JC/GF

There are many connections and similarities that can be drawn from comparing William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar to Francis Ford Copola’s “The Godfather”, most notably in similar characters and group dynamics.

Julius Caesar is murdered by conspiring senators and a New York mob family attempted to murder Don Corleone. Planning Caesar’s murder is what brings Brutus into the group of conspiring senators, while it is Don Corleone’s near death experience that brings Michael Corleone into the family business. Both Brutus and Michael are heroes, very logical about their thoughts and actions, yet both experiencing a fall. This character can be contrasted against Mark Antony and Sony Corleone because they’re lack of seriousness. They are both playboys: Antony parties and engages in sports, while Sonny gets mixed up with drugs and sleeps around.

The group of senators is similar to the Corleone family. The senators are of an elite class of Romans, and many have familial relations to one another. There is also a strong sentiment of love that senators speak of to one another. In the Corleone family, certainly there is a main family with the Don, Michael, and Sonny, who are blood related. There are also many people included in this family who are not blood related, but called brothers and uncles. They similarly talk of love between men in this group. The group of senators has an allegiance to Rome, while the Corleone family also has an allegiance to their home in Italy, despite having immigrated to America.

The similar characters and group dynamics in these two dramatic pieces demonstrate that Julius Caesar could have had a strong influence on “The Godfather”.