Inside Robert De Niro’s Gotham Awards Speech Debacle (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

Robert De Niro? The “Killers of the Flower Moon” actor was gearing up to slam Donald Trump at Monday’s Gotham Awards, but when he took the stage he discovered that the speech he planned to give had been altered at the behest of Apple, the film’s producer.

The company was responding to feedback from the filmmaking team that wanted the actor’s remarks to be centered on the movie, according to a source.

The actor said he had not been informed of the changes, which took out any mention of the former president. De Niro, who was on hand to present “Killers of the Flower Moon” with the Gotham Historical Icon and Creator Tribute, criticized the awards show and Apple. “I don’t feel like thanking them at all for what they did,” he said. “How dare they do that, actually.” A revised version of the speech was delivered to the teleprompter less than ten minutes before the event started, according to sources with knowledge of the show.

A woman who told the teleprompter operator to upload a new speech was overheard identifying herself as an Apple employee. At 6:54 p.m., the teleprompter company was sent an email from two Apple employees with the new text, which omitted explicit references to Trump.