MANHATTAN (CN) — Actor Robert De Niro, known for his roles in “Taxi Driver” and “Goodfellas,” took the stand in federal court Tuesday to address a four-year-old legal battle between him and his former assistant.
De Niro, 80, testified in front of U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman, spending the entire day on the stand.
In 2019, De Niro’s former assistant Graham Chase Robinson sued accusing the “Taxi Driver” actor of harassment and gender discrimination. Two months earlier, De Niro’s company Canal Productions sued Robinson claiming embezzlement.
Robinson, who resigned as De Niro’s executive assistant in 2019 after 11 years, said De Niro treated her like an “office wife,” would make jokes about his Viagra prescription and sometimes urinate while on the phone with her.
De Niro called most of her claims “ridiculous,” but acknowledged he may have called her a “bitch” or a “brat” on some occasions. Tensions then began to escalate when Andrew Macurdy, Robinson’s lawyer, said De Niro would yell at her.
He said there was one time he yelled at Robinson when she failed to wake him up for an event he was scheduled to attend, but insisted it only happened that one time.
“You berated her,” Macurdy said.
“That time I did," De Niro answered. "It wasn’t abusive, I was annoyed."
The tense exchange came to a head when Macurdy asked if De Niro asked Robinson to scratch his back or if he peed during some of their phone calls.
“I was never abusive. Period,” De Niro said, nearly shouting.
De Niro also faced extensive questioning about Canal’s claims that Robinson took liberties in how she spent company money.
According to Canal’s lawsuit, Robinson used company money to pay for groceries, flowers and Uber and taxi rides. Additionally, Canal says Robinson used $125,000 worth of frequent flyer miles without permission or being properly authorized.
De Niro said he allowed Robinson to use the company’s frequent flyer miles for personal travel but trusted it would be “in reason.”
But De Niro said that between January and March 2019, Robinson transferred about 5 million frequent flyer miles to her personal account.
“I wanted her to do it in reason. I didn’t want her to take 5 million miles,” De Niro testified.
When asked why he didn’t impose specific rules for how many frequent flyer miles she was able to withdraw, De Niro repeatedly said it was about trust.
He added that he was fine with her using the miles, if there were enough left for his kids to use.
De Niro also said he thought Robinson took liberties when she used the company card to order food when she worked from home, purchase groceries for work-from-home meals and frequently ordered Ubers and taxis to travel to and from work.
“My personal feeling is she took them all the time, thinking she was an executive and had the right,” De Niro said.
But Macurdy pointed out that other employees at Canal Productions had access to Macurdy’s company American Express card, and pressed De Niro on how he knows she was the one making all of the purchases.
De Niro did not give a direct answer but said his accountant might have missed it.
“I wasn’t looking at those bills. My accountant might have missed that, I don’t know,” De Niro said.
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