Al Pacino is one of the most acclaimed actors in cinematic history,
but he didn't have an easy climb to fame. His tragic real-life story
includes a tough family life, a struggle with his craft, and even a temporary departure from acting.
Pacino's early years were no walk in the park. He was born in New
York City in 1940 and never got to enjoy a happy and steady two-parent home life,
as his parents separated when he was just two. In a 2015 interview with The Guardian,
he mentioned that his school teachers felt that he needed a father figure in his life,
as his own dad wasn't an active presence at that point. As Pacino described it,
"I wasn't an out-of-control teenager, but I was close."
When Pacino was growing up, he was surrounded by his mom,
his sister, and his grandparents. Even though they weren't well off financially, he still felt
lucky and got a chance to experience a life of adventure. As he told Interview Magazine,
"It was tough for me growing up, I will say. But pretty much my grandmother,
she ruled. And my mother was second. They were relatively young. My mother had me young. I
owe a lot to that period in my life. I owe a lot to those women and my grandfather."
Pacino has always felt indebted to his family for taking care of him in
those turbulent times and helping him become the person he was meant to be.
Pacino has also always been fascinated by the arts from a young age.
He would often take to performing wherever he was, even on the streets. In fact,
in his neighborhood he was known by the nickname of "The Actor." As he told The New Yorker in 2014,
"We'd act out parts from joke books and comic books. Kids make videos today,
but it was kind of an unusual thing then to get street urchins to join you in
acting out comics. Of course, it never got off the ground; there’s a comedy in there somewhere."
According to his old neighbor Ken Lipper,
"[Pacino] was full of drama."
Furthermore, he wasn't afraid to warm up to play different characters and would often experiment
out in public. He was also handsome. His looks and talent both got him noticed early on as girls in
the neighborhood admired him, calling him "Sonny Pacino, the lover bambino." On top of all that,
he was also witty, and he would use his acting skills to befriend other kids and confuse bullies,
something that definitely worked to his advantage.
It was almost like he was destined to become an acting legend.
"I had this ability to mimic. I would mimic the movies. I would mimic any of the current singers."
Pacino was intrigued enough by the arts to take a drama class when he was in junior high.
While helping his mom Rose run the house, he also got a chance to attend the High
School of Performing Arts in Manhattan. This was something his mother struggled
to come to terms with. Simply put, she wasn't pleased, as she told her son,
"Acting isn't for our kind of people. Poor people don't go into this."
Nevertheless, Pacino wasn't discouraged, as he was
determined to succeed and believed that he was a survivor. As he told The New Yorker,
"Survivors only hear what they want to hear."
He did experience a setback, though, when his stint at the high school turned out to be a
short one because the non-acting subjects were more rigorous than he had anticipated.
Spanish class, for instance, was actually held in Spanish. The style of teaching
didn't appeal to him either. He was too young for it. So he dropped out at the age of 16,
but he didn't give up on his future and he started focusing on auditioning and working on his craft.
When he was a struggling actor, Pacino didn't have a lot of money or connections,
but he was resilient enough to get through the tough times. As he explained to The Guardian,
"There were times when I was young when I could have used money: after college I was often
unemployed and at one time I slept in a storefront for a few days. But I’ve
never been materialistic. Except that I am, of course, because my lifestyle makes me a spender!"
It also helped that Pacino truly loved what he was learning. He would read voraciously and meet
all kinds of characters on the streets of downtown New York. It was also fortunate that he was young
and that poverty didn't seem like that big of a deal at that point in his life. He could survive
it with his youth and with the age-old street slice of pizza. As he told Interview Magazine,
"You just have yourself to deal with. A piece of pizza goes a long way [...] You could live
on anything at that age. It doesn't matter. You extract every bit of that piece of pizza."
His enthusiasm for acting didn't fade in the least
and he continued working on it as he learned to survive in the real world.
Pacino lived through loss at an early age. He was just 21 and struggling through his early
acting days when his 43-year-old mother passed away. It was a huge blow for someone who'd grown
up around mostly strong maternal figures, and he wasn't sure how to deal with it.
Before he could truly comprehend this loss, his grandfather James passed away the following year.
By 1962, he found himself struggling to make sense of it all. It was an incredibly difficult time
for him, indeed one of the worst periods he's ever lived through. As he told The New Yorker,
"And I had no father. I think that was my darkest period. I felt lost."
Despite what he was going through, Pacino didn't give up on his dream
as he learned to navigate uncharted territory and cope with loss. He continued looking for work,
getting through rejections and doing his best to try and land good roles.
"Tough getting through life. You gotta be tough, I guess. We're all tough."
When Pacino was 23, he benefited from joining the Actors Studio, where he evolved as an actor
and polished his skills under the guidance of Studio director Lee Strasberg. But Pacino
knew he wasn't like his contemporaries who came from privileged backgrounds.
