Lionsgate apologizes for new Coppola film trailer containing fake quotes from dead critics

Lionsgate recalled its new trailer for Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis on Wednesday amid revelations that critics’ quotes were fabricated.

“Lionsgate is immediately recalling our trailer for Megalopolis,” a Lionsgate spokesperson said in a statement to The Associated Press. “We offer our sincere apologies to the critics involved and to Francis Ford Coppola and American Zoetrope for this inexcusable error in our vetting process. We screwed up. We are sorry.”

The trailer, released earlier Wednesday, included quotes from critics like Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert of other Coppola films that did not actually appear in their reviews. The intent, it seems, was to highlight the critical divisiveness of now-classics like The Godfather and Apocalypse Now, leaning into some of the more negative reactions to Megalopolis, the self-financed $120 million US epic opening in September.

The trailer attributed a quote to Kael that The Godfather was “diminished by its artsiness.” But Kael loved The Godfather, and this phrase was not used in her March 1972 review of the film for The New Yorker. Ebert also did not write that Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula was “a triumph of style over substance.” Quotes from Rex Reed and Vincent Canby, about Apocalypse Now, did not appear in their reviews either.

The quotes are preceded by narration from Laurence Fishburne, who appeared in Apocalypse Now.

“True genius is often misunderstood,” says Fishburne.

WATCH l The trailer in question:

With the exception of Reed and Owen Glieberman, the critics cited died several years ago, including Andrew Sarris, John Simon and Stanley Kauffmann.

Current film critic Bilge Ebiri of New York magazine’s Vulture culture section questioned the veracity of the quotes in an article published before the Lionsgate statement.

“Taking on critics might be an exciting and cathartic marketing tactic, but I suspect Megalopolis will need critics championing it when it actually comes out,” Ebiri said. “And making up fake quotes from our heroes is probably not the best way to get us on your side.”

Megalopolis has been decades in the making, and it received mixed reviews upon its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year.

The film, starring Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel and Giancarlo Esposito, is set to have its North American premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) on Sept. 9.