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Any use of this material must clearly credit CNN.

In an interview that aired Monday on CNN International, legendary actor Robert De Niro spoke to Hala Gorani about playing Special Counsel Robert Mueller on “Saturday Night Live,” upcoming projects with Martin Scorsese and David O. Russell and why he would never want to meet President Trump.

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Highlights:

On portraying Bob Mueller on Saturday Night Live

“We were talking about what could I do – what character could I play in all of this, and my wife said what about Mueller? I called Lorne Michaels and I said ‘Lorne, what about playing Mueller?’ I love SNL, so that part of it is always fun to do.”

On speaking out against President Trump

“I know what kind of person this guy is. He’s a New Yorker who I never would want to meet, and now he’s president. The reason I wouldn’t want to meet him is because of the kind of person he is as we all know now – it’s nothing new. It’s disgraceful, but we’ll get past it. It'll be one of those things that'll be like a nightmare that you remember. We'll be five years from now saying, remember all that stuff how terrible it was?  And at least I lived to see the time when this will all pass, like any nightmare.”

On his ninth collaboration with Martin Scorsese, The Irishman

“It started over 11 years ago with a book called ‘I Heard You Paint Houses,’ which is really what the title will be. Everyone refers to it as ‘The Irishman,’ but it really – but that’s the title.  And I think that Marty wants to use that title, which I like better really, though, ‘The Irishman’s’ a good title. It’s very specific about Jimmy Hoffa’s killing -- Al Pacino plays Hoffa, Joe Pesci plays a character named Russell Bufalino, who was a big part of all of this, and the three of us are very close and friends.  And I’m – don’t want to give it away I suppose, but anyway then you’ll see.”

On working in television and his upcoming Netflix project with David O. Russell

“Well many things in television are better – better quality and so on, and I’m working on something with David O. Russell.  We were working on something, but because of the whole Amazon-Weinstein company thing, that got kind of put aside, but we have another big project that we’re working on, and it’ll be, again, a Netflix project and maybe it will be – open in theaters if it feels that’s the way it