Robert De Niro stars as retired police detective Pete Willis in Netflix's new horror film The Whisper Man. The 83-year-old Hollywood legend is also a father of seven, a family detail fans may know little about.
In the film, Pete is devastated when his grandson goes missing and his estranged son asks for help. Ten years earlier, he caught the infamous serial killer known as the Whisper Man. With children vanishing again, Pete must face the man he put behind bars to find his grandchild.
De Niro's seven children
De Niro's youngest child, Gia Virginia Chen-De Niro, was born three years ago, shared with his girlfriend Tiffany Chen. Long before Gia, he became a father for the first time with his adopted daughter, actress and model Drena De Niro, in the mid-1970s.
His first biological son, Raphael De Niro, was born in 1976 and now works in New York as a luxury real estate broker. De Niro later had twins with former girlfriend, actress and model Toukie Smith: Julian Henry De Niro, who has pursued acting, and Airyn De Niro, born via a surrogate.
His son Elliot De Niro was born in 1998 and is now a tennis player in the Special Olympics. His daughter Helen Grace De Niro was born in 2011, also through surrogacy.
First wife: Diahnne Abbott
De Niro's first marriage was to actress and singer Diahnne Abbott, mother of his adopted daughter Drena and eldest son Raphael. They met on the set of Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver, where she played a concession stand clerk in a minor role. The couple wed in April 1976, the same year the film premiered, and divorced 12 years later. Abbott is also known for roles in New York, New York, The King of Comedy, and Welcome to LA.
Second wife: Grace Hightower
De Niro met his second wife, Grace Hightower, in 1987 at Mr Chow restaurant in London, where she worked as a hostess. He became a regular patron and stayed in contact with the former flight attendant through the following decade. They married in June 1997 and had children Elliot and Helen Grace. The couple separated in November 2018, completing divorce proceedings over subsequent years after 21 years of marriage.
Girlfriend: Tiffany Chen
De Niro has been in a relationship with world champion martial artist Tiffany Chen since 2021. The 46-year-old first met him on the set of the 2015 film The Intern, where she played his character's tai chi instructor. Asked by CBS Mornings in 2023 about his aptitude for the discipline, she said: "I've had better students, but he was okay. He had a lot of other stuff to do in the movie." She is the mother of his youngest child, Gia.
The Whisper Man is available to watch on Netflix.
