Threats

Emmy winner Sheryl Lee Ralph has been reminiscing about career advice that Robert De Niro gave her when they filmed Mistress in 1992. Suddenly I remembered a fun experience I had with Sheryl. Back in the early 90’s I was writing the gossip column for Star magazine and a security guard from a fancy NY hotel called with a story. The guard was laughing and said that Robert De Niro just had a tantrum in the hotel lobby. It was after 10 o’clock and the hotel had a strict rule: nobody goes upstairs unless they have a key (that means NO visitors) UNLESS person renting room comes down to lobby to bring visitor up. De Niro wanted to go UP immediately to visit someone and called for the manager. The manager insisted – the person De Niro wanted to visit HAD to come down and get him. Loud complaints and “Don’t you know who I AM?” followed – furious De Niro made phone calls. Finally Sheryl Lee Ralph came down in the elevator in a negligee and brought de Niro up to her room. I loved the story, but when it came out, De Niro called Star’s editor and tried to get me fired, threatened to sue Star AND the hotel – he denied everything. The editor was satisfied the story was true and stood his ground. De Niro didn’t take action and a couple of years later I ran into Sheryl Lee Ralph and reminded her of the incident. She was delightful and laughed out loud – admitting it was absolutely TRUE! I loved her for that – De Niro, not so much…

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