Fans of the legendary film The Godfather were stunned to learn one of the lead stars was “almost fired” a week into filming.
Though the movie has gone down in Hollywood history as one of the greatest films of all time, one of the main stars, who featured in all three films, was nearly sacked. Director Francis Ford Coppola had already struggled to get the ambitious project approved, and was also at risk of losing his job.
The actor in question has since shared their disbelief of nearly being canned from the film, with their reaction at the time being one of horror.
A post to the r/TodayILearned subreddit saw fans share quotes from the actor who was “nearly fired” along with the director.
An alleged choice to sack the pair had been made before the film was ready for a rough cut, though thankfully no action to fire the duo was carried out, and the rest is history.
A post to the Reddit forum reads: “The Godfather almost didn’t get made because Paramount didn’t believe in it, and the director nearly got fired before the studio saw the rough cut. It went on to become one of the most iconic films of all time.”
Al Pacino, the actor who was nearly fired from the film series, went on to appear in both sequels, The Godfather II and The Godfather III.
Fans have since reacted to the news of the near-sacking, with Pacino confirming he was nearly fired by Coppola, with the veteran director saying he was not “cutting it” when it came to leading the film.
Pacino recalled: “You know how much you mean to me, how much faith I had in you. And Francis said, ‘Well, you’re not cutting it.'”
The recollection comes from Pacino’s autobiography, Sonny Boy, which released late last year. He added: ” I felt that one in the pit of my stomach. It’s when it finally hit me that my job was on the line. I said to Francis, ‘What do we do here?’
“He said, ‘I put together rushes of what we’ve shot already. Why don’t you take a look at it yourself? Because I don’t think it’s working. You’re not working.'”
Fans were horrified to learn Pacino was nearly canned from the film’s production, with some saying it would not be the same movie without him.
One Reddit user wrote: “They also didn’t believe in Al Pacino as lead… how wrong could they be in the end…” Another user suggested there were question marks hanging over the project before filming even began thanks to co-star Marlon Brando.
The user wrote: “The Godfather was a very popular novel before it became a movie, and there was a lot of pre-production anticipation. Word from the gossip columnists was that Marlon Brando insisted on stuffing his mouth with cotton balls and mumbling his lines, and the whole movie was destined to be a bad joke and a huge flop.”
Another suggested Coppola was not a big enough name to carry the project at the time, writing: “At the time he had made a number of complete bombs. He outbid everyone else for the book rights by paying an excessive fee. It was a last desperate move to rescue his career.
Sure, amazing film but most people don’t get to fail that many times and buy themselves into one of the hottest literary properties of the time.”