John Cazale
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| John Cazale | |
 John Cazale (far right) in The Godfather |
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| Born | August 12, 1935 Boston, Massachusetts, USA |
| Died | March 12, 1978, aged 42 New York City, New York, USA |
John Cazale, born John Frank Charles Casali (August 12, 1935 – March 12, 1978) was a distinguished Golden Globe Award nominated American film and stage actor whose brief career spanned several acclaimed films of the 1970s.
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[edit] Biography
An Italian American, Cazale was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He studied drama at Oberlin College and Boston University, and was very good friends with Al Pacino as a teenager. He moved to New York City and worked as a messenger for an oil company, while working as an off-Broadway actor and auditioning for film and television projects. He is remembered not only for his roles, but also for helping discover his childhood friend Pacino, fellow theater actor Robert De Niro, and his fiancée at the time of his death, Meryl Streep.
Cazale's was cited as a "Distinguished Performance" by the Off-Broadway Obie Awards for the 1967-68 season for his performance in Israel Horovitz's play "The Indian Wants the Bronx." Cazale made his big screen debut, alongside old friend Al Pacino, as Fredo Corleone in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather. The film broke box office records and made Pacino, Cazale and several of their previously unknown co-stars famous. Cazale again starred alongside Pacino in Sidney Lumet's Dog Day Afternoon (for which he received a Golden Globe nomination), and reprised his role as Fredo in The Godfather Part II. During this time, he also starred with Gene Hackman in Coppola's The Conversation.
[edit] Death
Despite being diagnosed with bone cancer, Cazale continued to work, his final appearance being with his then fiancée Meryl Streep, whom he met on the set of his fifth film, The Deer Hunter. When distributor Universal Studios learned of Cazale's illness, they were reluctant to insure him, but Streep and director Michael Cimino went to bat for him and won out. Cazale did not live to see the release of the film, and thus never learned that every feature in which he starred had received an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture. No other actor with multiple films to his credit has such a distinction.
[edit] Legacy
Today, Cazale is the only actor with multiple roles to have all of his feature films listed on the Internet Movie Database Top 250. In spite of the desperate, violent characters he played in a handful of films, he was by all accounts a kind and gentle person off screen - described by those close to him to be "often shy" and "very emotionally sensitive", and a close friend of many actors he worked with. Good friend and frequent co-star Pacino collaborated with him on three films and various theater productions, and referred to him as "his acting partner."
Years after his death he appeared in a sixth feature film, The Godfather Part III (1990) in archive footage. The Godfather Part III was also nominated for Best Picture. Most recently, Cazale's image was used for The Godfather video game, as his character, Fredo. He has a theater named after him, the McGinn/Cazale Theatre, located at 2162 Broadway at 76th Street, above the Promenade Theatre on the fourth floor.
[edit] Filmography
| Date | Film | Role |
|---|---|---|
| March 15, 1972 | The Godfather | Fredo Corleone |
| April 7, 1974 | The Conversation | Stan |
| December 12, 1974 | The Godfather: Part II | Fredo Corleone |
| September 21, 1975 | Dog Day Afternoon | Salvatore "Sal" Naturile |
| December 8, 1978 | The Deer Hunter | Stanley "Stosh" |
