“I had zero control”: Did Nicolas Cage ruin his brother’s directing career?
Christopher Coppola couldn’t believe his eyes. After a lifetime living in the shadow of his family name, synonymous with prestige cinema, thanks to his uncle Francis Ford Coppola, he had finally fought his way into the director’s chair of his own Hollywood movie. He wrote a script with substantial input from his famous brother, Nicolas Cage, who agreed to star in a supporting role in the low-budget endeavour. Everything looked promising until Cage turned up on day one, and Christopher had to do a double-take.
To his horror, Cage had arrived on the Deadfall set wearing a ridiculously phoney wig, dark sunglasses, and a rubbery prosthetic nose, none of which had been discussed with Christopher prior to this appearance. The latter had imagined Cage playing mobster Eddie King with genuine menace, but got a sinking feeling in his stomach when he realised his brother intended to use the role as one of his infamous acting experiments.
In the late 1980s and early ’90s, Cage had a habit of going into business for himself by throwing caution to the wind and playing his characters with absurd, bizarre ticks and afflictions. He didn’t care much for realism, which worked perfectly when he played characters like Peter Loew in Vampire’s Kiss or ‘Hi’ McDunnough in Raising Arizona. One of those guys believed he was turning into a vampire, and the other existed in something akin to a live-action Looney Tunes episode, so Cage’s eccentric choices fit the bill.
However, Christopher couldn’t figure out why his brother had decided to get so weird with King in a movie that was ostensibly set in the real world. When he asked him what the deal was with his getup, his brother exclaimed, “I’m just fuckin’ Joe Namath, man!” referring to the iconic NFL star. This didn’t really explain a whole lot, especially as Cage’s look and resulting performance were more in line with iconic comedian Andy Kaufman’s scuzzball alter-ego Tony Clifton. That part of Kaufman’s act was lewd, abrasive, and controversial, and it appeared as if Cage was going for a similar vibe.
Unfortunately for the fledgling director, by this point, his brother was already an established movie star, and he was effectively appearing in Deadfall as a favour. The young helmer needed a few big names attached to his low-budget noir after original star Val Kilmer dropped out, which in turn slashed the budget in half, so he was beholden to whatever Cage wanted to do.
“I had zero control,” he admitted in Zach Schonfeld’s How Coppola Became Cage.
How did the film affect Christopher’s career?
Throughout the film’s shoot, Christopher watched on helplessly as his brother chewed the scenery with reckless abandon. When asked what it was like working with Cage, he admitted it was “difficult” and noted, “He basically did whatever he wanted”. He fought with him a couple of times about his sunglasses, imploring him to take them off “so the audience could see his tortured, sad clown eyes, which would help explain why he was so over the top”, but to no avail. “He stomped his feet like a bratty little brother,” Christopher recalled with a sigh. Ultimately, Cage only agreed to remove them in two scenes, which the director confessed, “didn’t really help”.
All he could do was hold out hope that the performance could be edited into the final film without sticking out too badly like a sore thumb, but this wasn’t to be. Cage’s incongruous turn was all many critics could talk about, and the film was utterly savaged, with the former being dubbed “the Ed Wood of the Coppola family”. In fact, the situation was so dire that his lawyer advised him to lie low for two years before even attempting to get another movie off the ground, and, in the end, Christopher never made another mainstream Hollywood film again.
Naturally, this debacle strained the relationship between the siblings, who had always had a love-hate bond anyway. At one point, they didn’t speak for a full decade, and as of 2025, they’re back on non-speaking terms. Christopher still believes his brother is a masterful actor, though, and he’s come around slightly to the Deadfall performance’s wacky charms over the years. However, the experience still left a lasting dent on their kinship.
It’s perhaps best summed up by something Christopher once told the Godfather and Apocalypse Now-directing uncle, whose legacy towers over the entire family: “I really wish I’d never made that friggin’ movie. It’s just been a curse, and people bring it up all the time.”
“I’ve done so many more things in my life,” he lamented, “helping people and teaching, and films I like so much more. I wonder why my brother did that to me?” Once he was finished pouring his heart out, Francis, who has always had his own contentious relationship with Cage, could only wearily offer, “Well, that’s what you get when you hire Nic Cage”.
