Night and the City (1992 film) De Niro's work as "more like a riff on Rupert Pupkin, the goofy talk show fan he played in Scorsese's "The King of Comedy"". Ebert and Howe both agreed, however, that Alan King's performance was fantastic. Owen Gleiberman concurred in his review, but he sided with Ebert regarding De Niro, concluding, "the actor who once seemed the heir to Brando, Clift, and, yes, Widmark — the actor who once got so far inside his roles that he just about detonated the screen — now plays characters who don't seem to have any inner life at all." David Ansen praised the
Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro Scorsese's semi-autobiographical "J. R. trilogy", which also would have included his later film, "Mean Streets". Scorsese had impressed many with the film and made friends with Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and Robert Zemeckis, known as the influential "movie brats" of the 1970s. It was De Palma who introduced Scorsese to the young actor Robert De Niro. De Niro had known De Palma for several years previously, and his first film role in collaboration with De Palma materialized in 1963 at the age of 20, when he appeared in "The Wedding Party". However, the film