Francis Ford Coppola is an American film director, producer, and scriptwriter whose net worth is $300 million. He was born on April 7th, 1939 in Detroit, Michigan, in an Italian-American family, and surrounded by an artistic environment.
Second of the three children of Carmine Coppola, a flute player at the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and who became the first flute on the Arturo Toscanini orchestra, he composed music for his son’s films; And Italia Pennino, who was an actress.
His older brother is August Coppola; his younger sister is the actress Talia Shire. His paternal grandparents arrived to the United States from Bernalda, Basilicata. His maternal grandfather, the popular Italian composer Francesco Pennino, emigrated from Naples.
Early childhood.
Two years after his birth, his father was appointed main flutist at the NBC Symphony Orchestra and the family moved to New York, settling in Woodside, Queens, where Coppola spent the rest of his childhood.
When he was ten years old he had to keep his bed for polio, so he spent time animating puppets, mounting and synchronizing with a tape recorder the amateur films made by his family.
Studies.
He graduated from Hofstra University, where, in 1960, he earned a BA in Theater, and at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) film school. While still a student in the latter, he began working for Roger Corman, a prominent director and /or producer of series B films.
Beginning in cinema.
He won the Samuel Goldwyn Award for his screenplays, and he began learning the different stages of filmmaking. From this period, it is necessary to emphasize some erotic short films (among which we can highlight The Pepper, in 1961), mounted and dubbed Soviet adventures films for the Roger Coman American International, with whom he would work in Ireland in the feature film The Young Racers (1963).
When he returned to California, he signed a contract with the company Seven Arts to write some scripts that would give rise to the movies The Property is Condemned (Sidney Pollack, 1966) Paris brûle-t-il? (R. Clément, id.), and Patton (F. Schaffner, 1970). This company offered him the possibility of directing his second film, you are a Big Boy Now (1967), quick comedy about the relationships of an inhibited and clumsy young man with his family and women.
Other films and The Godfather.
He started working with his own / Producer or for some of the big ones, like Paramount or Universal. The godfather (1972), inspired on the novel by Mario Puzzo, was the work that made him one of the most outstanding filmmakers of the 70s thanks to his extraordinary success. Despite occasional adverse reviews, and some of the more serious commercial failures (After filming One from the Heart, 1981, had to sell his studio), Coppola has achieved international success and several Oscars for his works, among which we can emphasize The Conversation (1973), The godfather II (1974), Apocalypse now (1978), in which Coppola is shown to us as a master of fictional cinema.
Personal life.
His children have also pursued a career as filmmakers. His daughter Sofia is also a well-known director, while his son has also made some films by his own. His sister is the actress Talia Shire, and his nephew is the actor Nicholas Cage.