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Francis Ford Coppola
Francis Ford Coppola at Cannes 2001
Born	April 7, 1939 (1939-04-07) (age 68) Detroit, Michigan, U.S.
Spouse(s)	Eleanor Jessie Neil (1963-)
Children	Gian-Carlo Coppola (1963-1986) Roman Coppola (b.1965) Sofia Coppola (b.1971)
Parents	Carmine Coppola (1910-1991) Italia Coppola (1912-2004)
Awards Academy Awards Best Original Screenplay 1970 Patton Best Adapted Screenplay 1972 The Godfather 1974 The Godfather Part II Best Director 1974 The Godfather Part II Best Picture 1974 The Godfather Part II BAFTA Awards Best Direction 1979 Apocalypse Now Golden Globe Awards Best Director - Motion Picture 1972 The Godfather 1979 Apocalypse Now Best Screenplay 1972 The Godfather Best Original Score 1979 Apocalypse Now Other Awards NBR Award for Best Director 1974 The Conversation Palme d'Or 1974 The Conversation 1979 Apocalypse Now Saturn Award for Best Direction 1992 Bram Stoker's Dracula Career Golden Lion 1992 Lifetime Achievement

Francis Ford Coppola (born April 7, 1939) is a five-time Academy Award winning American film director, producer, and screenwriter. Coppola is also a vintner, magazine publisher, and hotelier. He earned an M.F.A. in film directing from the UCLA Film School. He is most renowned for directing the highly regarded Godfather trilogy, The Conversation, and the Vietnam War epic Apocalypse Now.

Contents 1 Childhood 2 Family 3 1960s 3.1 Partnership with Roger Corman 4 1970s 4.1 Early 1970s 4.2 The Godfather and The Godfather Part II 4.3 The Conversation 4.4 Apocalypse Now 5 1980s 5.1 Napoléon Restoration and One from the Heart 5.2 The Outsiders 5.3 Captain Eo 6 1990s 6.1 The Godfather Part III 6.2 Zoetrope All Story 7 Career: Present 8 Selected filmography 9 See also 10 Notes 11 External links

Francis Ford Coppola was born to Carmine Coppola (who, at the time, was the first flautist for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra) and his wife, Italia, in Detroit, Michigan on April 7, 1939. He was the second of three children (his sister is actress Talia Shire). Two years later, Carmine became the first flautist for the NBC Symphony Orchestra and the family moved to New York City, finding a home in Woodside, Queens, where Francis spent the remainder of his childhood.

Coppola had Poliomyelitis, or polio, as a boy, leaving him bedridden for large periods of his childhood, and allowing him to indulge his imagination with homemade puppet theater productions. Using his father's 8mm movie camera, he began making movies when he was 10. He studied theatre at Hofstra University prior to earning a Master of Fine Arts degree in film direction from UCLA Film School. There, he made numerous short films. While in UCLA's Film Department, Francis met Jim Morrison, whose music was used later in Apocalypse Now.

Coppola often worked with family members on his films. He cast his two sons in The Godfather as extras during the street fight scene and Don Corleone's funeral; his daughter, Sofia Coppola, appeared in the first and third installments of the series. His sister, Talia Shire, played Connie Corleone in all three Godfather films. His father Carmine, a composer and professional musician, co-wrote much of the music in The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, and Apocalypse Now. His nephew, Nicholas Cage, starred in Coppola's film Peggy Sue Got Married and was featured in Rumble Fish and The Cotton Club.

His eldest son, Gian-Carlo Coppola, was in the early stages of a film production career when he was killed on May 26, 1986 in a speedboat accident. Coppola's surviving son, Roman Coppola, is a filmmaker and music video director whose filmography includes the feature film CQ and music videos for The Strokes, as well as co-writing the Wes Anderson film The Darjeeling Limited.

Coppola's daughter, Sofia Coppola, is an Academy Award-winning writer and -nominated director. Her films include the critically-acclaimed films The Virgin Suicides and Lost in Translation. In 2004, she became the first American woman to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, for Lost in Translation.

Other famous members of Coppola's family include his nephews, Jason Schwartzman and Robert Schwartzman. Jason Schwartzman has starred in several films, such as Rushmore and Slackers. He also co-wrote (along with director Wes Anderson and cousin Roman Coppola) and starred in the 2007 film The Darjeeling Limited. His brother, Robert Schwartzman, is the lead singer in the band Rooney and has made small appearances in several films, including his cousin's The Virgin Suicides.

In recent years, Coppola, with his family, has expanded his business ventures to include winemaking in California's Napa Valley at the Rubicon Estate Winery in Rutherford, California. His company, Francis Ford Coppola Presents, owns a winery in Geyserville, Sonoma County, California. The company also produces a line of pastas and pasta sauces, and it owns several cafes and resorts.

