New Delhi, India

Hollywood star Robert De Niro featured on The Tonight Show where host Jimmy Fallon asked him about a number of rumours surrounding his career. 

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The first among the many in Jimmy’s list was a rumour that suggested Robert De Niro was originally cast as Josh, a character eventually played and made famous by Tom Hanks in Penny Marshall’s 1988 comedy, ‘Big’. Robert replied, “Yes But we had a thing, an issue with the negotiations, so it went the way it went. But that was fine.”

For the unversed, ‘Big’ is about a character named Josh Baskin, a young boy who makes a wish to be “big,” and learns to be careful what he wishes for, when he is transformed into an adult overnight. 

Robert also spoke about a rumours around his involvement in the Godfather franchise. He was originally auditioned for the role of Sonny Corleone, in the original ‘Godfather’. The Oscar-winning actor went on to win the statue for his role as a young Vito Corleone in Francis Ford Coppola’s ‘The Godfather: Part II’. 

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On this, Robert De Niro told Jimmy, “Everybody was up for Michael [Corleone], but everybody knew that Al [Pacino] was gonna do it, that Francis wanted him,” he told Fallon. “I wanted to do the Sonny part, too, and I read for it, but I think Francis was pretty set on Jimmy Caan, too. But they let me read.”