Leandro De Niro Rodríguez, grandson of Robert De Niro, has died at the age of 19.
His mother, Drena De Niro, announced the news in an Instagram post on Monday.
“I don’t know how to live without you but I will try to move on and spread the love and light you gave me so much in becoming your mom,” she wrote. “You were loved and cherished so much and I wish only that love could have saved you.”
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Drena De Niro shared Leandro with artist Carlos Mare, who posted black squares as a caption on his Instagram account.
“I am deeply saddened by the passing of my beloved grandson Leo. We really appreciate everyone’s condolences. We ask that we be given privacy to grieve the loss of Leo,” Robert De Niro said in a statement.
Further details were not initially known. Messages to a Drena De Niro representative were not immediately returned.
In response to a request to verify a TMZ report Leandro was found in a New York apartment The New York Police Department wrote that “an 18-year-old man was found unconscious and unresponsive and was pronounced dead by emergency medical services at the scene” at a Wall Street address where the Cipriani Club Residences is located. Leandro had just turned 19 according to the media.
The coroner will determine the cause of death.
Drena De Niro, 51, is the eldest of Robert De Niro’s seven children. The 79-year-old actor gave birth to a baby boy earlier this year.
The actor adopted Drena when he married her mother, Diahnne Abbott, his first wife. Drena De Niro is also an actress and has appeared in roles on Joy, The Intern, and Mozart in the Jungle, among others.
Leandro was also an actor, with roles in three projects in which his mother also starred: 2005’s The Collection and 2018’s Cabaret Maxime and A Star Is Born. In the Bradley Cooper remake, mother and son played mother and son, wife and son of Dave Chappelle’s character.
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