You talkin’ to him?
Robert De Niro had no idea his 1976 film “Taxi Driver” would be lauded as a classic.
“You never can think that you’re doing something that’s going to have an impact,” the actor, 82, exclusively explained to Page Six in a recent interview alongside his fellow Tribeca Festival co-founder Jane Rosenthal to promote next month’s event.
The Oscar winner “just never look[s] at it that way,” he adding, noting that success is “out of your control.”
The neo-noir drama, directed by Martin Scorsese, stars De Niro as an unhinged taxi driver named Travis Bickle, whose mental state deteriorates over the course of the movie.
De Niro acted in the iconic role alongside Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd, Harvey Keitel, Peter Boyle, and Albert Brooks.
The project generated controversy at the time for graphic violence and 12-year-old Foster’s casting as a child sex worker — and, later, for inspiring John Hinckley Jr.’s attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan.
Nevertheless, it is considered one of the greatest movies ever made and, in 1994, was designated as “culturally, historically or aesthetically” significant by the U.S. Library of Congress when selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.
The movie, which turned 50 this year, is being screened at the June film festival — and De Niro and Scorsese, 83, will reunite for a conversation about the project.
Their sitdown is just one of many special talks and screenings taking place at this year’s 25th Tribeca Festival.
Not only are interviews with Madonna, Sean Penn and Josh Safdie also scheduled, but there will be special anniversary screenings of “Cable Guy” and “Bridget Jones’s Diary.”
“There are so many great things to see,” Rosenthal told us. “There’s so much music, everybody from Earth, Wind and Fire and Madonna to Noga Erez and Sarah Bareilles and Peter Frampton.
“There’s just a lot to see,” the 69-year-old continued, stressing that the festival is “a welcome festival for all New Yorkers [with] tickets available” now.
The annual event, which runs from June 3 through June 14, was established in 2002 to spur the revitalization of Lower Manhattan following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center.
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