Where Is the Cast of “Taxi Driver” Now? Revisit the Martin Scorsese Film as It Turns 50
- - Where Is the Cast of “Taxi Driver” Now? Revisit the Martin Scorsese Film as It Turns 50
Victoria EdelFebruary 11, 2026 at 9:52 PM
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Robert De Niro in 'Taxi Driver'
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1976’s Taxi Driver was one of the most controversial movies of its time. The film, directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Paul Schrader, followed Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle, a disaffected taxi driver whose mental health is crumbling as he works the night shift. It hit theaters Feb. 8, 1976.
Starring alongside De Niro in the drama was Jodie Foster, then 12. Her character, Iris, is being sex trafficked by her boyfriend, and many worried about a preteen starring in such a violent film with a sexual plot.
But Foster, now 63, said on a January episode of Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend that in retrospect, the movie's sexually suggestive scenes were overblown. “They weren't very suggestive,” she said. “I think it was her taking down her shirt to below her shoulders, right? So that's nothing. . . . And I think I was supposed to like undo his fly. That was about it." Still, her 18-year-old sister was her stand-in for some of the scenes.
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The film's cast also included Cybill Shepherd, Albert Brooks, Harvey Keitel and Peter Boyle. It made over $28 million on a budget of less than $2 million, and received four Oscar nominations, including for Best Picture, Best Actor for De Niro and Best Supporting Actress for Foster. In 1994, it was chosen by the Library of Congress for inclusion in the National Film Registry, and it remains a perenial favorite of film fans everywhere.
Ahead, here's where the cast of Taxi Driver is now.
01 of 06
Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle
Robert De Niro in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Robert De Niro in 2025 (right)
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De Niro won an Oscar for 1974’s The Godfather Part II, where he played the younger Vito Corleone. He told PEOPLE after his win, “Producers waving scripts are coming at me from every direction. If I let them, my life would be planned every day from now through 1980. Ultimately, a star becomes a corporation and freedom goes flying."
Instead, he teamed up with Scorsese again for Taxi Driver. Famously, he ad-libbed the movie’s most famous line: "You talkin' to me?" Scorsese told him, “ 'Great, keep going,' " De Niro remembered to PEOPLE in 2017. “Marty always liked something unexpected.”
De Niro and Scorsese have worked together eight more times (so far): for 1977’s New York, New York, 1980’s Raging Bull, 1982’s The King of Comedy, 1990’s Goodfellas, 1991’s Cape Fear, 1995’s Casino, 2019’s The Irishman and 2023’s Killers of the Flower Moon. Raging Bull won him his second Oscar, and he was nominated for his work in Taxi Driver, Cape Fear and Killers of the Flower Moon and as a producer of The Irishman. "I consider myself very lucky to have that long of a relationship with him," De Niro told PEOPLE in 2020 of his bond with the director. "I can't imagine my life without it."
De Niro was also Oscar-nominated for his roles in 1978’s The Deer Hunter, 1990’s Awakenings and 2012’s Silver Linings Playbook.
De Niro’s many other roles include 1984’s Once Upon a Time in America, 1993’s This Boy's Life, 1987’s The Untouchables, 1995’s Heat and 2019’s Joker. He also branched out into comedy, perhaps most notably in the Meet the Parents film series. He also worked as a director, helming 1993’s A Bronx Tale and 2006’s The Good Shepherd, both of which he also starred in. He told PEOPLE of his career in 2020, "Happiness is doing what you love to do."
His many accolades include a 2009 Kennedy Center Honor, a 2016 Presidential Medal of Freedom, the 2019 Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, and the Honorary Palme d'Or in 2025. De Niro also cofounded New York City's Tribeca Film Festival in 2002 after the Sept. 11 attacks.
De Niro has seven children. He and Diahnne Abbott, his wife from 1976 to 1988, welcomed daughter Drena and son Raphael. He welcomed twins Julian and Airyn with model Toukie Smith. With his second wife, Grace Hightower, he welcomed Elliot and Helen. De Niro and Hightower were together from 1997 until their 2018 separation. In 2023, he and girlfriend Tiffany Chen welcomed daughter Gia.
