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| Don Corleone is probably Brando's best-known
role |
Late film star Marlon Brando is said to have
repeatedly turned down his
Oscar-winning role in The Godfather.
The actor's friend Budd Schulberg told Vanity Fair magazine that
Brando's assistant suggested he read the novel.
The actor repeatedly refused, throwing the book at
her and saying: "For the last time, I won't glorify the mafia
".
But Brando, who died last July at the age of 80, eventually took the
role of Don Corleone, winning him an Oscar in 1973 which he notoriously
refused.
The actor sent a young woman dressed in Native American costume to
refuse the award on his behalf and to draw attention to the plight of
Native Americans.
Schulberg told the magazine that Brando's assistant realised the film
star had warmed to the idea of The Godfather role when he sported a
drawn-on pencil moustache and asked: "How do I look?"
His assistant, Alice Marchak, said that he looked like George Raft, an
actor famed for playing gangsters on the silver screen.
Every time she went to see Brando from then on, she added, he was
wearing a different gangster-style moustache.
Brando was asked to screen test for the role in The Godfather, as
studio executives were said to be reluctant for the actor to play the part
following problems on the set of Brando's previous film Mutiny on the
Bounty .
In fact Brando's Academy Award triumph revived his career. The actor
was nominated for an Oscar the following year for his role in Bernardo
Bertolucci's Last Tango in Paris.
Before his death, Brando granted gaming company Electronic Arts the
rights to use his voice and image in a video game based on the Godfather
film and book and recorded voice-overs which closely resembled his role as
Don Corleone.
Brando's co-stars from The Godfather, James Caan and Robert Duvall,
will also reprise their roles for the video game, it was confirmed on
Wednesday.
(BBC) | 
Updated: 2005-02-03 09:39