Having contracted polio as a boy, Coppola was bedridden for large periods of his childhood, allowing him to indulge his imagination with homemade puppet theater productions. Reading "A Streetcar Named Desire" at age 15 was instrumental in developing his interest in theater. Eager to be involved in film, he created 8mm features edited from home movies with such titles as "The Rich Millionaire" and "The Lost Wallet." As a child, Coppola was a mediocre student, but he was so interested in technology and engineering that his friends nicknamed him "Science". Trained initially for a career in music, he became proficient on the tuba and won a music scholarship to the New York Military Academy. In all, Coppola attended 23 other schools before he eventually graduated from Great Neck North High School. He entered Hofstra College in 1955 with a major in theater arts. There he was awarded a scholarship in playwriting. This furthered his interest in directing theater despite the disapproval of his father, who wanted him to study engineering. Coppola was profoundly impressed after seeing Sergei Eisenstein's "", especially with the movie's quality of editing. It was at this time Coppola decided he would go into cinema rather than theater. Coppola says he was tremendously influenced to become a writer early on by his brother, August. Coppola also gives credit to the work of Elia Kazan and for its influence on him as a director. Amongst Coppola's classmates at Hofstra were James Caan, Lainie Kazan, and radio artist Joe Frank. He later cast Lainie Kazan in "One from the Heart" and Caan in "The Rain People" and "The Godfather".