Victor Rietti

Victor Rietti (29 February 1888 - 3 December 1963) was an Italian-born actor and director who achieved fame in television. He was knighted by the Italian government.

Career

Born in Ferrara, Italy in 1888 to a wealthy family, Vittorio Rietti was the eleventh of twelve children born to Samuele and Lucia Rietti. At the age of 13 he was discovered by the great Italian tragedian actor Tommaso Salvini while partaking in a charity performance. Salvini encouraged the boy to make the stage his career and it was under Salvini that he studied acting.

Rietti made his debut playing in Shakespeare at Bologna. At age 19 he had the distinction of being juvenile lead to the famous Eleonora Duse in her company. But his parents, who wanted him to pursue his musical talents, had him resume his studies and Vittorio studied violin at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. Studying together with him in Brussels was his cousin Vittorio Rieti (who went on to a highly successful career as a Broadway composer). He formed his own band the Rietti String Players with considerable success. He served in the Italian Army during the First World War.

After World War I Rietti resumed his stage career. In 1921 he founded Drama Players Theater (Later called Teatro Italiano and still later International Theater) which he ran for 40 years, producing popular Italian plays of the time. He would personally translate and adapt these plays into English and play the lead. He often cast his son Bobby Rietti (a popular child actor who went on to a successful career of his own under the name Robert Rietty) in these plays. On the side he taught acting, among his pupils were Ida Lupino, June Duprez and his son Bobby Rietti. His other son, Ronald Rietti, later became a film director and producer. Vittorio made his first motion picture in 1933, credited as Victor Rietti. He would make some 36 motion pictures, most notably as Beppo in Sinfonia Fatale 1946 - the first American motion picture to be shot entirely in Italy. He made a cameo appearance in Come Fly with Me (1963) which would be his last picture. He also broadcast in some 43 radio plays.

Stardom

With the beginning of television in the early 50's he scored his first major success in the 1951 television production of To Live in Peace, playing the lead role, the lovable priest Don Geronimo Bonaparte, uncle of Napoleon - a part he previously played on the stage in one of his own productions. He had personally translated the Italian play by Giovacchino Forzano and adapted it for television. The television play won critical acclaim being voted best play of 1951. Rietti himself was given the critics’ Oscar for best television actor of 1951 for his performance.

Due to popular demand, To Live in Peace was shot live again for television in early 1952 (BBC), 1956 (RAI), and again in 1957 (BBC), and was broadcast for radio as well in 1953 and 1956 with Rietti repeating his performance in all six productions, and his son Robert Rietty playing the part of Maso. In addition NBC's prestigious Kraft Theatre televised a special color broadcast of To Live in Peace in 1953 - the first of only two color broadcasts Kraft Theatre did in its eleven year run. CBC Television televised it in 1957. Rietti's television success with To Live in Peace led to his touring the continent with the play for Ralph Reader. Samuel French bought the book rights to play, and published it in 1952. Producer Sydney Box planned a motion picture of the play starring Rietti which never evolved. Eleven additional radio productions of the play were broadcast around the world. Rietti's overnight success led to his surprise appearance on the televised gala special Life Begins at Sixty and established him as a lead actor in television.

His success in television continued, his most memorable performances being the title role in The Wanderer (1952) and Professor Toti in Against The Stream (1959), both lead roles of Italian plays he had translated and adapted for television. For American television he guest starred with his son Robert Rietty in The Jack Benny Program (1957) in which he played two roles, and Harry's Girls (1963), both directed by his good friend Ralph Levy, director of the first I Love Lucy show, as well as The Burns and Allen Show.

Later Life

On July 23rd 1959, Victor Rietti and his son Robert were knighted with the title of Cavaliere by the Italian Government for their contribution to the Italian entertainment industry, and in particular for translating and adapting a great many popular Italian plays into English. When he had only been 35 years old he had been given six months to live by his doctors due to a heart condition. On December 3rd 1963, some 40 years later, he suffered a fatal heart attack. His life story was dramatized in the BBC radio play Papa Rietti.