02 of 06
Jodie Foster as Iris Steensma
Jodie Foster in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Jodie Foster in 2025
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Jodie Foster was also reuniting with Scorsese in Taxi Driver, having appeared in his 1974 film Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. In Taxi Driver, Foster’s Iris was a 12-year-old sex worker, pimped by her boyfriend, who De Niro’s Bickle tries, in his own way, to help. The movie earned Foster her first Oscar nomination.
Other early career movies for Foster included 1976’s Bugsy Malone and The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane and 1980’s Carny and Foxes. But after a career as a child star that began in commercials at age 3, she turned her back on the bright lights of Hollywood to attend Yale University. Paying for college is "what I worked for," she told PEOPLE in 1980. "And I think working is one of the best educations you can have."
While a freshman, Foster was stalked by John Hinckley Jr. In the spring of 1981, he tried to assassinate President Ronald Reagan, claiming he wanted to impress Foster. In 2024, Foster made rare comments about the incident in a conversation for Interview Magazine, calling it “a traumatic moment.”
She appeared in a few films while she was in college and graduated in 1985. 1987’s Five Corners earned her an Independent Spirit Award. 1988’s The Accused was her breakthrough role as an adult and won her an Oscar.
She won her second Oscar for 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs, playing FBI trainee Clarice Starling. She told PEOPLE in 1991 of the now-iconic character that Clarice ''is not a male, Rambo-like superhero rewritten for a woman. She's not a victim or a crying mom, the usual stuff offered to actresses. She's a real, developed person put in a situation where she has to use her mind to combat evil.''
Foster also received Oscar nominations for 1994’s Nell and 2023’s Nyad. Other film roles have included 2006’s Inside Man, 2021’s The Mauritanian and 2025’s A Private Life. In 2024, she starred in the fourth season of True Detective, winning an Emmy award.
Foster also began directing with 1991’s Little Man Tate. She told PEOPLE at the time that directing “is where I feel sanest and healthiest. That doesn't mean I'm always Miss Cheerful. I just enjoy being the benevolent leader who is also one of the people.''
From 1993 until 2008, Foster was in a relationship with producer Cydney Bernard. They welcomed sons Charlie and Kit in 1998 and 2001, respectively. In 2014, Foster married actress and photographer Alexandra Hedison.
03 of 06
Cybill Shepherd as Betsy
Cybill Shepherd in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Cybill Shepherd in 2024 (right)
HBO Max; David Crotty/Getty
Shepherd played Betsy, a campaign worker Bickle becomes obsessed with and tries to date. She told Los Angeles Magazine in 2023 about how she was cast in the part, “[My agent] Sue Mengers said, ‘When you go to meet them, just shut up and don’t talk and you’ll probably get the part.’ … I got the part by shutting up.”
Her major breakout came in 1985, when she was cast opposite Bruce Willis in Moonlighting. She played Maddie, a former fashion model who owns a detective agency, and Willis played David, a detective who always has a smart retort. The series won her two Golden Globes. Moonlighting became a runaway success, though things were famously tense behind the scenes. It ended in 1989.
''They made Maddie an unreasonable, hysterical woman,'' Shepherd told PEOPLE in 1990, ''because Bruce Willis didn't want to play a jerk anymore. He was too smart and too successful. So where are you going to get the conflict? From Maddie.'' She said she was relieved when the show was canceled, though she still said it “was the part and break of a lifetime.'' She told PEOPLE in 2025 that she did ultimately mend fences with Willis.
In 1989, Shepherd starred in Chances Are with Robert Downey Jr. She told PEOPLE at the time, “'I didn't do a movie for years because there wasn't anything worth doing, but I liked this because it involves an older woman and a younger man. It's good to encourage that type of thing for young men's sake. In this movie, I fool around with a younger man, and that's always fun.''
She starred in 1990’s Texasville, the sequel to The Last Picture Show, which she had starred in back in 1971.
Shepherd won a third Golden Globe for her eponymous series Cybill, which ran from 1995 to 1998. Other TV roles included parts on The L Word, Psych, The Client List and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. She also has performed as a cabaret singer.
From 1978 to 1982, she was married to David M. Ford. They welcomed daughter Clementine in 1979; she appeared on The L Word alongside her mother.
