In the mid-1980s, Al Pacino was in a relationship with Diane Keaton when he realized he was facing financial difficulties. Despite the critical and commercial success of The Godfather, Pacino only earned about $35,000 from the film.
“When I finished The Godfather, I was broke—though I had never really had much money, I now owed some,” he writes. “My manager and agents took their cuts from my salary, and I had to rely on support from Jill Clayburgh.”
While he made more from The Godfather II in 1974 and significantly more from Scarface in 1983, Pacino did not manage his finances well. His career had also slowed, with only five films released throughout the 1980s.
“I had about ninety grand in the bank, and that was it,” the now 84-year-old actor shares in his new memoir, Sonny Boy. “I had a lifestyle to maintain, including a country home I didn’t want to give up. I was spending without earning; I was putting out but not bringing in.”
He reflects, “I could blame others my accountants, my manager Mary Bregman, who put me in a bad tax shelter or I could take responsibility for my own actions.”
When Pacino and Keaton approached his entertainment lawyer about his financial woes, Keaton erupted, demanding, “Do you know who he is?” As the lawyer began to respond, she interrupted, saying, “Yeah, you’re going to tell me, ‘Oh, he’s an artist.’ No. He. Is. An idiot.”
“He’s an ignoramus,” she continued. “When it comes to this, you’ve got to take care of him.”
Pacino acknowledges Keaton was right. “I didn’t understand how money worked,” he admits, “just as I didn’t grasp how a career worked. It was a language I simply didn’t speak.”
Encouraged by Keaton to return to acting, his first project was Sea of Love. The 1989 cop thriller, co-starring Ellen Barkin, received critical acclaim and became a major success, marking Pacino’s return since 1985’s Revolution.
However, he reveals he didn’t earn much from the film because he lacked an “appropriate back end.” “They knew I had been out of the game for four years, so they didn’t need to offer me a sweet deal,” he explains.
