The Robert De Niro Connection
The following is a trivial connection to Miller, but I found it fascinating when I first read about it and think it’s worthwhile to share. Admittedly, there is not much to say on the subject, once the link between actor Robert De Niro and Henry Miller is made. However, I spent the time trying to dig up some research, so, in the spirit on getting this blog going once again, here it is, whatever it is.______________
Actor Robert De Niro was born August 17, 1943, in New York City [1]. Author Henry Miller, a native New Yorker himself, was then living in Beverly Glen, California; he was broke, able only to afford the cheapest watercolour paints [2]. It was the kind of existence that De Niro’s own father knew only too well. His father, Robert “Bob” De Niro (Sr.), was a painter, as was his mother, Virginia Admiral, who was also a poet. “My parents both moved in bohemian circles,” De Niro junior has stated [3]. Henry Miller and Anais Nin were two such bohemians.
I have not found anything written by Miller that refers to Bob DeNiro or Virginia Admiral. However, Anais Nin has written of them in her diaries. Her acquaintance with them seems to have begun through poet Robert Duncan, via James Cooney’s The Phoenix magazine enterprise. I assume that Miller’s acquaintance with the couple came through Nin’s introduction.
De Niro’s mother, Virginia Admiral (born 1915) was an artist involved with the San Francisco poetry scene of the 1930s. In 1936, she met the young poet Robert Duncan, with whom, that year, she created the arts magazine Epitaph (later The Experimental Review) [4]. The following year, 1937, Duncan would have poems published in another upstart arts publication, The Phoenix, which was being run by James Cooney out of Woodstock, New York [5]. That same magazine had assigned Miller as their “European editor,” and had accepted Nin’s “orchestra” fragment from Winter of Artifice [6].
By 1939, Duncan had made his way to Woodstock and worked for Cooney as an assistant for The Phoenix [4]. Here, Nin met Duncan for the first time, as described in the “Winter 1939” entry of her published diaries. Around that same time, in the final quarter of 1939, Duncan re-connected with Virginia Admiral, who had transplanted herself from the west coast to New York [5] to attend the Hofmann School of Art [7].
I have not found anything written by Miller that refers to Bob DeNiro or Virginia Admiral. However, Anais Nin has written of them in her diaries. Her acquaintance with them seems to have begun through poet Robert Duncan, via James Cooney’s The Phoenix magazine enterprise. I assume that Miller’s acquaintance with the couple came through Nin’s introduction.
De Niro’s mother, Virginia Admiral (born 1915) was an artist involved with the San Francisco poetry scene of the 1930s. In 1936, she met the young poet Robert Duncan, with whom, that year, she created the arts magazine Epitaph (later The Experimental Review) [4]. The following year, 1937, Duncan would have poems published in another upstart arts publication, The Phoenix, which was being run by James Cooney out of Woodstock, New York [5]. That same magazine had assigned Miller as their “European editor,” and had accepted Nin’s “orchestra” fragment from Winter of Artifice [6].
By 1939, Duncan had made his way to Woodstock and worked for Cooney as an assistant for The Phoenix [4]. Here, Nin met Duncan for the first time, as described in the “Winter 1939” entry of her published diaries. Around that same time, in the final quarter of 1939, Duncan re-connected with Virginia Admiral, who had transplanted herself from the west coast to New York [5] to attend the Hofmann School of Art [7].
Henry Miller, in Paris and Greece this entire time, arrived back in New York in mid-January 1940. A week or two later, Robert Duncan visited Anais Nin, bringing Virginia Admiral as a guest. Virginia told Anais, “You are much kinder and sweeter than I imagined from House of Incest.” Nin thought Virginia and Robert Duncan were “both children out of Les Enfants Terribles. But they are children.” [Nin’s diaries, “Winter 1939”].
.JPG)
Meanwhile, Robert De Niro (senior), from Syracuse, New York, had just turned 18 in January. Pursuing a dream to become a painter, the young De Niro was studying art at Black Mountain College in North Carolina [3] [8]. To supplement his artistic education, in 1940, he attended a summer school in Provincetown, Massachusetts. [3] Hans Hofmann, of the Hofmann School in New York, was the teacher. De Niro, made class monitor, [7] was a favourite student of Hofmann’s [3], as was a female student—25-year old Virginia Admiral. De Niro and Admiral became romantically involved [3] [9]. As Hofmann’s summer course ended, the couple stayed in Massachusetts, living in a shack by the dunes, picking berries for pocket money, while De Niro worked at a fish cannery [3].
