Introduction
Director Francis Ford Coppola recently revealed that The Godfather will be celebrating its 50th anniversary by coming back to theaters in 2022. The theatrical release will be a new 4K remaster. The latest restoration will further enhance the sound and image quality of one of the great films in cinema history. Coppola revealed this news during the Paramount panel at CCXP Worlds 2021 back in December.
The Godfather had its worldwide release in New York City on March 14, 1972. Beginning on February 25th, the 50th-anniversary rerelease will hit theaters. In anticipation of this upcoming release, Cinema Scholars celebrates the 50th anniversary of this modern classic. In this two-part series, we take a deep dive into this genre-defining film, including casting, pre-production, filming, post-production, release, and the film’s legacy.
Beginnings
The Godfather is widely seen as one of the greatest American films ever made. Directed by Academy-Award-winning director Francis Ford Coppola. The film is the triumphant zenith of the New Hollywood filmmaking movement. Beginning in the 1960s, the movement produced such masterpieces as Cool Hand Luke (1967), Midnight Cowboy (1969), and Five Easy Pieces (1970).
Coppola’s crime classic went on to earn an astounding 11 Academy Award nominations. The film won seven, including Best Picture, and Best Actor for star Marlon Brando. For Coppola to get to this point, however, was a daunting task. The journey started with journalist, literary agent, and film producer, Peter Bart.
In 1967, Bart was the Vice-President in charge of Production at Paramount Pictures. The young studio executive had recently read an unfinished manuscript by author Mario Puzo, entitled Mafia. Puzo was an insatiable gambler and needed to pay off his debts. As a result, the author optioned the rights to the 60-page treatment to Bart. For this, Paramount paid Puzo the meager sum of $12,500.
The deal was made – to the objection of Puzo’s literary agent. However, as a bonus, an additional $80,000 would be awarded to Puzo upon the completion of the novel and subsequent motion picture. Soon after, the treatment is retitled The Godfather and released in 1969. Puzo’s novel becomes a worldwide sensation and a New York Times best-seller for 67 weeks.
Robert Evans
In 1956, 26-year-old Robert Evans was sitting poolside at the Beverley Hills Hotel when he caught the eye of actress Norma Shearer. The screen legend thought that the tan and attractive Evans would be perfect to play the role of her late husband, Irving Thalberg in the Lon Chaney biopic film Man of a Thousand Faces (1957).
By 1962, Evans was struggling and felt that he didn’t have the talent to truly succeed as an actor in Hollywood. As a result, he transitioned from acting into film production. He would go on to purchase the rights to the 1966 novel The Detective. Written by Roderick Thorp, Evans turned this into a successful film starring Frank Sinatra, Lee Remick, and Robert Duvall. The New York City native with the baritone voice was on his way.
Peter Bart, a writer for The New York Times, noticed Evans. He wrote an article about his keen production skills and flamboyant style. Charles Bluhdorn, head of Gulf & Western, read the article and made Evans the production VP of Paramount Pictures, which was owned by Gulf & Western. Evans immediately hired Bart as a scout for Paramount.
Despite a lack of experience, Evans turned around Paramount Pictures. Starting in 1967, Evans transformed Paramount into one of Hollywood’s most profitable and successful studios. During his tenure, Evans turned out films such as The Odd Couple (1968), Rosemary’s Baby (1968), Serpico (1973), Chinatown (1974), and many others.
Robert Evans, who passed away in 2019 at the age of 89, reflected in 1994 to Terry Gross on the Fresh Air radio show about snatching up the rights to The Godfather, and the constant struggle to get the film made:
“Anything about The Organization, as it was called before the Mafia…there had never been one successful film made about the Mafia before that…they wanted me to sell it, and I refused…We found the reason why there had been no successful Mafia films – because they had been made by Jews and not Italians…It must have been because we had made one two years before with Kirk Douglas…written and directed and produced by Jewish people…there’s a difference – a thin line between a Jew and a Sicilian…I felt that made the difference. That’s why we gave Francis Coppola his assignment to do it”
Francis Ford Coppola
Director Francis Ford Coppola had already won an Oscar for co-writing the screenplay for Patton (1970). However, the 29-year-old founding member of the New Hollywood movement had very little juice amongst the Hollywood elite and was broke. Evans however, wanted the adaptation of Puzo’s novel to be “ethnic to the core.” He also wanted it directed by an Italian. This would put Coppola in the running.
