FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA INSINUATES HE SOLD HIS SOUL TO THE DEVIL TO MAKE "THE GODFATHER" ONE OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL MOVIES IN HISTORY!
What Coppola told me next, however, he says less frequently, and it perhaps reveals something more true, and less valedictory, about his ultimate feelings about the film and the effect it had on its maker. “I joke about this,” Coppola said, “but to hell what people think. The only way what happened could have happened is if, on that night, after the kid said, ‘Yeah, I guess so,’ and got on his bike, out of the bush, there was smoke and a little guy in a red suit who said, ‘How would you like The Godfather to be one of the most successful movies in history?’… And I said, ‘Well, what do I have to give?’ And he said, ‘You know what you have to give.’ And then he went away and I went to bed in Jimmy Caan's maid's room.”
Coppola stared at me with an expectant look, but I'm a little slow, I guess.
“What did you have to give?” I asked.
“What do you give the devil?” Coppola asked in return.
“Your soul?”
Coppola nodded. “Doesn't he always want your soul?”
“That's a joke,” he said, finally.
https://www.gq.com/story/francis-ford-coppola-50-years-after-the-godfather