Vittorio Gassman

Vittorio Gassman, Knight Grand Cross, OMRI (born Vittorio Gassmann; 1 September 1922 – 29 June 2000), popularly known as Il Mattatore, was an Italian theatre and film actor, as well as director.

He is considered one of the greatest Italian actors and is commonly recalled as an extremely professional, versatile, magnetic interpreter, whose long career includes both important productions as well as dozens of divertissements (which made him greatly popular).

Biography

Early life

He was born in Genoa to a German father, Heinrich Gassmann, and a Pisan Jewish mother, Luisa Ambron. While still very young he moved to Rome, where he studied at the Accademia Nazionale d'Arte Drammatica.

Career

Gassman's debut was in Milan, in 1942, with Alda Borelli in Niccodemi's Nemica (theatre). He then moved to Rome and acted at the Teatro Eliseo joining Tino Carraro and Ernesto Calindri in a team that remained famous for some time; with them he acted in a range of plays from bourgeois comedy to sophisticated intellectual theatre. In 1946, he made his film debut in Preludio d'amore, while only one year later he appeared in five films. In 1948 he played in Riso amaro.

It was with Luchino Visconti's company that Gassman achieved his mature successes, together with Paolo Stoppa, Rina Morelli and Paola Borboni. He played Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams' Un tram che si chiama desiderio (A Streetcar Named Desire), as well as in As You Like It (by Shakespeare) and Oreste (by Vittorio Alfieri). He joined the Teatro Nazionale with Tommaso Salvini, Massimo Girotti, Arnoldo Foà to create a successful Peer Gynt (by Henrik Ibsen). With Luigi Squarzina in 1952 he co-founded and co-directed the Teatro d'Arte Italiano, producing the first complete version of Hamlet in Italy, followed by rare works such as Seneca's Thyestes and Aeschylus's The Persians.

In 1956 Gassman played the title role in a production of Othello. He was so well received by his acting in the television series entitled Il Mattatore (Spotlight Chaser) that "Il Mattatore" became the nickname that accompanied him for the rest of his life. Gassman's debut in the commedia all'italiana genre was rather accidental, in Mario Monicelli's I soliti ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street, 1958). Famous movies featuring Gassman include: Il sorpasso (1962), La Grande Guerra (1962), I mostri (1963), L'Armata Brancaleone (1966), Profumo di donna (1974) and C'eravamo tanto amati (1974).

He directed Adelchi, a lesser-known work by Alessandro Manzoni. Gassman brought this production to half a million spectators, crossing Italy with his Teatro Popolare Itinerante (a newer edition of the famous Carro di Tespi). His productions have included many of the famous authors and playwrights of the 20th century, with repeated returns to the classics of Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky and the Greek tragicians. He also founded a theatre school in Florence (Bottega Teatrale di Firenze), which educated many of the more talented actors of the current generation of Italian thespians.

In cinema, he worked frequently both in Italy and abroad. He met and fell in love with American actress Shelley Winters while she was touring Europe with fiancé Farley Granger. When Winters was forced to return to Hollywood to fulfill contractual obligations, he followed her there and married her. With his natural charisma and his fluency in English he scored a number of roles in Hollywood, including Rhapsody with Elizabeth Taylor and The Glass Wall before returning to Italy and the theatre. While rehearsing Hamlet, he began an affair with Anna Maria Ferrero, his 16-year-old Ophelia, which ended his marriage to Winters. He and Winters were forced to work together on Mambo just as their marriage was unraveling, providing fodder for tabloids all over the world. He later voiced Mufasa in the Italian version of The Lion King.

Personal life

Gassman married three actresses: Nora Ricci (with whom he had Paola, an actress and wife of Ugo Pagliai); Shelley Winters (mother of his daughter Vittoria); and Diletta D'Andrea, by whom he had a son, Jacopo. In addition, he had an affair with actress Juliette Maynel (mother of his son Alessandro, also an actor). In the 1990s he took part in the popular TV show Tunnel in which he very formally and "seriously"' recited documents such as utility bills, yellow pages and similar trivial texts, such as washing instructions for a woollen sweater or cookies ingredients. He rendered them with the same professional skill that made him famous while reciting Dante's Divine Comedy.