In the early 1960s, Coppola started his professional career making low-budget films with Roger Corman and writing screenplays. His first notable motion picture was made for Corman, the low-budget Dementia 13. After graduating to mainstream motion pictures with You're a Big Boy Now, Coppola was offered the reins of the movie version of the Broadway musical Finian's Rainbow, starring Petula Clark, in her first American film, and veteran Fred Astaire. Producer Jack Warner was nonplussed by Coppola's shaggy-haired, bearded, "hippie" appearance and generally left him to his own devices. He took his cast to the Napa Valley for much of the outdoor shooting, but these scenes were in sharp contrast to those obviously filmed on a Hollywood soundstage, resulting in a disjointed look to the film. Dealing with outdated material at a time when the popularity of film musicals was already on the downslide, Coppola's end result was only semi-successful, but his work with Clark no doubt contributed to her Golden Globe Best Actress nomination. During this period, Coppola lived for a time with his wife and growing family in Mandeville Canyon in Brentwood, California, according to author Peter Biskind in Easy Riders, Raging Bulls (Touchstone Books, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1998).

In 1971, Coppola won an Academy Award for his screenplay for Patton. However, his name as a filmmaker was made as the co-writer and director of The Godfather (1972), The Conversation (1974), and The Godfather Part II (1974). In between directing the Godfather films, Coppola wrote the screenplay for the critically and commercially unsuccessful 1974 adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby, which was directed by Jack Clayton and starred Robert Redford and Mia Farrow. Coppola also produced George Lucas's breakthrough film, American Graffiti, which was released in 1973. Also during this period, Coppola invested in San Francisco's City Magazine, hired an all-new staff, including mob daughter and writer Susan Berman, and named himself publisher. Although critically acclaimed, the magazine was short lived. The magazine floundered until 1976 when Coppola published its last issue.^[1]

This section covered in greater detail in The Godfather

In 1972, The Godfather was released to critical acclaim and huge commercial success. Directed by Coppola and adapted by Coppola and Mario Puzo from Puzo's bestselling novel, The Godfather follows the story of the Corleone crime family during the 1940s and 50s. The film won three Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Actor for Marlon Brando. Coppola himself was awarded Best Adapted Screenplay, along with Mario Puzo, and was nominated for Best Director.

In 1974 the highly anticipated sequel The Godfather Part II was released. Again directed and co-written by Coppola, the second film follows the story of the Corleone family under Michael Corleone throughout the 1950s and 60s, intercut with sequences depicting Vito Corleone as young man and his subsequent rise to power. The sequel was equally as successful commercially as the first film and received much critical praise. It became the first sequel to win the Academy Award for Best Picture; it also earned Coppola Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay while winning three other awards and earning five other nominations.

In between The Godfather and The Godfather Part II, Coppola directed The Conversation, the story of a paranoid wiretapping and surveillance expert (played by Gene Hackman) who finds himself caught up in a possible murder plot. The Conversation was released to theaters in 1974 and was also nominated for Best Picture, competing against The Godfather Part II; Coppola became one of the few directors to have two films competing for the Best Picture Oscar since the annual number of nominees was reduced to five in 1945.^[2] While The Godfather Part II won the Oscar, The Conversation won the 1974 Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

This section covered in greater detail in: Apocalypse Now.

Following the success of The Godfather, The Conversation and The Godfather Part II, Coppola began filming Apocalypse Now, an adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness set in Cambodia during the Vietnam War. Before production of the film began, Coppola went to his mentor Roger Corman for advice about shooting in the Philippines, since Corman had filmed several pictures there. It was said that all the advice Corman offered Coppola was "Don't go". The production of the film was plagued by numerous problems, including typhoons, nervous breakdowns, the firing of Harvey Keitel, Martin Sheen's heart attack, and an unprepared Marlon Brando with a bloated appearance (which Coppola attempted to hide by shooting him in the shadows). It was delayed so often it was nicknamed Apocalypse Whenever. The film was equally lauded and hated by critics when it finally appeared in 1979, and the cost of production nearly bankrupted Coppola's nascent studio American Zoetrope. The film was selected at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival and won the Golden Palm, along with The Tin Drum, directed by Volker Schlöndorff.

Like Citizen Kane, its reputation has grown in time and Apocalypse Now is regarded by many as a masterpiece of the New Hollywood era. Roger Ebert considers it to be the finest film on the Vietnam war and included it on his list for the 2002 Sight and Sound poll for the greatest movie of all time.

The 1991 documentary film Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse, directed by Eleanor Coppola (Francis's wife), Fax Bahr, and George Hickenlooper, chronicles the difficulties the crew went through making Apocalypse Now, and features behind the scenes footage filmed by Eleanor.

