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The Godfather Saga
''The Godfather Saga'' is a 1977 American television miniseries that combines ''The Godfather'' and '' The Godfather Part II'' into one film. It originally aired on NBC over four consecutive nights (one three-hour segment and three two-hour segments) in November 1977. ''The Godfather Saga'' is also known as ''The Godfather: The Complete Novel for Television'', ''The Godfather: A Novel for Television'', ''The Godfather Novella'', ''The Godfather 1901–1959: The Complete Epic'', and ''The Godfather Epic'' (on HBO). The television version was the basis for a shorter, 1981 video release known as ''The Godfather 1902–1959: The Complete Epic''. Following the release of ''The Godfather Part III'' in 1990, a third unified version was released to video in 1992 entitled ''The Godfather Trilogy: 1901–1980''. Film structure Francis Ford Coppola asked his editor Barry Malkin to make a seven-hour version for television; Coppola reportedly did this project to raise money for ''Apocalypse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mario Puzo
Mario Francis Puzo (; ; October 15, 1920 – July 2, 1999) was an American author, screenwriter, and journalist. He is known for his crime novels about the Italian-American Mafia and Sicilian Mafia, most notably '' The Godfather'' (1969), which he later co-adapted into a film trilogy directed by Francis Ford Coppola. He received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for the first film in 1972 and for '' Part II'' in 1974. Puzo also wrote the original screenplay for the 1978 '' Superman'' film and its 1980 sequel. His final novel, '' The Family'', was released posthumously in 2001. Personal life Puzo was born in the Hell's Kitchen section of New York City to Italian immigrants from Pietradefusi, Province of Avellino, Campania. When Puzo was 12, his father, who worked as a trackman for the New York Central Railroad, was committed to the Pilgrim State Hospital insane asylum for schizophrenia, and his wife, Maria, was left to raise their seven children. He served i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paramount Television (original)
The original incarnation of Paramount Television was the name of the television production division of the American film studio Paramount Pictures, that was responsible for the production of Viacom television programs, until it changed its name to CBS Paramount Television on January 17, 2006, due to the Viacom split. History Desilu Productions Desilu Productions was an American production company founded and co-owned by husband and wife Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball, best known for shows such as ''I Love Lucy'', '' Star Trek'', and ''The Untouchables''. Until 1962, Desilu was the second-largest independent television production company in the U.S. behind MCA Inc.'s Revue Productions until MCA bought Universal Pictures, and Desilu became and remained the number-one independent production company until it was sold in 1967. Ball and Arnaz jointly owned the majority stake in Desilu from its inception until 1962, when Ball bought out Arnaz and ran the company by herself for se ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sonny Corleone
Santino "Sonny" Corleone is a fictional character in Mario Puzo's 1969 novel ''The Godfather'' and its 1972 film adaptation. He is the eldest son of the mafia don Vito Corleone and Carmela Corleone. He has two brothers, Fredo and Michael, and a sister, Connie. In the film, Sonny was portrayed by James Caan, who briefly reprised his role for a flashback scene in ''The Godfather Part II''. Director Francis Ford Coppola's son Roman Coppola played Sonny as a boy in the 1920s scenes of ''The Godfather Part II''. Novel and film biography In both the novel and the movie, Sonny is the eldest of Vito Corleone's four children. Unlike his quiet, level-headed father, Sonny is fiery-tempered and prone to violence. At age 16, Sonny commits a robbery. When Peter Clemenza, Vito's right-hand man and Sonny's godfather, informs Vito about it, Vito demands his son explain himself. Sonny replies that he had witnessed Vito murder the "Black Hand" gangster Don Fanucci years before, and he now ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Corleone
Michael Corleone is a fictional character and the protagonist of Mario Puzo's 1969 novel ''The Godfather''. In the three ''Godfather'' films, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, Michael was portrayed by Al Pacino, for which he was twice-nominated for Academy Awards. Michael is the youngest son of Vito Corleone, a Sicilian immigrant who builds a Mafia empire. Upon his father's death, Michael succeeds him as the don of the Corleone crime family. In June 2003, Michael Corleone was recognized as the 11th most iconic villain in film history by the American Film Institute, although some critics consider him to be a tragic hero. The British film magazine ''Empire'' selected Michael Corleone as the 11th greatest movie character, with Pacino's performance as Michael Corleone widely regarded as one of the greatest performances in cinematic history. Family Born on March 23, 1920, to Mafia don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) and his wife Carmela ( Morgana King), Michael has two olde ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hyman Roth
Hyman Roth (born Hyman Suchowsky) is a fictional character and the main antagonist in the 1974 film '' The Godfather Part II''. He is also a minor character in the 2004 novel ''The Godfather Returns''. Roth is a Jewish mobster, investor and a business partner of Vito Corleone, and later his son Michael Corleone. He is based on notorious mobster and gambling kingpin Meyer Lansky. It was Al Pacino who suggested Lee Strasberg, his former acting teacher, for the role. Character overview Roth's background is supplied in a deleted scene in ''The Godfather Part II''. In this scene, set in Little Italy, New York in the early 1920s, he is working as a car mechanic. He is noticed by Peter Clemenza, who has been calling him "Johnny Lips". Clemenza introduces him to his friend Vito Corleone, who suggests that he change his name, which was originally Hyman Suchowsky. When Vito asks him whom he admires, Suchowsky says Arnold Rothstein, for having fixed the 1919 World Series; according ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vito Corleone
Vito Corleone (born Vito Andolini) is a fictional character in Mario Puzo's 1969 novel ''The Godfather'' and in the first two of Francis Ford Coppola's film trilogy. Vito is originally portrayed by Marlon Brando in the 1972 film ''The Godfather'', and later by Oreste Baldini as a boy and by Robert De Niro as a young man in '' The Godfather Part II'' (1974). He is an orphaned Sicilian immigrant who builds a Mafia empire. He and his wife Carmela have four children: Santino ("Sonny"), Frederico ("Fredo"), and Michael, and one daughter Constanzia ("Connie"). Vito informally adopts Sonny's friend, Tom Hagen, who becomes his lawyer and '' consigliere''. Upon Vito's death, Michael succeeds him as Don of the Corleone crime family. Vito oversees a business founded on gambling, bootlegging, prostitution, and union corruption, but he is known as a kind, generous man who lives by a strict moral code of loyalty to friends and, above all, family. He is also known as a traditional ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Don Fanucci
Don Fanucci is a fictional character appearing in Mario Puzo's 1969 novel ''The Godfather'' and the 1974 film ''The Godfather Part II'', a sequel to the 1972 film version of Puzo's novel. Fanucci is portrayed by Gastone Moschin and is based on the personality of Ignazio Lupo, a real-life Black Hand figure. In the original novel and ''The Godfather Part II'' Fanucci is a notorious Black Hand extortionist in Little Italy who supports himself by demanding and collecting protection money from neighborhood businesses. Vito Corleone (Robert De Niro) witnesses Fanucci threatening to disfigure a young girl when her father refuses to pay him and is about to intervene when he is stopped by his friend, Genco Abbandando, who tells him who Fanucci really is. Vito also loses his job as a grocery clerk when Fanucci strong-arms Genco's father into employing his nephew. In the novel and in ''The Godfather Saga'', the film adaptation re-edited for television, Vito witnesses an attack on Fanucci b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Da Capo Press
Da Capo Press is an American publishing company with headquarters in Boston, Massachusetts. It is now an imprint of Hachette Books. History Founded in 1964 as a publisher of music books, as a division of Plenum Publishers, it had additional offices in New York City, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Emeryville, California. The year prior, Da Capo Press had net sales of over $2.5 million. Da Capo Press became a general trade publisher in the mid-1970s. It was sold to the Perseus Books Group in 1999 after Plenum was sold to Wolters Kluwer. In the last decade, its production has consisted of mostly nonfiction titles, both hardcover and paperback, focusing on history, music, the performing arts, sports, and popular culture. In 2003, Lifelong Books was founded as a health and wellness imprint. When Marlowe & Company became part of the imprint in 2007, Lifelong's range was expanded to include the New Glucose Revolution series and numerous diabetes titles, as well as books on healthf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apocalypse Now
''Apocalypse Now'' is a 1979 American epic war film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The screenplay, co-written by Coppola, John Milius and Michael Herr, is loosely based on the 1899 novella '' Heart of Darkness'' by Joseph Conrad, with the setting changed from late 19th-century Congo to the Vietnam War. The film follows a river journey from South Vietnam into Cambodia undertaken by Captain Willard ( Martin Sheen), who is on a secret mission to assassinate Colonel Kurtz ( Marlon Brando), a renegade Special Forces officer who is accused of murder and presumed insane. The ensemble cast also features Robert Duvall, Frederic Forrest, Albert Hall, Sam Bottoms, Laurence Fishburne and Dennis Hopper. Milius became interested in adapting ''Heart of Darkness'' for a Vietnam War setting in the late 1960s, and initially began developing the film with Coppola as producer and George Lucas as director. After Lucas became unavailable, Coppola took over directorial c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Godfather Part III
''The Godfather Part III'' is a 1990 American crime film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola from the screenplay co-written with Mario Puzo. The film stars Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, Andy García, Eli Wallach, Joe Mantegna, Bridget Fonda, George Hamilton, and Sofia Coppola. It is the third and final installment in ''The Godfather'' trilogy. A sequel to ''The Godfather'' (1972) and '' The Godfather Part II'' (1974), it concludes the fictional story of Michael Corleone, the patriarch of the Corleone family who attempts to legitimize his criminal empire. The film also includes fictionalized accounts of two real-life events: the 1978 death of Pope John Paul I and the Papal banking scandal of 1981–1982, both linked to Michael Corleone's business affairs. Coppola and Puzo's intended title for the film was ''The Death of Michael Corleone'', which Paramount Pictures rejected; Coppola considers the series to be a duology, while ''Part III'' serves as the epi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Godfather Part II
''The Godfather Part II'' is a 1974 American epic crime film produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The film is partially based on the 1969 novel ''The Godfather'' by Mario Puzo, who co-wrote the screenplay with Coppola. ''Part II'' serves as both a sequel and a prequel to the 1972 film ''The Godfather'', presenting parallel dramas: one picks up the 1958 story of Michael Corleone (Al Pacino), the new Don of the Corleone family, protecting the family business in the aftermath of an attempt on his life; the prequel covers the journey of his father, Vito Corleone (Robert De Niro), from his Sicilian childhood to the founding of his family enterprise in New York City. The ensemble cast also features Robert Duvall, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, Morgana King, John Cazale, Mariana Hill, and Lee Strasberg. Following the success of the first film, Paramount Pictures began developing a follow-up, with many of the cast and crew returning. Coppola, who was given more creative contro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Godfather
''The Godfather'' is a 1972 American crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola, who co-wrote the screenplay with Mario Puzo, based on Puzo's best-selling 1969 novel of the same title. The film stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Richard Castellano, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard Conte, and Diane Keaton. It is the first installment in ''The Godfather'' trilogy, chronicling the Corleone family under patriarch Vito Corleone (Brando) from 1945 to 1955. It focuses on the transformation of his youngest son, Michael Corleone (Pacino), from reluctant family outsider to ruthless mafia boss. Paramount Pictures obtained the rights to the novel for $80,000, before it gained popularity. Studio executives had trouble finding a director; the first few candidates turned down the position before Coppola signed on to direct the film but disagreement followed over casting several characters, in particular, Vito (Marlon Brando) and Michael (Al Pac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
