Bautista On Getting Snubbed By De Niro

I don’t know if you caught the movie Heist a while back.  It featured Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Robert De Niro and also Dave Bautista.  You may also have noticed a lack of shared scenes between Bautista and De Niro.  This was because De Niro apparently did not want to be in a scene with him.

On the Talk is Jericho podcast recently, Bautista revealed:

It was kinda heartbreaking, I was really disappointed.  I did a film called Heist and the reason I wanted to do it was because I thought I’d be opposite De Niro.  And so his people wouldn’t approve me for the role because they have cast approval.

It didn’t make sense to me at the time.  I thought it was good for me and something the producers wanted me for.  So they offered me another role playing opposite De Niro, it was a different role, a smaller role.  So I said okay, I’ll take that role.  But his people didn’t want me for that role either!

So I ended up playing the bad guy, but I was like, I don’t have any scenes with De Niro, I don’t want that role, but his people approved me for that role.  And I said wait a minute, how does that make sense? And I thought ohh, okay.  De Niro’s people just don’t want me to have scenes with De Niro.

He then goes on to describe how he and Jeffrey Dean Morgan made the movie better by themselves, adding that Morgan was a very cool cat.  It’s also kind of funny to see De Niro snub Bautista, who is now appearing in ever bigger roles, while De Niro is appearing in movies featuring turd jokes and dildo jokes.