After filming Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola famously stated:

"We were in the jungle, there were too many of us, we had access to too much money, too much equipment, and little by little, we went insane."

In 2001, Coppola re-released Apocalypse Now as Apocalypse Now Redux, restoring several sequences lost from the original 1979 cut of the film thereby expanding its length to 200 minutes.

This section covered in greater detail in Napoléon Restorations.

Despite the setbacks and ill health Coppola suffered during the making of Apocalypse Now, he kept up with film projects, presenting in 1981 a restoration of the 1927 film Napoléon that was edited and released in the United States by American Zoetrope. However it wasn't until the experimental musical One from the Heart (1982) that he returned to directing. Unfortunately, that film was a huge financial failure, although it developed a cult following in later years.

This section is covered in greater detail in The Outsiders

In 1982, he directed The Outsiders, a film adaptation of the novel of the same name by S. E. Hinton. Coppola credited his inspiration for making the film to a suggestion from middle school students who had read the novel. The Outsiders is notable for being the breakout film for a number of young actors who would go on to become major stars. These included major roles for Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, and C. Thomas Howell. Others rising stars in the cast include Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, and Tom Cruise. Matt Dillon and several others also starred in Coppola's related film, Rumble Fish, which was also based on a S.E. Hinton novel and filmed at the same time as The Outsiders on-location in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Carmine Coppola wrote and edited the musical score, including the title song "Stay Gold", which was based upon a famous Robert Frost poem and performed for the movie by Stevie Wonder.

In 1986 Coppola, with George Lucas, directed the Michael Jackson film for Disney theme parks, Captain Eo, which at the time was the most expensive film per minute ever made.

In 1990 he completed the Godfather series with The Godfather Part III which, while not as critically acclaimed as the first two movies, was still a box office success. Some reviewers criticized the casting of Coppola's daughter Sofia, who stepped into a role abandoned by Winona Ryder just as filming began.

In 1997, Coppola founded Zoetrope All-Story, a flashy literary magazine that publishes short stories. The magazine has published fiction by T.C. Boyle and Amy Bloom and essays by David Mamet, Steven Spielberg, and Salman Rushdie. Since its founding, the magazine has grown in reputation to become one of the premier American journals of literary fiction. Coppola serves as founding editor and publisher of All-Story.

He co-owns the Rubicon restaurant along with fellow San Franciscan Robin Williams and Robert De Niro.

Coppola serves as "Honorary Consul H. E. Ambassador Francis Ford Coppola."^[3] for the Central American nation of Belize in San Francisco, California.

In November 2005, Coppola took part as a special guest at the 46th International Thessaloniki Film Festival in Greece.

The director is currently living in the San Francisco Bay Area. He also spends considerable time in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he is establishing a subsidiary of his production company, in support of the film he is planning to start shooting there in 2008.

Coppola plans to produce his own films in order to avoid the marketing input that goes into most films (making them appeal to too-wide an audience). His new film "Youth without youth", made for only around 19 million dollars, has a limited release 2007-12-14.

Director Year Film 1963 Dementia 13 1966 You're a Big Boy Now 1968 Finian's Rainbow 1969 The Rain People 1972 The Godfather 1974 The Conversation The Godfather Part II 1979 Apocalypse Now 1982 One from the Heart 1983 The Outsiders Rumble Fish 1984 The Cotton Club 1986 Captain EO Peggy Sue Got Married 1987 Gardens of Stone 1988 Tucker: The Man and His Dream 1989 New York Stories 1990 The Godfather Part III 1992 Bram Stoker's Dracula 1996 Jack 1997 The Rainmaker 2007 Youth Without Youth 2009 Tetro TBA Mirror TBA Megalopolis

Writer Year Film 1963 Dementia 13 1966 This Property Is Condemned Is Paris Burning? You're a Big Boy Now 1969 The Rain People 1970 Patton 1972 The Godfather 1974 The Great Gatsby The Conversation The Godfather Part II 1979 Apocalypse Now 1982 One from the Heart 1983 Rumble Fish 1984 The Cotton Club 1986 Captain EO 1989 New York Stories 1990 The Godfather Part III 1997 The Rainmaker 2007 Youth Without Youth 2009 Tetro TBA Mirror TBA Megalopolis TBA Descent

• List of wine personalities
• Coppola family tree
• American Zoetrope

• Francis Ford Coppola at the Internet Movie Database
• Francis Ford Coppola at SensesOfCinema.com
• Bibliography at the University of California Berkeley Library
• Rubicon Estate Winery (formerly Niebaum-Coppola), Napa Valley
• Francis Ford Coppola Presents
• Altman and Coppola in the Seventies: Power and the People Essay (24 Lies A Second)
• Coppola Speaks: A Conversation about Youth Without Youth at Propeller.com

