“I appreciate how my unexpected life has stretched and pulled me in many extraordinary ways and led me in many directions beyond my wildest imaginations,” wrote Eleanor Coppola, an American documentary filmmaker and producer, in her recently completed memoir. She passed away on Friday, April 12 in Rutherford, Northern California. The wife of director Francis Ford Coppola, with whom she raised four children who also made their mark in the world of film, was 87 years old.
Coppola often accompanied her husband on the set of his films, documenting the making of them with a behind-the-scenes look. The most famous is probably the documentary film Heart of Darkness: The Director’s Apocalypse, for which she won an Emmy Award. It charts the creation of Coppola’s legendary Apocalypse, who was born in the Philippine jungle for a long and demanding 238 days. During them, a typhoon destroyed the sets, actor Martin Sheen (83) had a heart attack and a member of the construction crew died.
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Eleanor was also very active in the field of visual arts. Her photography, drawings and conceptual works have been exhibited in numerous galleries and museums around the world, including a retrospective of her work at the Sonoma Valley Art Museum near San Francisco in 2014. In addition to documentaries, she has also directed two romantic comedies Love, love, love a Paris will wait. Unfortunately, despite the stellar cast, they did not receive a very warm audience reception.
While still an arts and crafts student, Eleanor met Coppola in 1962 while filming his horror film Dementia 13. A year later they got married. Their first-born son Gian-Carlo appeared in his father’s films from a young age, but tragically died in a boating accident at the age of 22. Daughter Sofia (52) became a director, has a film to her credit Lost in translation, for which she also wrote the script. Son Roman (58) is a screenwriter and shoots music videos.
Francis Ford Coppola with his wife Eleanor
Autor: Profimedia