Francis Ford Coppola, the visionary director behind “The Godfather” and “Apocalypse Now,” was named a 2024 Kennedy Center honoree earlier this year, celebrating his lifetime of artistic achievements. Over a career spanning more than half a century, the 85-year-old filmmaker has earned five Oscars, six Golden Globes, two Palme d’Or awards and a BAFTA.
When asked if there is a signature “Coppola style,” the director said, “I think I was always someone even as a 17-year-old, 18-year-old film director who wanted to poeticize the work I did, but then take it to the very brink where if I took it any further, it would fall off the cliff.”
The daring creative philosophy has shaped some of the most influential films in history, including “The Conversation” and “The Godfather” trilogy.
Coppola’s journey began in Detroit, where he was born into an Italian-American family. Raised in Queens, New York, he was heavily influenced by his parents, especially his father Carmine, a flutist for Arturo Toscanini’s NBC Symphony Orchestra. That is where he learned that music and pictures are not always connected.
While in college, Coppola was deeply inspired by Sergei Eisenstein’s silent film “October: 10 Days That Shook the World.”
“It was a silent picture, but they weren’t playing any accompaniment,” he said. “And I was amazed at how the film itself sort of made you think you were hearing it because of the way it was cut. I came out of that experience absolutely bowled over.”
Coppola followed his passion for film to UCLA. “I had no money. I had no car. I had no girlfriend. I had nothing,” he said.
After graduating, Warner Brothers hired him to direct “Finian’s Rainbow,” and in 1970, his screenplay for “Patton” earned him his first Academy Award.
At just 29, Coppola signed on to co-write and direct “The Godfather,” a film that became a cornerstone of modern cinema. “I really was an Italian-American. So although I didn’t know gangsters, I knew that to the detail of what life was like in that kind of household,” he said.
Casting Marlon Brando as Vito Corleone proved challenging. “I was ordered by the head of the studio that I couldn’t even mention Brando,” Coppola said. Eventually, the studio agreed — on three conditions. “He has to do the movie for nothing, no fee; he has to shoot a screen test; he has to put up a million-dollar bond. So, I said, ‘I accept.'”
Brando’s transformation into the character astonished the studio. The studio dropped all conditions after seeing Brando’s screen test, and the rest is history.
“The Godfather” earned Coppola an Oscar nomination for Best Director and a win for Best Adapted Screenplay. He continued his streak with adaptations like “The Outsiders.”
Coppola went on to adapt S.E. Hinton’s “The Outsiders” and “Rumble Fish,” which featured his nephew, Nicolas Cage.
Cage is just one of many members of the Coppola family who have pursued successful careers in the arts. Reflecting on his priorities, Coppola said, “I want my children to be healthy, and I want them to be happy in their work, which they seem to be. I’m now more concerned that there’s going to be an Earth here that’s going to sustain itself.”
Now, as a Kennedy Center honoree, Coppola reflected on how he views himself, saying, “I think of someone who loved his human family — not just my immediate family, but the entire human family. That’s who I am. I am the one who loves everybody.”
The Kennedy Center Honors ceremony, which took place on Dec. 8, 2024, will be broadcast on CBS on Dec. 22.
