Robert De Niro is gushing about being a dad to a baby girl again.
The 80-year-old Oscar winner, who welcomed his 9-month-old daughter, Gia, with girlfriend Tiffany Chen in April 2023, got emotional when he opened up AARP The Magazine February/March 2024 about parenting his little girl.
"It's great," De Niro said about being a parent again at 80.
“Everything that I’m consumed with or worried about just goes away when I look at her. It’s wondrous," he continued.
Everything that I’m consumed with or worried about just goes away when I look at her."
“When she gets older — who knows? But that very sweet way she has of looking at you, taking you in, thinking and watching and observing ..." added the actor, growing teary-eyed.
The "Killers of the Flower Moon" star, who is dad to seven children, doesn’t sugarcoat how tough it is to be a dad.
“It doesn’t get easier,” he told The Guardian on Oct. 15, 2023. “It is what it is. It’s OK. I mean, I don’t do the heavy lifting.”
The Hollywood legend, who was 28 when became a dad for the first time in 1971, said Chen is a far more hands-on parent than he is. “I’m there, I support my girlfriend,” the actor explained. “But she does the work. And we have help, which is so important.”
De Niro told the publication that he enjoys “all” aspects of fatherhood.
“With a baby it’s different to with my 11-year-old. My adult children. My grandchildren. It’s all different,” he shared.
His "it is what it is" statement echoes a famous line of De Niro's in the 2019 Martin Scorsese film "The Irishman," in which his hitman character says "It's what it is" as lightly veiled threat of murder.
De Niro has been married twice.
He shares daughter Drena and son Raphael with his first wife, Diahnne Abbott, to whom he was married from 1976 to 1988. In 1997, De Niro tied the knot with his second wife, Grace Hightower. They welcomed two children, Elliot and Helen, and divorced in 2018.
De Niro shares his other kids — Julian, Aaron and Gia — with two women he dated.
The father of seven told TODAY's Hoda Kotb in June 2023 that he's learned a lot from his kids.
“Well, I have certain awareness,” he said. “When you’re older, you have awareness of certain things in life, dynamics, everything, family dynamics. It’s just, you can’t avoid learning some things, and then how you can deal with those, manage them."
Read on to learn more about De Niro's kids.
Drena De Niro
In 1976, De Niro adopted his first wife’s daughter, Drena De Niro, according to IMDb.
Drena De Niro spoke about her famous family, and her upbringing in the public eye, in an interview with Avenue in 2011.
“I came from a really creative bunch of people. My grandparents were painters, my mother (Diahnne Abbott) is a great actress. So, to me, I didn’t really see things the way the public saw stuff. It was just a group of wonderfully crazy, talented people who love each other, and who are doing the best they can," she said.
Drena De Niro has made a name for herself in Hollywood as an actor and model. She played Paulette Stone in "A Star Is Born," Anita in "When They See Us," and Cindy in "Joy."
Her son, Leandro De Niro Rodriguez, died in 2023.
Raphael De Niro
In 1976, De Niro and Abbott welcomed their son, Raphael Eugene De Niro. Raphael De Niro works as a broker at the New York City real estate firm Douglas Elliman, per the firm's website, where he founded the De Niro team.
Raphael De Niro married his first wife, Claudine De Niro, in 2008, according to People. He remarried in 2020, wedding Hannah Carnes De Niro, the New York Post reported.
Julian Henry and Aaron Kendrick De Niro
Following his divorce from Abbott, De Niro was linked to former model, actor and restauranteur Toukie Smith (he gets a mention in her New Yorker profile). Their twin sons, Julian and Aaron De Niro, were born in 1995.
An actor, Julian De Niro played a young Barack Obama in "The First Lady."
Elliot De Niro
In 1998, De Niro welcomed his son Elliot De Niro with his second wife, Grace Hightower.
At the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival, De Niro revealed his son has autism, according to People.
“Grace and I have a child with autism and we believe it is critical that all of the issues surrounding the causes of autism be openly discussed and examined,” De Niro said.
De Niro told ESPN in 2019 that he decided to put Elliot in tennis lessons. Although De Niro said his son "wasn’t crazy about it, at times,” he said that Elliot really came into the sport and started to love it over time.
“His mother was good at pushing (him), and wanting him to be physical and work out,” De Niro shared.
“He has realized, ‘Oh, I can accomplish this. I can do this,'" Hightower added. "It has helped him socially."
Helen Grace De Niro
In 2011, De Niro and Hightower welcomed their daughter, Helen.
The couple split in 2018. “Grace and I have two beautiful children together. We are entering a period of transition in our relationship which is a difficult but constructive process,” De Niro said in a statement at the time, according to People. “I honor Grace as a wonderful mother and ask for privacy and respect from all as we proceed to develop our roles as partners in parenting.”
Gia Virginia Chen-De Niro
Gia is De Niro’s youngest child, welcomed in April 2023 with girlfriend Tiffany Chen. But like most of his other kids, Gia has been kept out of the public eye.
In fact, De Niro’s fans didn’t even know that he had a seventh child until the actor told ET Canada that he was in fact, a dad of seven.
“Seven, actually. I just had a baby,” he said.
During a June appearance on TODAY, De Niro talked about his life at home with Gia and said he's been "very happy" with how things have been going so far, and added that Gia has been sleeping "great."
CORRECTION (June 18 7:37 a.m.): A previous version of this story said Julian and Aaron De Niro were born in 2023. They were born in 1995.