Falco - The Violent Imagination

This could get nasty, this podcast with Ed Falco. Falco has written a violent book. It must be violent. It’s "The Family Corleone," the prequel to "The Godfather," by Mario Puzo.

But we don’t dwell on the violence in this interview. Because a source close to the great director of the movie version of "The Godfather," Francis Ford Coppola, told us Coppola never viewed "The Godfather" as a story primarily about the mafia. He viewed it as a story about family.

So in this podcast, we’re going to talk about family. About what we parents can learn from Vito Corleone’s mistakes. We're going to learn from Ed Falco (who got the blessing from the family of Mario Puzo) why Vito, who wanted his sons to go legit, led his family on a tragic path.

But we can’t avoid the violence. Because, as you’ll hear, author Ed Falco has a violent imagination.

Editor's note: Since we first published this interview, we've learned that the estate of Mario Puzo, the author of the original Godfather books, is seeking to keep Paramount pictures from producing any more Godfather films. It's part of an ongoing legal struggle between the studio and the Puzo estate that began in the 1960s. The latest battle in the ongoing fight between the two flared up after the Puzo estate licensed this new book, "The Family Corleone" by Ed Falco.