From 1987 to 1990, she was married to Bruce Oppenheim. They welcomed twins Molly Ariel and Cyrus Zachariah Shepherd-Oppenheim.
04 of 06
Harvey Keitel as Matthew "Sport" Higgins
Harvey Keitel in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Harvey Keitel in 2024 (right)
THA/Shutterstock; Daniele Venturelli/Getty
Keitel played Matthew "Sport" Higgins, Iris’ pimp. Keitel is another frequent Scorsese collaboratgor, having appeared in 1967’s Who's That Knocking at My Door, 1973’s Mean Streets and 1974’s Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore before Taxi Driver. He teamed up with the director twice more, on 1988’s The Last Temptation of Christ and 2019’s The Irishman.
Keitel also appeared in Quentin Tarantino 1992 film Reservoir Dogs and 1994 film Pulp Fiction and in three Wes Anderson movies: 2012’s Moonrise Kingdom, 2014’s The Grand Budapest Hotel and 2018’s Isle of Dogs. Other roles include 1991’s Thelma & Louise, 1991’s Bugsy (which earned him an Oscar nod), 1993’s The Piano and 2004’s National Treasure. He also starred in the 2024 TV series The Tattooist of Auschwitz.
Keitel was in a relationship with actress Loraine Bracco from 1982 to 1993. They share daughter Stella, born in 1985. In 2001, he and Lisa Marie Karmazin welcomed son Hudson. In 2001, he married Daphna Kastner. They welcomed son Roman in 2004.
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Albert Brooks as Tom
Albert Brooks in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Albert Brooks in 2025 (right)
HBO Max; Michael Buckner/Variety via Getty
Brooks played Tom, who, like Bickle, also wants to date Shepherd’s Betsy. Taxi Driver was his film debut, and the actor and writer (who was born Albert Einstein) had already established himself as a comedic voice on TV, including contributing short films to a then-new Saturday Night Live.
In 1979, he directed Real Life, in which he played himself as a director who’s trying to make an Oscar-worthy movie about a typical family.
In the ‘80s and ‘90s, he appeared in more movies directed by other people, perhaps most famously in 1987’s Broadcast News, which earned him an Oscar nomination. Movies he directed (and starred in) included 1981’s Modern Romance, 1985’s Lost in America, 1991’s Defending Your Life and 1996’s Mother, which co-starred Debbie Reynolds, mom of his friend Carrie Fisher. She told PEOPLE in 1997 that he gave her the role after having her read one scene. “I said, 'Albert, you shouldn't take me on just one scene. Shouldn't I read two?' And he said, 'See,you're bossing me around already,’ ” she remembered.
Brooks also voiced Nemo’s dad Marlin in the Finding Nemo films and received acclaim for his role in 2011’s Drive.
Brooks married Kimberly Shlain in 1997. They share two children, Jacob and Claire.
06 of 06
Peter Boyle as "Wizard"
Peter Boyle in 'Taxi Driver' (left); Peter Boyle in 2006 (right)
HBO Max; Scott Rudd/Patrick McMullan via Getty
Boyle played Wizard, another taxi driver, int he film. Boyle worked widely as a character actor beginning in the late ‘60s, appearing in films including 1972’s The Candidate, 1974’s Young Frankenstein (which he told PEOPLE in 1999 was "the highlight of my career"), 1992’s Malcolm X, 1995’s While You Were Sleeping and 2001’s Monster's Ball. He also won an Emmy for a guest role on The X-Files.
He found fame thanks to his role as Frank on Everybody Loves Raymond, which premiered in 1996. "He's like my own father," Ray Romano, whose life formed the basis for the series, told PEOPLE of the actor in 1999. The series earned Boyle seven Emmy nominations.
When the show ended in 2005, Boyle told PEOPLE of how he was spending his time: “I'm enjoying life, reading scripts, going to the theater in New York and missing the Raymond show.”
While making Young Frankenstein, he met journalist Loraine Alterman. They married in 1977, and John Lennon was his best man. They welcomed daughters Lucy and Amy.
Boyle died in 2006 at age 71 from multiple myeloma and heart disease. Romano told PEOPLE in 2019 that since his death, he had hosted an annual fundraiser to raise money for myeloma, at the request of Boyle’s wife Loraine.
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