Mary Corleone

Mary Corleone is a fictional character in The Godfather Part III, portrayed by Sofia Coppola.[1] She is the daughter of Michael Corleone and Kay Adams and sister of Anthony Vito Corleone.

Mary Corleone
Sofia Coppola portraying Mary Corleone
First appearanceThe Godfather Part II
Last appearanceThe Godfather Part III
Created byMario Puzo
Portrayed bySofia Coppola
In-universe information
GenderFemale
FamilyCorleone family
RelativesMichael Corleone (father)
Kay Adams-Corleone (mother)
Vito Corleone (paternal grandfather; deceased)
Anthony Corleone (brother)
Sonny Corleone (paternal uncle; deceased)
Fredo Corleone (paternal uncle; deceased)
Vincent Mancini-Corleone (paternal cousin and lover)
Connie Corleone (paternal aunt)
Carmela Corleone (paternal grandmother; deceased)
Carlo Rizzi (uncle; deceased)

The Godfather Part II

Mary first appears in The Godfather Part II as the youngest child of Michael and Kay. She is a young child (aged about 4 or 5) in the late 1950s. Like Anthony, she does not have a significant role or story arc in the film.

The Godfather Part III

Mary is one of the pivotal characters of Godfather Part III, set in 1979–80. Her father's favorite, she is sheltered from the violent world of the Corleone crime family. She falls in love with her cousin, Vincent Mancini, Sonny Corleone's illegitimate son. While the family is traveling in Sicily, Michael tells Mary he disapproves of the romance, believing that Vincent's growing involvement in the "family business" puts her life in danger. He fears that Mary could suffer the same fate as his first wife, Apollonia, who was killed by a car bomb intended for him 30 years earlier.

Toward the end of the film, Michael names Vincent as his successor, on condition that he break off his relationship with Mary. After her brother's debut concert, the assassin Mosca tries to kill Michael. One bullet grazes Michael's shoulder, but the other accidentally hits Mary in the torso, fatally wounding her. Michael is devastated by Mary's death.

Casting

Sofia Coppola, the daughter of director Francis Ford Coppola, was cast in the role after the original choice, Winona Ryder, discontinued her involvement with the film due to nervous exhaustion.[2][3][4][5] It has been suggested that the situation further damaged Francis Ford Coppola's career and ruined Sofia's before it had even begun.[6] Coppola has said that she never really wanted to act and only did it to help out when her father asked her to.[7] After shooting, she confirmed that she did not want to go into acting.[7] It has also been suggested that Sofia's role in the film may have contributed to its box office performance, which started strongly and then went into decline.[6] Coppola has said that her father based a lot of her character on her while writing the script, before she was even cast into the role.[6] Sofia had herself worried that she had only been given the role because she was the director's daughter, and the role placed a strain on her during the time of shooting that her mother observed in a series of diaries she wrote for Vogue during the filming.[6]

After she was critically panned for her performance in The Godfather Part III, for which she was named "Worst Supporting Actress" and "Worst New Star" at the 1990 Golden Raspberry Awards, Coppola ended her acting career, although she appeared in the independent film Inside Monkey Zetterland (1992), as well as in the backgrounds of films by her friends and family: for example, she appeared as Saché, one of Queen Padmé Amidala's five handmaidens in George Lucas' Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999).[4] Coppola has since been quoted as saying that she was not hurt by the criticism from her role in The Godfather Part III, because she never especially wanted an acting career.[8]

Sequel novels

Mary appears as a minor character in Mark Winegardner's sequel novels The Godfather Returns and The Godfather's Revenge, although in the original novel, Michael's second child is a boy.

Family

References
  1. "The Godfather, Part III (1990)". nytimes.com. Retrieved 24 June 2014.
  2. "Death in the family". The Guardian. 15 April 2000. Retrieved 22 August 2013.
  3. "The Teenage Heartbreak of Sofia Coppola's Mary Corleone". TIFF. Retrieved 27 February 2020.
  4. Gilbey, Ryan (4 July 2013). "Sofia Coppola on The Bling Ring: 'What these kids did really took ingenuity'". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 July 2013.
  5. "Sofia Coppola Biography". Tribute. Tribute Entertainment Media Group. 2013. Retrieved 5 July 2013.
  6. "Storm over Sofia Coppola". EW.com. Retrieved 16 April 2018.
  7. "Revisited: Sofia Coppola - Interview Magazine". Interview Magazine. 26 October 2017. Retrieved 15 April 2018.
  8. "Out of the Godfather's shadow". The Independent. 30 April 2000. Retrieved 27 August 2012.
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