Awards
Preceded by William Friedkin for The French Connection	Golden Globe Award for Best Director - Motion Picture 1973 for The Godfather	Succeeded by William Friedkin for The Exorcist
Preceded by Jerry Schatzberg for Scarecrow and Alan Bridges for The Hireling	Palme d'Or - Cannes Film Festival 1974 for The Conversation	Succeeded by Mohammed Lakhdar-Hamina for Chronicle of the Years of Fire
Preceded by George Roy Hill for The Sting	Academy Award for Best Director 1974 for The Godfather Part II	Succeeded by Miloš Forman for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Preceded by Ermanno Olmi for The Tree of Wooden Clogs	Palme d'Or - Cannes Film Festival 1979 for Apocalypse Now (tied with Volker Schlöndorff for The Tin Drum)	Succeeded by Akira Kurosawa for Kagemusha and Bob Fosse for All That Jazz
Preceded by Alan Parker for Midnight Express	BAFTA Award for Best Direction 1979 for Apocalypse Now	Succeeded by Akira Kurosawa for Kagemusha
Preceded by Michael Cimino for The Deer Hunter	Golden Globe Award for Best Director - Motion Picture 1980 for Apocalypse Now	Succeeded by Robert Redford for Ordinary People

v • d • e Francis Ford Coppola
1960s	Battle Beyond the Sun (with Aleksandr Kozyr and M. Karzhukov) · The Bellboy and the Playgirls (with Fritz Umgelter and Jack Hill) · Tonight for Sure · Dementia 13 · You're a Big Boy Now · Finian's Rainbow · The Rain People
1970s	The Godfather · The Conversation · The Godfather Part II · Apocalypse Now
1980s	One from the Heart · The Outsiders · Rumble Fish · The Cotton Club · Peggy Sue Got Married · Gardens of Stone · Tucker: The Man and His Dream · New York Stories (with Woody Allen and Martin Scorsese)
1990s	The Godfather Part III · Bram Stoker's Dracula · Jack · The Rainmaker
2000s	Youth Without Youth · Tetro
Productions	The Junky's Christmas (1993) · Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (1994) · Don Juan DeMarco (1995) · Lani Loa (1998) · The Florentine (1999) · The Virgin Suicides (1999)

v • d • e The Godfather series
Films	The Godfather · The Godfather Part II · The Godfather Part III · The Godfather Saga
Novels	The Godfather (novel) · The Sicilian · The Godfather Returns · The Godfather's Revenge
Corleone family	Vito Corleone · Carmella Corleone · Tom Hagen · Sonny Corleone · Fredo Corleone · Michael Corleone · Connie Corleone-Rizzi · Apollonia Vitelli-Corleone · Kay Adams-Corleone · Anthony Corleone · Mary Corleone · Vincent Mancini-Corleone · Sandra Corleone
Other families	Emilio Barzini · Ottilio Cuneo · Anthony Stracci · Bruno Tattaglia · Philip Tattaglia · Carlo Tramonti · Vincent Forlenza · Louie Russo · Joe Zaluchi · Frankie Falcone · Tony Molinari · Sam Drago · Paulie Fortunato · Ozzie Altobello · Rico Tattaglia
Other characters	Luca Brasi · Peter Clemenza · Don Fanucci · Johnny Fontane · Senator Pat Geary · Archbishop Gilday · Moe Greene · Frederick Keinszig · Cardinal Lamberto · Rocco Lampone · Lucy Mancini · Al Neri · Frank Pentangeli · Hyman Roth · Carlo Rizzi · Virgil Sollozzo · Salvatore Tessio · Don Tommasino · Jack Woltz · Joey Zasa · Nick Geraci · Eddie Paradise · Tommy Neri  · James Shea · Ritchie Nobilio · Joe Lucadello · Momo Barone · Sal Narducci · Carmine Marino · Danny Shea · Billy Van Arsdale · Mickey Shea · Bud Payton · Jaggy Jovino · Monk Malone · Aldo Trapani ·
Music	The Godfather (soundtrack) · The Godfather Part II (soundtrack) · The Godfather Part III (soundtrack) · Speak Softly Love (Love Theme From The Godfather) · Promise Me You'll Remember (Love Theme from The Godfather Part III)
Related	Francis Ford Coppola · Albert Ruddy · Nino Rota · Crime film · Organized crime · Mafia · Five Families · Sicily · Corleone · The Godfather: The Game · Mark Winegardner · The Sicilian

Persondata
NAME	Coppola, Francis Ford
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Director, producer, screenwriter
DATE OF BIRTH	April 7, 1939 (1939-04-07) (age 68)
PLACE OF BIRTH	Detroit, Michigan, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH