Robert de Niro is after Filipino food, not film

Hollywood actor Robert de Niro confessed that Philippine food rather than filmmaking in the Philippines is the priority for him now that he is a new owner of a top brand hotel there.

“I really want to taste the food of the country that I’m in,” said De Niro on Monday, at the opening of Nobu Hotel, one of major leisure brands at the City of Dreams Manila, a conglomerate of entertainment and gaming resort that sits on a 6.2 hectare property in Metro Manila’s Paranaque City.

De Niro’s delight in food reflects the enthusiasm of his partner in Nobu Hotel — gourmet and world-renowned Japanese chef Nobu Matsushita. His colleague in film-land, Hollywood producer Meir Teper, is also a Nobu owner.

The 321-room hotel within the bayside casino and entertainment City of Dreams complex opened Monday to the beat of traditional drums and shower of gold and silver confetti.

The Hollywood icon and his Nobu Hospitality partners Matsuhisa and Teper led the ribbon cutting with Australian billionaire James Packer and Macau tycoon Lawrence Ho, co-chairmen of the complex operator Melco Crown Entertainment.

De Niro says he is not only lending his name to the project but is personally involved in it.

Eight other Nobu Hotels are set to open within two years, including one in Saudi Arabia.

The award-winning-actor-turned-hotel owner was tentative when asked if he would also opt to shoot a film in the Philippines, saying, “there’s nothing [film project] as of now. But of course, I would stay here and film a move in the Philippines.”

Ho and Packer’s Melco Crown Entertainment and Philippines’ SM Group’s Belle Corporation developed the City of Dreams, which opened in early February.

It will house a chain of other top ranking entertainment and leisure brands such as Crown, Dreamworks, Hyatt, and the Pangaea Group.

With inputs from AP