Robert De Niro Wants to Play Governor Andrew Cuomo in Inevitable COVID-19 Film

Robert De Niro called in from quarantine on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert Wednesday night, catching up with the late-night host on how his quarantine is going. For the distinguished actor and producer, it’s a lot of reading scripts, a bit of working out and “trying to stay alive.”

When asked who he would like to portray when, inevitably, there’s a movie made about the COVID-19 crisis, De Niro stated that he would like to play New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who has managed the pandemic in its epicenter within the United States.

“He’s doing what a president should do,” De Niro said knowingly. The actor has never been shy about his disdain for current President Donald Trump, and he praised Cuomo’s leadership in comparison. “Though I’m for Biden and I want everything to go well for Biden, at least we have a person who is a very capable backup, if you will. If God forbid anything were to change, he’s good for the job. He’s doing what any president should do.”

Colbert asked De Niro about his past responses to New York tragedies, such as the Tribeca Film Festival, which was meant to invigorate the downtown life of the city after 9/11.

“They were disastrous situations of a different sort and terrible things that happened, but as Cuomo’s saying, you learn from those experiences and how to handle them,” he said.