Robert De Niro Began ‘Mumbling’ the Osage Language in His Sleep While Making Killers of the Flower Moon (Exclusive)

Robert De Niro takes his work home with him.

In the new issue of PEOPLE, the actor opens up about his commitment to his latest film, Killers of the flower moonwhich tells the shocking true story of the reign of terror in Oklahoma in the 1920s.

De Niro stars as William Hale, a seemingly well-intentioned white man who orchestrates the murders of several Osage natives in order to steal their oil-rich land.

As he has done for decades in movies like Mad bull and Taxi driverDe Niro threw himself into the role.

“When Bob commits, he starts digging in with research, questions about absolutely everything from what the character wears to what he eats for breakfast,” director Martin Scorsese, who has worked with De Niro on 10 feature films, tells PEOPLE. “Search and discovery never end.”

Killers of the Flower Moon.

Melinda Sue Gordon/Apple TV

Flower killers Month A true story: all about the real events that inspired Martin Scorsese’s film

De Niro made an effort to learn the Osage language. “He spent every waking minute trying to get it right,” recalls actress Lily Gladstone.

And sometimes every minute of sleep. “His partner, Tiffany [Chen]he joked that he would start speaking Osage in his sleep,” continues Gladstone, who plays Mollie Burkhart, one of Hale’s targets.

Asked if Chen overheard him, De Niro confirms: “She heard me mumbling. I kept repeating and repeating. I couldn’t get through it [onscreen]. You have to know that.”

Persistence paid off: De Niro’s performance was praised by critics and earned him his eighth acting Oscar nomination (he has another Best Picture producing nomination Irishman), putting him in elite company with only 17 performers in the entire history of Hollywood to have eight or more acting nominations. (Think: Meryl Streep, Katharine Hepburn, Jack Nicholson, Denzel Washington.)

Robert De Niro on the cover of PEOPLE.

Michael Schwartz

Fifty years ago, De Niro learned to speak Sicilian to play the young Vito Corleone The Godfather Part II — and won his first Oscar for the role. But he says learning Osage was “harder.”

Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro star in first trailer for Martin Scorsese’s ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’

“I knew Italian, not personally, I just loved Italian. I had a feeling for it, but there was still a lot of work because he was Sicilian,” he says. “I went to Sicily for a few weeks, I filmed people there.”

Killers of the flower moonwhich was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director (for Scorsese), Best Actress (for Gladstone) and Best Supporting Actor (for De Niro), is now streaming on Apple TV+.

Find out more about Robert De Niro in the new issue PEOPLE.

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Source: HIS Education