Carmela Corleone

Casting

Jazz singer Morgana King had never acted before playing Carmela Corleone opposite Marlon Brando in The Godfather. Her parents were Sicilian-born, and she had to be talked into taking the part, which she got without auditioning. In the first film she had no dialogue but sang "Luna Mezz'o Mare" in Italian during a wedding scene. Francesca De Sapio played a younger Carmela in The Godfather Part II. King refused to lie in a coffin for the character's death scene due to superstition, so Francis Ford Coppola's mother played the corpse instead.

Character biography

Carmela was born in Sicily in 1897 and immigrated to the United States after the turn of the century. She married Vito Corleone in 1915, and they were married for 40 years until his death in 1955. They had four children: Sonny, Fredo, Michael, and Connie, and also took in Sonny's friend Tom Hagen, who became the family consigliere. In the novel, Carmela speaks broken English, but in the films she speaks fluent English with a New York accent.

She develops a close relationship with Michael's girlfriend Kay in the novel. In The Godfather Part II, she confronts Connie about her behavior and discusses family life with Michael, who fears losing his family as Don. Carmela dies near the end of the sequel. She was disturbed by Vito's transformation into a ruthless criminal but forgave him, seeing him as a good man devoted to family. A devout Catholic, she attended Mass daily to pray for her husband's soul.