He felt inadequate and different because of that. As he told The Telegraph in 2015,
"I knew I was this vagabond kid."
Pacino realized that as an Italian-American, he didn't look like his fellow actors at the
auditions he went to. He felt like an outcast, but he didn't let that bring him down,
as he knew he needed to be patient for the right gig to come along. But he nevertheless found
himself struggling and filled with self-doubt at times. When he started working on the play
Creditors alongside actors who'd received classical training, he worried he couldn't
go through with it and wanted to leave the show. Luckily for him, director Charlie Laughton was
there to quell his fears and doubts. Sticking with the hard material of Creditors proved to
be so transformative for Pacino that an image of him in the play still sits on his mantelpiece.
Pacino wasn't always lucky. To get into Broadway and the movies, he had to work hard and it took
quite a bit of time before he got opportunities that paid off. Even being a part of productions
was taxing for him at times, especially as he worried about connecting with his audience.
For example, while performing in his Off-Off Broadway debut, he found himself tearing up during
the intermission, convinced that the performance wasn't working. Charlie Laughton counseled him
through it, and he decided to go back to his performance. As Pacino recalled to The New Yorker,
"It was a very important moment for me. I went back in there and finished the run."
Before Broadway, getting to the point where Pacino could bag roles meant milking
every opportunity that came along. He would put up plays in cafes with his
peers and focus on making the most of what he had. As he told Inquirer.net in 2020,
"We passed the hat around after each performance. Somebody would drop in coins here and there.
That's how we ate. And it was right in New York City."
He added that the experiences he lived through helped him to hone his creativity
and understand the importance of cultivating the desire to grow and do new things.
Pacino has often turned to alcohol to cope with his struggles. In fact, he had his first drink
when he was just a teen. Being the Method actor that he is, he found himself feeling
overwhelmed after his performances and felt the need to reward himself. He liked the way alcohol
made him feel, but it eventually started getting in the way of his relationships.
When he was dating fellow actor Jill Clayburgh and had one of his binges, he was barely able
to focus on anything around him. She told him that she was lonesome, but he was too drunk to hear it.
Pacino wasn't able to kick his addiction for a long time,
but his loved ones eventually knew that it could no longer be avoided. In 1977,
he finally acknowledged his drinking problem thanks to his friends and made a decision to
get sober. In the biography Al Pacino: A Life On The Wire, he's quoted as saying,
"My friends finally made me realize that drinking was an addiction. After each show,
I felt entitled to a reward, but now it's ice cream and Oreo cookies!"
"How did you defeat alcoholism?"
"Well, I didn't defeat it. One doesn't look at it that way."
"How long are you sober?"
"All I can say is- I'm never sober."
It's safe to say that Al Pacino played one of the most iconic roles in cinema as Michael Corleone
in the Godfather trilogy. But he almost didn't land the part. In fact, other actors such as
Robert Redford, Warren Beatty, Jack Nicholson, and Ryan O'Neal were being considered for the role.
Luckily for Pacino, though, Mario Puzo, who wrote the Godfather novel,
was keen to listen to director Francis Ford Coppola, who was set on casting Pacino.
However, Pacino still almost lost the part when he showed up hungover at the screen test without
having learned his lines. It took him three attempts to deliver his dialogue, and he was
left feeling agitated after the experience. A bit of back and forth ensued, and Pacino
was finally offered the part. There was still one snag, though, as it conflicted with another role
he'd agreed to do a few months earlier. He had to lobby hard and pull a few strings to get out of
the sticky situation. After he finally landed the role, for which he earned a flat fee of $35,000,
he spent time thinking about how to do it justice. As he explained to The New Yorker,
"I didn't see Michael as a gangster. I saw his struggle as something that was connected to his
intelligence, that innate sense of what's around and being able to adjust to things."
"It just wasn't enough time, Michael. Wasn't enough time."
"We'll get there, Pop. We'll get there."
Al Pacino may be an iconic film legend, but he's clearly witnessed his share of
highs and lows during his career. For example, his 1985 film Revolution was a
much-anticipated project that ended up flopping. He later said of the movie,
"Nobody saw this film, but we love it and we hung
in for the next 20 years and changed this movie a little."
Revolution's failure was a major letdown and something that affected Pacino on a personal
level. Afterwards, he decided to step away from films for four years, as he needed to
take a break and reflect. But eventually he had to return because he was going broke and
his then-girlfriend Diane Keaton pushed him to get back out there with the 1989 thriller Sea of Love.
Amidst all the struggles, Pacino's passion for acting has never subsided.
He believes that if the passion is still there, a person should keep doing what they've been doing.
As he told The Guardian in 2015,
"I believe I have reached my stride, which is why I persist.
As long as you have passion for the art, keep working, because age catches up with you."
"Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."
Check out one of our newest videos right here! Plus,
even more Grunge videos about your favorite stars are coming soon.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one.