Eleanor Coppola, an American filmmaker who won an Emmy for chronicling her husband Francis Ford Coppola‘s taxing 238-day production of “Apocalypse Now” in her documentary “Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse,” died Friday at her home in Rutherford, Calif. She was 87.
Coppola’s death was confirmed in a statement by the Coppola family to the Associated Press.
A lifelong creative partner to her husband Francis, Eleanor Coppola took up filmmaking during the production of his Vietnam war feature “Apocalypse Now.” A highly anticipated follow-up to “The Godfather: Part II,” the planned five-month Philippines shoot more than doubled in length due to a litany of headaches and complications, including initial star Harvey Keitel’s replacement with Martin Sheen, typhoons wrecking sets, a reworked ending and Sheen’s hospitalization due to a heart attack.
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