courtroom (Pacino’s Scent of a Woman), and the other wins for not saying a word while punching a meat locker (De Niro’s Raging Bull). Their combined crying face should be a national monument. And here’s the kicker: they’re both rich enough to buy Manhattan, but they still live in the same New York neighborhoods, wearing black turtlenecks and eating at the same deli. Probably ordering the same thing. Separately.
