Christian Bale, Margot Robbie and the 'Amsterdam' cast on working with Robert De Niro: 'It's like doing a scene with the Eiffel Tower'
There’s so much star power in Amsterdam that even it’s A-list cast members marveled over whom they got to collaborate with in David O. Russell’s new mystery-comedy-thriller.
Take Margot Robbie. The two-time Oscar nominee couldn’t believe she was working with acting titan Robert De Niro. “He’s an icon,” she tells Yahoo Entertainment during a recent virtual press day (watch above). “And I never thought I’d ever get to share the screen with him. It was incredible.”
“When you work with someone like De Niro,” Mike Myers explains, “I had the same thing when I first met Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger, which is, you're going, 'So those are the molecules that make up Robert de Niro.' It's like doing a scene with the Eiffel Tower or something.”
De Niro is also a hero to John David Washington (Tenet), the 38-year-old son of another acting giant, Denzel Washington.
John David was also particularly amped to work with comedian/actor Chris Rock.
“For what he meant to my childhood, like, just growing up, seeing his stand-ups. He's an icon,” Washington says. “He's one of the greatest comedians of all time. Like Richard Pryor, he's in that same room, at least in my opinion. So it was definitely Mr. Rock."
Amsterdam, a period piece that follows three friends — a doctor, a nurse and a lawyer — who find themselves caught up in the mysterious murder of a U.S. senator, also costars Christian Bale, Rami Malek, Anya Taylor-Joy, Zoe Salda?a, Michael Shannon, Andrea Riseborough and a musician-turned-actor you may have heard of named Taylor Swift.
Myers and Shannon, who steal scenes together as international spies and bird watchers, loved working with each other. They were also neighbors behind the scenes, living in the same apartment complex.
"It had balconies, where you could go out on the balcony and wave to each other, so that really deepened the relationship," Shannon says. "There was some tapping on the wall and some screaming sometimes."
"I tend to scream. Night terrors," Myers cracked.
Amsterdam is the latest collaboration between Russell and Bale, who previously worked together on 2013’s American Hustle and 2010’s The Fighter, and was six years in the making. (It’s Russell’s first film since 2015’s Joy.)
Says Bale: "We talked about some ideas, about some vague ideas, of characters for a few years, and then we just started saying about how we wanted to see people who overcome adversity, who have optimism, who believe in hope, who believe in joy. And we took about six years doing that."
–Video produced by Olivia Schneider, edited by Luis Saenz
Amsterdam opens in theaters Friday, Oct. 7.
Watch the trailer:
