Name: Francis Ford Coppola Is Betting On Himself | Letterman
Uploaded: 2024-04-24T22:00:29.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Francis Ford Coppola Is Betting On Himself | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-24. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Francis Ford Coppola Is Betting On Himself | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-24. Transcript available.

Francis Ford Coppola is perhaps the finest filmmaker working today with credits
that include The Godfather, The Godfather II, The Conversation, and Apocalypse
Now.
He is a showman in the finest of Hollywood traditions.
Not only are his films thrilling, but the events surrounding the release of
those motion pictures equally thrilling.
And that's certainly the case with his most recent film, One from the Heart.
Please welcome Francis Ford Coppola.
Very nice of you to be on the television show here with us this evening.
We mentioned in your introduction there that very often the release around your
films or the release of your films is as exciting as the films themselves.
Why is that, do you suppose?
Well, it's exciting for me, too.
I don't think we really do it intentionally.
I think it comes from the fact that, well, for example, I'm starting a film now
in three weeks, and we don't really have the money for it altogether.
But we're in a position where we have all the people, and we're working on it,
and we want to continue working on it.
So each week you say, well, let's go another week, and you're sort of financing
it yourself, hoping that next week someone will come in with the money.
And what happens is then you get so far deeply into the production that you
sort of have to go all the way.
And then suddenly someone says, well, you owe $14 million.
Now you raise an interesting point there that people who fancy themselves
artists probably could understand, but people who fancy themselves businessmen
are probably going,
and they're going to come in with you, and they're going to come in and say,
well, you know, it's so easy for someone to come in and say, well, we don't
like that idea, or we don't think that's like anything that's done well.
So really, if you want to start, my feeling is just start, and follow your
heart.
And really, Godfather II, I remember, we had spent a million dollars building
the sets before Paramount ever told us we could make it.
Now see, now what would have happened if Paramount said, oh, we've decided
against it?
Well, that's sort of what has happened to me at certain times, and this notion
of me being a risk taker isn't really so true.
It's not that I'm a risk taker.
It's just that once we're making the film, we don't want to stop.
And we sort of, maybe in a naive way, think that it'll all work out, and we
really just keep, you know, like, what would happen if they said, look, the
money for the show is gone now, and you want to keep doing it, or should we
tell the audience to leave?
And, I mean, we say, let's do the show and worry about it when it's all over.
Yeah.
And that's really how it is.
It's the risk part is the least important.
We're not thinking about that.
We're thinking about the film.
The film, One from the Heart, we have been led to believe, maybe, you shouldn't,
we shouldn't be believing this, but it looks like if this one doesn't work,
there goes your house, there goes the speedboat, there goes the vacation, there
goes the studio.
The speedboat went on Apocalypse now.
And, you know, and truly, the speedboat was called Godfather Part II, I
remember.
And it really did go on.
It really was a speedboat, but it's gone now.
Right now, your assessment is the things that look like it would be a moneymaker.
I think we're out of it.
My mind is on the movie starting in Tulsa in a week and a half.
I have 40 17-year-olds in a room that are trying out for this picture literally
right now.
And we ran away from the screen test to come and do the show and be with you.
And then we're going to go back to these kids.
You got a room full of 17-year-olds?
Francis Ford Coppola is with us, of course.
And you mentioned one thing about the, you felt that One from the Heart now was
in pretty good shape and you were in your mind, at least, on to other projects.
I want to ask you about that.
But also, in getting back to the heat and the controversy and so forth that
seems to be generated with this one, do you enjoy that?
Could you just as soon the thing slipped out and was distributed successfully
and became a huge hit without you?
Well, slipped out doesn't sound too good, but huge hit sounds fine, right?
Yeah.
I really, sincerely don't intend to cause the controversy.
I think in this president incident, what happened is I made a decision four
days before, for reasons of my own, that it was appropriate to preview the
picture and preview the picture.
It has to do with the fact that when you make a movie, not unlike the theater,
you need, once in a while, an audience to come in near the end to help you
decide those final things.
And the way the movie business is now and the critical press, if you try to
sneak it in Minnesota, someone will sneak in and there will be a review that
appears saying that it's a disaster.
Which, for example, happened to Steven Spielberg on Close Encounter that
someone snuck in and this first early report.
And those kind of reports, I mean, sweep through the financial aspect of the
film like a tornado.
The wives of the bankers read them and suddenly you're trying to finish the
film and you're finding that people get frightened, you know?
And I do think it's a tradition to allow people to preview a picture without
writing reviews.
And I got so angry that it is now impossible that I said, let's preview New
York in the Radio City Music Hall so there'll be enough seats.
Okay, let's briefly mention what you were reacting to.