Sergio Leone was Paramount’s first choice to direct The Godfather. However, Leone turned down the offer so that he could focus on his own epic crime film, Once A Time In America, eventually released in 1984. Peter Yates, Arthur Penn, Otto Preminger, and the late Peter Bogdonovich had all been offered the director’s chair by Paramount. All of them had declined.
When the offer was finally sent to Coppola to direct The Godfather, the Oscar-winner was initially hesitant. In a Deadline interview back in December 2020, Coppola stated that he was “not impressed” with Puzo’s novel and turned down the job offer. Coppola reflected:
“I didn’t know who he was and I didn’t read his other books…When I saw the book’s ad, Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, with that puppet. I thought that it was going to be some intellectual Italian author’s novel on the dimensions of power. I was interested. When I realized it was just this sort of potboiler from some American guy, I dismissed it. It’s only when I met Mario. He was this wonderful, familiar kind of uncle, real and funny – that I became so attached to him“
Eventually, Coppola agreed to take on the project and was paid $125,000, as well as receiving six percent of the film’s profits. As pre-production and casting for The Godfather began, so too would the nightmare for Coppola. The director tried to sustain creative and artistic control, as his decisions were challenged and rejected at almost every turn.
Al Pacino
In 1971, Al Pacino was a little-known New York stage actor. The actor only had a couple of film roles to his credit. The Panic in Needle Park (1971), was well-received but performed poorly at the box office. Coppola knew Pacino’s work and liked the fact that he looked Italian. Because of this, Coppola was lobbying for Al Pacino to portray the film’s lead, Michael Corleone.
Evans thought that Pacino was too short and inexperienced. The actor also had screen-tested for the role three times and it hadn’t gone well. Evans was pushing for Ryan O’Neal (Love Story), an Irish-American, to portray Michael Corleone. The studio also screen-tested James Caan and Martin Sheen.
Robert Redford was offered the role and Warren Beatty was given the chance to portray Michael, as well as direct the film. They both turned it down. Jack Nicholson and Dustin Hoffman also said no and even David Carradine and Tommy Lee Jones were considered. Coppola eventually convinced Evans to at least speak to Pacino’s agent. Evans did and the agent quickly turned down the offer.
Kerkorian, Evans, and the Mob
Al Pacino declined the offer because of a scheduling conflict in MGM’s The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight (1971), which was in pre-production. Las Vegas hotel magnate Kirk Kerkorian owned MGM at the time. He was a Hollywood hotshot, and apparently had ties to organized crime. As Evans told it, he asked reputed Mafia attorney, and friend, Sidney Korshak to help with negotiations.
Evans was not a man who liked hearing the word “no.” The producer wanted Pacino freed up and made available to Paramount Pictures if he decided to go that route. James Aubrey ran MGM and worked under Kerkorian. The executive was a loud and foul-mouthed man. The negotiations with Korshak and Aubrey took under 30 minutes. Later on, Aubrey called Evans on the phone, cursing him out.
Sometime later, Evans spoke to Korshak. He asked him what he had said to Aubrey that had so quickly convinced Kerkorian to change his mind and release Pacino to Paramount. Korshak responded that he told Aubrey that if Kerkorian wanted to finish building his hotel, he would let Pacino out. An offer Kerkorian couldn’t refuse.
Marlon Brando
Mario Puzo always liked the idea of having screen and stage legend Marlon Brando portray Don Vito Corleone, patriarch of the Corleone crime family. Puzo even went on record stating it was his idea in the first place. He had written Brando a letter asking him to take the part. Coppola, in a 1996 NPR interview, clarified the situation:
“Well, it’s true that Mario had always liked the idea of Brando. But, you know, Mario was often Bay Shore. He was not really on the scene so much…a lot of my work with him was my sending him drafts and him writing notes. So although he had posed the idea of the godfather being Brando…I don’t even know if he told me that ’cause I just was hit by a whole bunch of ideas from the studio. Danny Thomas was one, Ernest Borgnine – it was a whole bunch of ideas. Even Carlo Ponti was suggested”
Paramount was against casting Marlon Brando from the beginning. The studio felt that Brando was difficult to work with and would cause production delays and increased costs. Coppola was told by Paramount that Brando would never appear in the film. Other actors that were considered to play Don Vito included Burt Lancaster, Laurence Olivier, Ernest Borgnine, and Anthony Quinn, among others.
Improv Session
After some over dramatics by Coppola, Evans and Paramount relented and agreed to consider the casting of Brando, under the following conditions: Brando agreed to do the movie for free. The actor agreed to perform an on-camera screen-test; and that Brando personally put up a million-dollar bond. This was to offset any misbehavior or production delays that the eccentric actor might cause. Coppola accepted.