.JPG)
Meanwhile, Robert De Niro (senior), from Syracuse, New York, had just turned 18 in January. Pursuing a dream to become a painter, the young De Niro was studying art at Black Mountain College in North Carolina [3] [8]. To supplement his artistic education, in 1940, he attended a summer school in Provincetown, Massachusetts. [3] Hans Hofmann, of the Hofmann School in New York, was the teacher. De Niro, made class monitor, [7] was a favourite student of Hofmann’s [3], as was a female student—25-year old Virginia Admiral. De Niro and Admiral became romantically involved [3] [9]. As Hofmann’s summer course ended, the couple stayed in Massachusetts, living in a shack by the dunes, picking berries for pocket money, while De Niro worked at a fish cannery [3]. And then, in 1940, came the infamous erotica-on-demand episode. This is a time when it seems most likely that Henry Miller may have met DeNiro and Admiral.
Beginning during the summer of 1940, Henry Miller, Anais Nin, and several other people took to writing pornographic stories at one-dollar a page for an oil millionaire from Oklahoma who collected erotica. Today, this collection of dirty stories is incorrectly attributed to Miller as Opus Pistorum or Under the Roofs of Paris. This is an interesting but complex chapter, which I won’t go into here [10]. Suffice it to say that Nin had recruited a number of other people to churn out these blue pages; Robert De Niro and Virginia Admiral were two such recruits. Admiral’s involvement began as a typist for Nin’s stories [3], but her involvement grew.
“All of us need money, so we pool our stories,” wrote Nin. “I could not turn them out fast enough, so I inserted some of Robert [Duncan]’s, some of Virginia’s, some of George Baker’s” [8]. Though not a writer, even De Niro was offered a chance to make an easy buck. "It was very hard work," De Niro later recalled, "so eventually I went back to the fishery" [3].
De Niro continued to work for the cannery, but Virginia got herself a female roommate to share an artist’s loft on 14th Street in New York. Nin describes the flat in her diary: above some shops, cold, with high ceilings and large windows, canvases everywhere and nails on walls to use as coat-hangers [11]. By the end of 1940, Anais Nin became a regular visitor for Virginia. “Virginia tells me she is enriched and liberated by our talks,” writes Nin. “[S]he becomes identified with me, repeating my imprisonment in bourgeois life, my liberation through Henry and June.” [8]
By the end of 1940, Robert came to live in the New York loft. But sexual intrigue threatened to ruin things. It was Virginia’s good friend, Robert Duncan, who would prove to be the catalyst. Duncan, a gay man who turned to hustling during this period [12], seduced De Niro, who was beginning his own journey of bisexual exploration [3] [9]. The incident created a rift between Admiral and Duncan, whom she felt had betrayed her. When he asked to stay at her loft, as he’d often done, Virginia threw him out [3] [9] [13].
In her diary entries for June 1941, Nin describes an argument, lasting several hours, that Robert and Virginia had over Robert Duncan. Nin describes how De Niro felt “shocked” and “looked haunted” when he realized that their neighbours had heard the entire argument through the thin walls, and now knew of his secret life. In December 1941, De Niro and Admiral married. In 1943, Robert De Niro junior was born. The couple separated shortly thereafter, and divorced in 1945.
“All of us need money, so we pool our stories,” wrote Nin. “I could not turn them out fast enough, so I inserted some of Robert [Duncan]’s, some of Virginia’s, some of George Baker’s” [8]. Though not a writer, even De Niro was offered a chance to make an easy buck. "It was very hard work," De Niro later recalled, "so eventually I went back to the fishery" [3].
De Niro continued to work for the cannery, but Virginia got herself a female roommate to share an artist’s loft on 14th Street in New York. Nin describes the flat in her diary: above some shops, cold, with high ceilings and large windows, canvases everywhere and nails on walls to use as coat-hangers [11]. By the end of 1940, Anais Nin became a regular visitor for Virginia. “Virginia tells me she is enriched and liberated by our talks,” writes Nin. “[S]he becomes identified with me, repeating my imprisonment in bourgeois life, my liberation through Henry and June.” [8]
By the end of 1940, Robert came to live in the New York loft. But sexual intrigue threatened to ruin things. It was Virginia’s good friend, Robert Duncan, who would prove to be the catalyst. Duncan, a gay man who turned to hustling during this period [12], seduced De Niro, who was beginning his own journey of bisexual exploration [3] [9]. The incident created a rift between Admiral and Duncan, whom she felt had betrayed her. When he asked to stay at her loft, as he’d often done, Virginia threw him out [3] [9] [13].
