Mafia Mamma director Catherine Hardwicke unpacks The Godfather Easter eggs
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Warning: This article contains spoilers about Mafia Mamma.
Making a mafia movie and including visual references to The Godfather? That was an offer director Catherine Hardwicke couldn't refuse.
When Hardwicke signed on to make Mafia Mamma, now playing in theaters, she knew that its comedic stylings had to also pay homage to the big-screen mobsters who are part of our cultural memory.
"I love The Godfather, I love Mean Streets," says Hardwicke. "I grew up watching all those mafia movies, and the drama is so high, the stakes are so high. You love the loyalty, the families. All of it is part of our collective consciousness. But of course, we aren't quite that dark because we are doing a feminine version of The Godfather. We don't have the gloomy lighting. We are doing a version where a woman wants to be in a rom-com. She wants to go to Italy and have fun and sex and romance and eat pasta. It's a great clash."
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The film follows a suburban mom from California, Kristin (Toni Collette), whose entire life is turned upside down when she learns she has inherited her Italian grandfather's winery, Balbano Wines — as well as the top seat of the family's criminal organization. With the current consigliere, Bianca (Monica Bellucci), at her side, Kristin learns what it takes to become a mafia don.
EW caught up with Hardwicke ahead of the film's debut to chat The Godfather Easter eggs, why the Twilight and Thirteen filmmaker has lately pivoted to comedy, and the particulars of filming murder by designer heels.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: How did Mafia Mamma come your way and what appealed to you about it?
CATHERINE HARDWICKE: I did another movie with Toni Collette and Drew Barrymore called Miss You Already. We did it in London. Toni and I got along, and that was a very comedic movie too. When she got this script, she sent it to me and said, "What do you think?" I was picturing her as Kristin as I'm reading the script. Then I was imagining Monica too, because I'd met Monica before. I love Monica. I'm like, "Oh, imagine these two together." And then they said, "We're shooting in Rome." Okay, how could I not? At this point in our life, when we've been through all the pandemic and so many serious political things and global crisis, the idea of being able to laugh and be entertained in an imaginative way, I thought, "This sounds fun. I want to do it. I want to laugh." And it has a message — we see a woman transforming through this story — so I just thought it had a great combination of things.
How much did The Godfather and its cinematic language influence your choices? Obviously, the poster typeface is the same. There's some direct nods in the storytelling, as well.
We have some little Easter eggs, like oranges, which are thematic in The Godfather. Something at the end is very similar.
There's also this running gag about how Kristen has never seen The Godfather. How do you toe that line of, "I'm going to make these visual references to it, but we will also explicitly acknowledge its existence within the story"?
That was a good challenge. I mean, it does seem true that everybody in those families has seen The Godfather and loved The Godfather. So I feel like it was actually pretty true and authentic. Plus, it was a funny gag that I laughed my head off when I read, that they were so upset that she hadn't seen The Godfather yet.
At one point, Kristin has to kill a rival mafia boss with only her stiletto heels for a weapon. Was that in the original script?
That was in the script. That was one of my favorite things when I read the script. Her rage, her frustration, her anger was emotionally building at being literally muted. [In the scene, Kristin's coworkers mute her over Zoom while she deals with the attacker.] Her voice was silenced. They put her on mute, they didn't even listen to what she said. They're pitching these hilarious, misogynistic jet ski ideas. But on the other hand, she's being physically assaulted by a rapist assassin. And then she's been trained in the Krav Maga class, "Crotch, Eye." So she uses that feminist symbol as the weapon of choice.
Obscured Pictures Toni Collette's Kristin becomes a mob boss in 'Mafia Mamma'
Walk me through choreographing and shooting that because killing someone with a shoe is an intimate, visceral experience.
Oh my God. Well, first of all, we had a selection of shoes to decide which shoe is the most lethal? So we had a beauty contest for the most dangerous shoes. Some shoes really do have that very thin steel stiletto heel, and they really are dangerous. You can really do some damage with it.
Oh, I know. I once jabbed a hole in my leg in a dressing room wearing a sharp heel.
S---! Okay, we should have had you as a consultant. I wanted to make a life mask of the person so we could have a real head that we could really get serious about. And I made a cast of the crotch area so that we could really get in there. You wanted to feel her rage, you know? Then we encouraged Toni to just get in there, put your frustration out, all those years of being less than and not seen, put it all into that stiletto. She was like a madwoman in that moment. She had a lot of fun with that scene. Then, of course, at the end she's got the blood on her and she's disheveled and she has to go back to the Zoom meeting, which I thought was hilarious.
One of my favorite moments in the film is that door closing on her family at the end in recreation of the end of The Godfather. Was that scripted or something you knew you wanted to do from day one?
We always wanted to have that homage. A lot of it was in the script, and then you watch the scene again with Diane Keaton and [you have to do it]. I'm so glad you picked up on it. We wanted to have that scene playing on a TV in the background so that everybody would get it, but we weren't allowed to use The Godfather. So only those that really know it pick up on it.
Were you trying to recreate the exact same angle of the shot or anything like that?
It was very challenging because we were in a tiny little hall that the door opened to — that door opened and you had like two feet. So we couldn't even match it in a million years. The DP and I were like, "Can we even do this?" Because those old villas, they're very strange. They have walls that are two feet thick and you can't touch anything. You can't change anything. So we had to make work what we could with what was there.
Obscured Pictures Toni Collette's Kristin and Monica Bellucci's Bianca stomp grapes in 'Mafia Mamma'
There's also the whole winery aspect of this. How much was that in your production process? Did you have to decide what kind of wines Balbano wines were going to make? Was there some sampling involved?
That is really a winery that's been in business for over 200 years where we filmed. They really make very high-quality wine. The owner — it's been in his family for generations — explained everything about the wine and being in those concrete vaults. The kegs upstairs that you see in the upstairs part, real wine is aging in there. Then we saw the real grapes in that vineyard. I did get a great education. When Toni and Monica are tasting the wine, trying to make it better, that's real wine made right there. It was pretty cool to learn all these processes. Different popes have drank wine from that winery.
What was your favorite part of being in Rome to shoot this?
I'm trained as an architect and I was a production designer. So, honestly, my eyeballs were popping out all the time because you have so many layers of history, anywhere you could point the camera. Getting to shoot on the Ponte Sant'Angelo bridge with the castle behind and you have the Vatican in the background, I'm like, "How could I be this lucky?" The villa where Toni is stomping the grapes, that is a villa that is on the Appian Way. They're standing on stones that have been there for 2,000 years. That tree's been there for, like, a thousand years. I loved every minute of it.
Would you want to do Mafia Mamma: Part 2 where we see Kristin more established in this world?
Yes. I would love to see how she and Monica and her lawyer, Jenny, played by Sophia Nomvete, are going to transform the crime family, make it maybe more humane, more fun. Kristin's already doing that. Wouldn't you love to see those three badasses running the business?
Mafia Mamma is currently playing in theaters.
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