The director even convinced Brando to perform a screen-test under the guise of an “improv session” at Brando’s house. This was to see how the handsome 47 year old with long flowing blond hair could transform himself into the aging Don Vito. At Brando’s house early one morning, Coppola set up cameras and laid out a bunch of props such as Italian sausage, little Italian cigars, provolone, for instance. Coppola would later state:
“And then the door opened…and out came this beautiful man in a Japanese robe with flowing, blond hair…he didn’t talk very much…Marlon was a brilliant man. And he just knew what was going on instantly. I remember he came, and he took his hair…he rolled it up and made it sort of like a bun in the back…then he took shoe polish…he was mumbling the whole time. And he made the shoe polish and made his hair black…then he put on the shirt that I had brought…I remember him folding the lapel. Those guys always – the lapel is always folded…right in front of my eyes…then he said, oh, he’s shot in the throat in the story…so he should talk like this – you know, his throat…he started doing that…right in front of my eyes, he transformed himself into this character. And I couldn’t believe it…it was quite remarkable”
Paramount studio heads wanted the role of Don Corleone to go to TV icon and Hollywood powerhouse Danny Thomas. The hope was that Thomas would have his own production company kick in on the films rising budget. Thomas, who was no dummy, declined the role, urging the studio to cast Brando after Thomas had seen the screen test. Eventually, Bludhorn, after viewing the screentest, was won over. As a result, the role was Brando’s.
Rounding Out The Cast
Coppola always wanted veteran actor and friend Robert Duvall to play the part of Corleone consigliere, attorney, and unofficial adopted family member, Tom Hagen. After screen testing and considering other actors that included Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Anthony Perkins, Duvall was finally given the part.
Coppola had cast Diane Keaton as Kay Adams, Michael’s girlfriend, and eventual wife. This was after the director noticed her in Lovers and Other Strangers (1970). Coppola liked her eccentric style of acting. It also helped that Keaton and Pacino had chemistry both on and off the screen.
Paramount had wanted James Caan for The Godfather and had the actor audition for the role of Michael. Carmine Daridi landed the role of hot-headed older brother Santino “Sonny” Corleone. Evans, however, preferred Caan. The 6’4″ Caridi is significantly taller than Al Pacino, with whom he would share the screen. Caan was seven inches shorter than Caridi and as a result, got the part of Sonny.
In 1971, casting director Fred Roos had noticed veteran stage actor John Cazale and recommended him to Coppola. Roos thought that Cazale’s demeanor would translate perfectly for the role of Frederico “Fredo” Corleone. The well-intentioned, yet meek older brother to Pacino’s Michael.
Roos cast Al Martino as Johnny Fontane, popular singer, and godson to Don Vito. Martino was a popular nightclub singer of the day. However, Coppola preferred crooner Vic Damone. He also liked Rat Packer Eddie Fisher for the part. Stripped of the role, Martino went to Russell Bufalino for help. The reputed crime boss was Martino’s real-life godfather. As a result, Damone dropped out. Coppola stated:
“I liked very much Eddie Fisher, although he was not Italian. But I also liked Vic Damone. I had several thoughts. I don’t remember what happened with Eddie Fisher, but Vic Damone politely declined. Vic Damone was known to, you know, know that Frank Sinatra was not so happy about the reference. And, you know, they were afraid”
Cast as Paulie Gatto, made man and chauffeur for Don Vito was Robert De Niro. However, there was an opening in the soon-to-be filming The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight. This was because Al Pacino had been freed from his contract. De Niro auditioned and won the role, dropping out of The Godfather. A sliding doors moment because De Niro would win the Oscar for portraying a young Vito Corleone in The Godfather: Part II (1974).
Coppola gave several roles in The Godfather to members of his family. This included his sister, Talia Shire, playing the role of Connie Corleone, Michael’s abused sister. Coppola’s infant daughter Sofia played Michael Francis Rizzi, the newborn son of Connie and her husband Carlo. Coppola’s mother, wife, and children all appeared as extras in the film. Talia Shire looked back on the role back in 2012:
“I knew my audition was terrific and I was picked by Robert Evans’ office…I used the name “Shire,” not “Coppola,” so they had no idea Francis was my older brother. After I was picked, Francis and I had a long talk, because he was very concerned about the politics…Looking back on it, I realize how hard it was for him to have me on that movie”
To read the second part of this article CLICK HERE.
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