uproar. Kay claims to Michael that she actually had an abortion, not a miscarriage, and that she intends to leave him and take their children. Outraged, Michael strikes Kay, banishes her from the family, and takes sole custody of the children. Carmela dies sometime later, and Michael hurries to wrap up loose ends. At the funeral, Michael appears to forgive Fredo at Connie's behest, but exchanges a glance with Corleone enforcer Al Neri suggesting that Fredo is to be killed. Soon afterward, Neri shoots Fredo dead while the two are fishing, as Michael watches from his den. Roth is forced to return to the United States after being refused asylum and entry to Israel. On Michael's orders, Roth is assassinated by Corleone caporegime Rocco Lampone during an interview at the Miami International Airport; Lampone is killed in turn by a federal agent while attempting to flee the scene. At Pentangeli's compound, Hagen visits and the two discuss how failed plotters against the Roman emperor often committed suicide in return for clemency for their families; Pentangeli is later found dead in his bathtub, having slit his wrists. Kay visits her children; as she is saying goodbye, Michael arrives and closes the door on her. The film ends with a flashback to Vito's 50th birthday party, occurring on the same day that the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor. While the family waits to surprise Vito, Michael announces that he has dropped out of college and joined the Marines, angering Sonny and Hagen; Fredo is the only member of the family to support his decision. Back in the present, Michael sits alone at the family compound, looking out over the lake. Cast Production Development Puzo started writing a script for a sequel in December 1971, before The Godfather was even released; its initial title was The Death of Michael Corleone. Coppola's idea for the sequel would be to "juxtapose the ascension of the family under Vito Corleone with the decline of the family under his son Michael... I had always wanted to write a screenplay that told the story of a father and a son at the same age. They were both in their thirties and I would integrate the two stories... In order not to merely make Godfather I over again, I gave Godfather II this double structure by extending the story in both the past and in the present." Coppola originally wanted