Al Pacino's financial downfall: 16 cars, 23 phones, and $400K on a house he never used

In the mid-1980s, Al Pacino was in a relationship with Diane Keaton when he realized he was financially struggling.

Although The Godfather had been both a critical and commercial triumph, Pacino did not earn a substantial paycheck from it, reportedly making just $35,000 for the film.

"When I finished making The Godfather, I was broke, not that I had ever had any money, but now I owed money," he writes. "My manager and agents got their cuts of my salary while I had to live on support from Jill Clayburgh."

Pacino earned more from 1974’s The Godfather II and significantly more from 1983’s Scarface, but he had not managed his finances wisely.

His career had also slowed down, as he only appeared in five films throughout the 1980s.

"I had about ninety grand in the bank and that was it," the now 84-year-old actor writes in his new memoir Sonny Boy. "I had a lifestyle to boot. I had my home in the country, which I didn’t want to give up. I was spending and not earning; I was putting out but I wasn’t bringing in."

He continues, "I could say I got taken advantage of. I could blame my accountants. I could blame [my manager] Mary Bregman, who had put me into some sort of tax shelter that went south. I could blame myself, but then I’d have to take responsibility for my own actions."

Pacino and Keaton went to his entertainment lawyer to discuss his financial troubles, when Keaton suddenly became enraged and shouted at the lawyer: "Do you know who he is?"

When the lawyer began to respond, the Baby Boom star interrupted again.

"Yeah, you’re going to tell me, 'Oh, he’s an artist. No. He. Is. An idiot," she thundered.

"He’s an ignoramus," she continued. "When it comes to this, you’ve got to take care of him."

Pacino acknowledges that Keaton was correct.

"I didn’t understand how money worked," he admits, "any more than I understood how a career worked. It was a language I just didn’t speak."

Keaton pushed Pacino to return to acting, and his first project was Sea of Love.

The 1989 cop thriller, co-starring Ellen Barkin, received critical praise and became a massive success. It was also Pacino’s first movie since 1985’s Revolution.

However, Pacino reveals that he didn’t earn much from the film because he had no "appropriate back end … They knew I had been out of commission for four years, so they didn’t have to cut that sweet a deal."