Nic Cage's father dies at 75
Actor Nicolas Cage's father, August Coppola, has died at the age of 75.
Coppola, a literature professor, was the brother of director Francis Ford Coppola and uncle of film-maker Sofia.
A spokeswoman for Cage, Annett Wolf, said August died on Tuesday after a heart attack. He was dean of creative arts at San Francisco State University.
Cage spoke about why his dad chose literature and not film earlier this year. "My father, who I think was being groomed to be a medical doctor, always had an interest in books," he said. "He was just interested in literature and philosophy and that was his calling. That was before Francis decided that he was going to be a film-maker."
Cage said his father was the oldest of three children. "Carmine, my grandfather, came to America [from Italy] and it was really because of his skills as a flautist - he was a first chair flautist for Toscanini - that we kind of came out of ... almost like a poverty situation. So it was the arts that did that."
In addition to Cage, August is survived by two other sons and five grandchildren.