Somebody, and I'm not clear who, took a rough cut of the film and previewed it
at a photo mat or something, didn't they?
Along that idea, it has to do with things that are not that interesting related
to the fact that the exhibitors in some states by law, by state law,
have required that if you want to book the picture, you must show it to them so
that they can choose whether they like it or not.
Now they become the only people in show business who demand the right to see
the film.
I mean, the actors, when they're in it, they, of course, are going on good
faith and the director doesn't know how it's going to turn out.
The distributor invests a lot of money, so in some ways I feel the exhibitors
out of line.
And what happens, of course, is that the film is shown six months before it's
finished.
Do you ever see a suit before it's done when those guys come out with the
threads hanging out and the lining showing?
That's what a movie looks like.
And in this case, since it was a film told by songs, 20 songs, the songs were
not in yet.
And someone, of course, some enterprising reporter went around and asked all
the exhibitors what they thought of it.
And a couple of guys said, it's the worst film I've seen in 30 years, which was
interesting because the same guys had said that Apocalypse Now was the worst
film they saw in 30 years,
which means this was only the worst film they had seen in three years, as I saw
it.
This movie, One from the Heart, was done entirely in your house, your facility,
your own studio.
Our studio in Hollywood's Zoetrope Studios is like the, it's not even the
American motors of the movie industry, it's kind of the Vespa.
But we've been in business 12 years, we've never made a flop, we've produced
such films as the Godfather films, American Graffiti, Black Stallion, Apocalypse,
many films.
We've introduced more new directors, we introduced George Lucas, produced his
first films, and Carol Ballard and lots of people, we brought a lot of new
actors.
And so sort of, we would like to be an official little movie company based on
those backgrounds.
Now this is a rarity, isn't it, having your own little independent studio
turning out big, huge motion pictures?
Yeah, but of course it's more like the early days of movies when it was fly by
your pants and the people in the film business were not so much businessmen,
but they were like, they were former garment industry people, so they were used
to what it is to invest in next year's hemline.
So there was the element of risk in movie making, it has to be.
Hi there. Welcome back to the show here, and Francis Ford Coppola is here.
I have to ask you about Marlon Brando. You know him, obviously. He was in two
motion pictures that you've done.
Is he a fun guy to be with?
Very much so. You know, he's really a wonderful man. He's like a big kid in a
way.
Really?
He's extremely intelligent. I mean, beyond his talent for his films, I mean,
you can talk to him about all kinds of things and really feel you come away
having learned something.
But is it tough to, does a guy like that take any kind of direction at all, or
does he just show up, roll out of the car, and do it, and that's it?
Absolutely. That kind of actor who is so relaxed and so secure, really all he
wants from a director is, you know, he said to me, "Oh, Francis, say more angry
or less angry."
That's not bad, by the way.
And it is true that he really does work with little cue cards, and they're
everywhere, absolutely everywhere. They're in the bread.
He has his lines.
And when he said to me, he says, when I was upset in a dramatic scene that he
was reading, he says, "You like the taxi scene on the waterfront?"
He says, "Yeah." He says, "Well, the lines were all on the taxi."
True.
But don't you-- Now, I know this is stupid, but for that kind of dough, he
ought to memorize it, don't you think?
He doesn't have a good memory, really.
Well, there you go.
And his whole acting style is sort of based on him reaching for the line, like
he'll say something like that, and he is really seriously--
He's just looking for notes, huh?
He's trying to remember the line, but he is very extreme.
What he says about acting in one sentence is, you know, you can't care while
they'll see it on your face, and so he approaches it with total relaxation, and
he's wonderful.
But he's not mean. He looks like he'd be mean.
No, he's not mean. He's like a kid, and he loves children, and to see him play
with kids is a very, very wonderful thing.
We've talked extensively about the motion picture, and you said you wanted to
give a preface to this thing before it goes across the country soon.
No, because I think only that I've been associated with films that are sort of
dark and heavy.
Certainly, the Vietnam War and the conversation was a very kind of strange film.
And one from the heart was really my desire to make something that was romantic
and pretty and beautiful with songs,
and sort of literally a valentine, and it's a very unusual film, and it tells
itself in its own way, but in the end,
it's meant to be like a real something happy for people.
Do the critics bother you?
No.
Not really?
No.
They used to.
I think Apocalypse was the last time because they were so rough on Apocalypse.
I mean, literally, I remember getting off a plane and getting a Time magazine.
It says Apocalypse Now is the most disastrous film made in 30 years.
And, you know, I didn't feel that certainly that was the case, you know.
Yeah.
People are very extreme with things that are different.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I appreciate you being here tonight.
Good luck with the film.
Francis Ford Coppola, one from the heart.
We have to pause.
We'll be right back.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.