Italy offers Robert De Niro citizenship
| quote: | ROME - Italy plans to grant Robert De Niro (news) honorary citizenship, rejecting opposition from an Italian-American organization that says the actor has projected a bad image with numerous roles as an Italian thug, the Culture Ministry said Friday.
Culture Minister Giuliano Urbani still wants to grant De Niro honorary citizenship during the Venice Film Festival in September, where he is expected to promote his voice-over role in cartoon movie "Shark Tale," press official Tiziana Benini said.
The Order Sons of Italy in America (OSIA) wrote a letter to Premier Silvio Berlusconi earlier this week, urging him to cancel the planned honor. "De Niro has made a career of playing gangsters of Italian descent," the organization said in a statement.
The letter to Berlusconi argued: "He has done nothing to promote Italian culture in the United States. Instead, OSIA and its members hold him and his movies responsible for considerably damaging the collective reputations of both Italians and Italian Americans."
De Niro, whose paternal grandparents Giovanni and Angelina were born in Italy, has played a wide range of roles that critics often say make him one of America's greatest actors. Many of his most famous films have dealt with the Mafia, violence and criminality, including "The Godfather, Part II" (1974), "Taxi Driver" (1976); "Raging Bull" (1980); and "Goodfellas" (1990).
Berlusconi's office had no immediate comment.
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Source: Yahoo news
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