On 29 June 2000, Gassman died of a heart attack at his home in Rome, aged 77.

Filmography

Actor

• Preludio d'amore (Love Prelude, 1946)
• Le avventure di Pinocchio (The Adventures of Pinocchio, 1947)
• Il cavaliere misterioso (The Mysterious Rider, 1947)
• Daniele Cortis (1947)
• L'ebreo errante (1947) aka The Wandering Jew, (1947)
• La Figlia del capitano (The Captain's Daughter, 1947)
• Riso amaro (Bitter Rice, 1948)
• Ho sognato il paradiso (Streets of Sorrow, 1949)
• The Wolf of the Sila (1949)
• Lo sparviero del Nilo (1949)
• Il tradimento (1949)
• Una voce nel tuo cuore (1949)
• I fuorilegge, (The Outlaws, 1950)
• Il leone di Amalfi (1950)
• Anna (1951)
• La corona negra (1951)
• Il sogno di Zorro (1952)
• Sombrero (1953)
• The Glass Wall (1953)
• Cry of the Hunted (1953)
• Mambo (1954)
• Rhapsody (1954)
• La donna più bella del mondo (1955)
• Difendo il mio amore (1956)
• Giovanni dalle Bande Nere (1956)
• Kean (1956)
• War and Peace (1956)
• La ragazza del palio (1957)
• La tempesta (1958)
• I soliti ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street, 1958)
• Audace colpo dei soliti ignoti (Hold-up à la milanaise, 1959)
• La cambiale (1959)
• The Great War (1959)
• The Miracle (1959)
• Le sorprese dell'amore (1959)
• Crimen (Killing in Monte Carlo, 1960)
• Il Mattatore (1960)
• Barabbas (1961)
• Anima nera (1961)
• I briganti italiani (1961)
• Fantasmi a Roma (Ghosts of Rome, 1961)
• A Difficult Life (1961)
• The Last Judgement (1961)
• L'amore difficile (Sex Can Be Difficult, 1962)
• Il giorno più corto (1962)
• La Marcia su Roma (March on Rome, 1962)
• Il Sorpasso (The Easy Life, 1962)
• Frenesia dell'estate (1963)
• La Smania addosso (1963)
• Il Successo (1963)
• I Mostri (1963)
• La Congiuntura (Hard Time for Princes, 1964)
• Il Gaucho (1964)
• Se permettete parliamo di donne (Let's Talk About Women, 1964)
• Slalom (1965)
• Una Vergine per il Principe (Virgin for the Prince, 1965)
• The Dirty Game (1965)
• L'Arcidiavolo (Devil in Love, 1966)
• L'Armata Brancaleone (1966)
• Le piacevoli notti (1966)
• Lo scatenato (1967)
• Il Tigre (1967)
• Sette Volte Donna (Woman Times Seven, 1967)
• La pecora nera (The Black Sheep, 1968)
• Questi fantasmi (Ghosts – Italian Style, 1968)
• Il Profeta (1968)
• L'Alibi (Alibi, 1969)
• L'Arcangelo (1969)
• Dove vai tutta nuda? (Where Are You Going All Naked?, 1969)
• Una su 13 (The 13 Chairs, 1969)
• Brancaleone alle Crociate (Brancaleone at the Crusades, 1970)
• Contestazione generale (1970)
• Il Divorzio (1970)
• In nome del popolo italiano (1971)
• Scipione detto anche l'africano (Scipio the African, 1971)
• L'udienza (The Audience, 1971)
• Senza famiglia, nullatenenti cercano affetto (1972)
• Che c'entriamo noi con la rivoluzione? (1973)
• La Tosca (1973)
• C'eravamo tanto amati (We All Loved Each Other So Much, 1974)
• Profumo di donna (Scent of a Woman, 1974)
• A mezzanotte va la ronda del piacere (Midnight Pleasures, 1975)
• Come una rosa al naso (Pure as a Lily, 1976)
• The Desert of the Tartars (The Desert of the Tartars, 1976)
• Signore e signori, buonanotte (1976)
• Telefoni bianchi (1976)
• Anima persa (The Forbidden Room, 1977)
• Due pezzi di pane (Happy Hobos, 1978)
• I nuovi mostri (Via l'Italia!, 1978)
• A Wedding (1978)
• Quintet (1979)
• Caro papà (Dear Father, 1979)
• Sono fotogenico (1980)
• La terrazza (The Terrace, 1980)
• The Nude Bomb (1980)
• Il Turno (1981)
• Sharky's Machine (1981)
• Camera d'albergo (Chambre d'hôtel, 1981)
• Il Conte Tacchia (Count Tacchia, 1982)
• Di padre in figlio (1982)
• Tempest (1982)
• Benvenuta (1983)
• La Vie est un roman (Life Is a Bed of Roses, 1983)
• Paradigma (Power of Evil, 1985)
• I Soliti ignoti vent'anni dopo (Big Deal After 20 Years, 1987)
• La Famiglia (The Family, 1987)
• I Picari (1988)
• Mortacci (1989)
• Lo zio indegno (1989)
• I Divertimenti della vita privata (The Amusements of Private Life, 1990)
• Les 1001 Nuits (1990)
• Dimenticare Palermo (1990)
• El Largo invierno (1991)
• Rossini! Rossini! (1991)
• Quando eravamo repressi (1992)
• Tolgo il disturbo (1992)
• Tutti gli anni una volta l'anno (1994)
• Abraham (1994, TV series)
• Sleepers (1996)
• Un homme digne de confiance (1997)
• Deserto di fuoco (1997, TV Series)
• La cena (1998)
• La bomba (1999)
• Luchino Visconti (1999)

