Drena De Niro trusts her mother’s intuition.
The actress remembers feeling “completely in pain, but I didn’t know why” on the morning of July 2, 2023.
“I woke up and I was a physical mess. I couldn’t concentrate…I was so excited,” she told Page Six in an exclusive interview from her Tribeca home.
Drena, whose father is actor Robert De Niro, felt so nervous that she decided to lie down while calming music was played. “And then the doorbell rang.”
It was an NYPD detective who came to tell her that her only child, Leandro De Niro Rodriguez, had died of a drug overdose just shy of his 20th birthday.
“The whole world I knew came crashing down as this detective stood there,” Drena said.
She added of the officers who had to tell her that she had lost her only child. “I can’t think of a salary that would earn me that…I have to do it because I’m worried.”
Leandro’s body was found that afternoon in his apartment in the financial district, sitting in a chair, with a white powdery substance and drug paraphernalia nearby.
It was later confirmed that he died of an accidental fentanyl overdose.
Five suspected drug dealers who sold fentanyl-laced opioid pills and killed three people last month, including Akira Stein, 19, the daughter of Leandro and Blondie guitarist Chris Stein, were arrested on federal charges.
Sophia Haley Marks, 20, an alleged drug trafficker known as “Percocet Princess,” was separately charged with selling Leandro the pills he overdosed on.
Drena said the arrest was “really strange. It’s very bittersweet because I couldn’t be happier.”
“I hope they get some justice. If you’re going to sell drugs to young people, you’re going to take a chance whether you succeed or not, whether you know it or not.”
After a pause, she added: “I have no interest in ruining a 24-year-old’s life.”
She was no stranger to her son’s drug use, and says the terrifying trio of TikTok, the pandemic and fentanyl turned into a deadly tsunami that trapped Leandro.
“He changed so quickly,” Drena said. Before getting hooked on opioids, he said, “He liked to smoke weed, he liked to party and have a good time. But he got messy pretty quickly, and I knew something wasn’t right here, and I knew it had something to do with what he was doing on the Internet.”
Before he died, he was “talking about rehab.” In fact, Leandro had briefly participated in the sport before, but “it took a toll on him.
“That was very sad for me because he needed help,” Drena said. “He knew he was over the edge. I don’t think he even knew why. I think he was unknowingly exposed to stronger drugs.”
Leandro’s death came just two months after Stein died in his family’s downtown apartment. Stein said she took fentanyl-laced pills allegedly purchased from men who sold drugs to her multiple times in the past six months, leading to at least one nonfatal overdose.
Drena, who shared Leandro with ex-partner Carlos Mare Rodriguez, an artist known for his graffiti tag ‘Mare139’, confirmed her son’s death in a heartbreaking Instagram post.
“My beautiful, sweet angel. From the moment I felt you in my belly, I have loved you beyond words and explanations. You are the joy of my heart and all that has ever been pure and real in my life,” she wrote.
Drena went on to say that Leandro was “so deeply loved and appreciated” and that she wished “love alone could have saved you.”
At the time, her famous father released a statement through his representative.
Robert De Niro said, “I am deeply saddened by the passing of my beloved grandson Leo.” “We greatly appreciate everyone’s condolences and ask for privacy as we mourn Leo’s death.”
The Oscar winner adopted Dorina in 1976 after marrying her mother, actress Diane Abbott. The couple had a son, Rafael, but divorced in 1988.
“My father was just a grandfather experience. He was just a pure soul,” Drena said of Leandro.
When asked to explain her deceased son, she lights up.
“He was such a great kid. He was so smart,” she told Page Six. “We were very close because it was the first time in my life that I was able to have an identity that had nothing to do with my father or someone else’s ‘I am this’ identity. All of a sudden you have this relationship in your life with someone who knows the best and the worst in you.”
After Leandro’s death, she said, “I didn’t think he would survive.” She remembers going to his funeral and “just felt like I didn’t want to be alive, and before I knew it, it was all over the media.”
The death of Robert De Niro’s grandson was big news.
“It was really painful, shocking and violating to have his story spread so widely,” Drena said. “Hearing people’s horrible thoughts.
“But part of me was like, ‘He’s not going to make a terrible noise. I’m going to make sure you know who this child is, and I’m going to make sure you know about all the other parents who are losing children.'”
So she founded the Leandro De Niro Rodriguez Foundation to “raise awareness” that fentanyl is a leading cause of drug deaths and “provide love and empathy to young people struggling with addiction and mental health.”
Drena added, “I want you to help other families so they don’t have to know this pain.”
She said with a laugh that she had no idea how to start a foundation, admitting: “It was difficult in this political climate. People didn’t want me to be involved in this field because of my father’s opinions.”
The “Goodfellas” star is a staunch opponent of President Trump. But Drena said she works with parents of all political views and from all socio-economic strata.
Her goal is to “free people from the ‘if you are this, you are against that’ perspective and return us to critical thinking.”
A year and a half after her son’s death, Drena strongly believes that Leandro is watching over and guiding her family.
When he and his father recently had an audience with Pope Leo XIV, he was convinced that Leandro was by his side.
“It was really amazing,” she recalls. “Every time[the pope]came into the room, the thing[the mantilla]that he was told to wear on his head kept falling off.” She was sure Leandro had something to do with it. “He was a very free-spirited, fun-loving kid with a great sense of humor and was always goofing around.
“And of all the popes we will meet, Pope Leo!”
That’s not to say that Drena isn’t plagued by guilt or remorse, but she chooses to move on and find purpose in life after her son’s death.
“You have to find something that will help you achieve your goals, and I truly believe that the kids there are a big part of that.”
If you or someone you love is affected by substance abuse, call SAMHSA’s national helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
