Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas is a classic of the gangster genre, but when the movie was in development, Scorsese was unsure about it and was almost discouraged from making it, and among those who tried to convince him not to make Goodfellas was none other than Marlon Brando. The gangster genre has seen many now-classics of cinema in general, and one of the biggest names in this branch is Martin Scorsese, who has made some of the most notable mob movies ever, and the one considered his best is Goodfellas, released in 1990.
Based on the book Wiseguy, by Nicolas Pileggi, Goodfellas tells the story of Henry Hill (Ray Liotta), from his days as a teenager running errands for Paul Cicero (Paul Sorvino) and his crew to his full involvement with the Lucchese crime family and later his decision to become an FBI informant. Goodfellas was a critical success and earned a number of awards, most notably the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor thanks to Joe Pesci’s performance as the ruthless Tommy DeVito, and it’s still regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made.
Goodfellas has also impacted the gangster genre and is one of the most influential mob movies ever, so it’s hard to imagine it never happening. Goodfellas went through some obstacles during its development, beginning with Scorsese not intending to make more mob movies at the time, but he changed his mind about Goodfellas once he read Pileggi’s book. However, he was almost convinced by Marlon Brando to not move forward with Goodfellas as Scorsese hadn’t made a gangster movie in years, and so Brando told him to better keep it that way. Had Brando had his way, the history of modern cinema may have been very different.
In the book Made Men: The Story of Goodfellas, by Glenn Kenny (via CheatSheet), Scorsese shared that legendary actor Marlon Brando was pushing for him to not make another mob movie and thus leave Goodfellas aside. Scorsese explained that he was visiting Brando on an island in Tahiti, and at the time, he was unsure about making another gangster movie, as he hadn’t made one since Mean Streets in 1973. Scorsese recalled that Brando told him “you don’t wanna do that again”, and those words stuck with him until director Michael Powell convinced him to go ahead with Goodfellas.
Powell was married to Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese’s longtime editor, and it was she who read the script to Powell, who then told Scorsese he “must do this”. Scorsese shared that Powell’s words shifted him back into the energy and impulse he initially had to make Goodfellas, and so he moved forward with the project. Marlon Brando’s advice against Goodfellas might come off as strange given that he famously starred as Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather, though it can also be understandable as he went through the whole experience of making a gangster movie that became huge. Ultimately, Martin Scorsese made the right decision and Goodfellas finally happened, changing the gangster genre and marking the highest point in Scorsese’s career as a filmmaker.