In her diary entries for June 1941, Nin describes an argument, lasting several hours, that Robert and Virginia had over Robert Duncan. Nin describes how De Niro felt “shocked” and “looked haunted” when he realized that their neighbours had heard the entire argument through the thin walls, and now knew of his secret life. In December 1941, De Niro and Admiral married. In 1943, Robert De Niro junior was born. The couple separated shortly thereafter, and divorced in 1945.
.jpg)
Above: Robert De Niro Jr (at right) with his father, Robert Sr., and his mother, Virginia Admiral, in 1992. Photograph © Estate of R
obert De Niro Sr., 2009/Ameringer-Yohe Fine Art. SOURCE.
As I stated at the beginning, the De Niro-Miller link is tenuous, but the stronger connection with Nin certainly implies that Miller was or could have been familiar with them. Read more about the bohemian lives of Robert De Niro Jr’s parents in these articles by John Baxter and Christopher Turner. (more details on De Niro Sr's professionl life here).
As a final note of trivia, actor Robert De Niro, in Cape Fear, uses Henry Miller as a means to seduce the character played by Juliette Lewis. [script at Drew's Script-O-Rama].
As a final note of trivia, actor Robert De Niro, in Cape Fear, uses Henry Miller as a means to seduce the character played by Juliette Lewis. [script at Drew's Script-O-Rama].
____________________
REFERENCES
[1] IMDB; [2] Marin, Jay. Always Merry and Bright: The Life of Henry Miller, p.397; [3] Turner, Christopher. “The bohemian life of Robert De Niro, senior”: Telegraph, 11:28PM GMT 19 Mar 2009; [4] Christensen, Paul. "Robert Duncan's Life and Career." American National Biography. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999 -- sourced at Modern American Poetry; [5] Robert Edward Duncan, Robert J. Bertholf, Albert Gelpi. The letters of Robert Duncan and Denise Levertov, p. 791; [6] Nin, Anais. The Diary of Anais Nin 1934-1939, p. 274; [7] New York Times. "Virginia Admiral, 85, Painter and Writer." New York Times, August 15, 2000: online; [8] Mark Borghi Fine Art . "Robert De Niro, Sr. (1922 - 1993)." Online; [9] Baxter, John. "In the Name of the Father." Excerpt from Baxter's De Niro, in The Sun-Herald: Sept. 26, 2002 - online; [10] For an online overview, see Stephen J Gertz' "The Celebrated Stable of Erotica Writers: Part II"; [11] See Nin's published journals, Vol. 3 - "December 1940"; [12] Duncan, Robert. Caesar's Gate, 1972 - p. xxix, xxxii. Online source; [13] Nin, Anais - "June 1941".
posted by RC at 7:20 PM
6 Comments:
Good notes on DeNiro/Nin, RC.
I just received NEXUS 7 in the mail, and I was pleased to see your post/essay about the lonely grave of June Corbett.
Next time in Arizona (perhaps after they change their "give me your papers" laws), I will visit two places - the Canyon de Chelly, and that grave...
Robert De Niro Sr is mentioned in the New York Scenes section of Kerouac's The Lonesome Traveler as someone you could visit and discuss his painting with, were you hanging around the Village, looking for something to do in the early 50s.
Robert de Niro is probably Jack Nicholson and with the best actor alive today and, undoubtedly, one of the best actors in history.
However, the screening of his latest films serve us well to know the quality of cinema. And frankly, in recent work of De Niro only highlights his own interpretation.
The problem with De Niro is inherent in contemporary cinema: the films that are made with a few exceptions lately with scripts are lousy kindergarten, and of course, the papers give De Niro are in line with the overall quality
Today there is a great lack of good scripts in the world of the cinema, which does that big actors choose for very slightly elaborated papers.
Of Niro it has not lost endowments as actor, which has lost they are movies good where to act, lately they are almost all a few americanadas that do not cost for anything.
Post a Comment
<< Home