Director

• Kean (1956)
• L'Alibi (1969)
• Senza famiglia, nullatenenti cercano affetto (1972)
• Di padre in figlio (1982)

Writer

• Luca de' Numeri. Novel, in 1947 won the Fogazzaro prize, publicated in 1965 (ed. Lerici)
• Un grande avvenire dietro le spalle. Milano, (1981). Longanesi & C.
• Vocalizzi. Milano, (1988). Longanesi & C.
• Memorie del sottoscala. Milano, (1990). Longanesi & C.

Disks

• CL 0426 – Antologia moderna – Ungaretti, Cardarelli, Palazzeschi, Montale, Quasimodo.
• CL 0401 – Dante Alighieri – Inferno canto quinto.
• CL 0437 – Dante Alighieri – Inferno canto XXVI.
• CL 0402 – Dante Alighieri – Paradiso canto XXXIII.
• CL 0457 – Elogio Olimpico – Poesie sportive.
• CL 0459 – Eschilo – Coefore – with Valentina Fortunato and Maria Fabbri.
• CL 0438 – Foscolo – Sepolcri.
• CL 0439 – Leopardi – Poesie
• CL 0440 – Leopardi – Poesie.
• CL 0458 – Manzoni – Adelchi, with Carlo D'Angelo.
• CL 0414 – Manzoni – Promessi sposi.
• CL 0416 – Manzoni – Il cinque maggio.
• CL 0441 – Mistici del '200.
• CL 0470 – Pascarella – Sonetti.
• CL 0417 – Pascoli – Poesie.
• CL 0420 – Saba – Poesie.
• CL 0415 – Shakespeare – Amleto.
• CL 0427 – Sonetti attraverso i secoli.
• CL 0443 – Gassman nel Mattatore prose varie.
• CL 0444 – Gassman nel Mattatore prose varie.
• CLV 0604 – Shakespeare – Otello.
• CLV 0607 – Irma la dolce.
• CLV 0609 – Gassman – Il Mattatore prose varie.