Monica Vitti
Monica Vitti is an Italian actress best known for her starring roles in films directed by Michelangelo Antonioni during the early 1960s. After working with Antonioni, Vitti changed focus and began making comedies, working with director Mario Monicelli on many films. She has appeared with Marcello Mastroianni, Alain Delon, Richard Harris, Terence Stamp, Michael Caine, and Dirk Bogarde. Vitti won five David di Donatello Awards for Best Actress, seven Italian Golden Globes for Best Actress, the Career Golden Globe, and the Venice Film Festival Career Golden Lion Award.
Early life
Born Maria Luisa Ceciarelli in Rome, Vitti acted in amateur productions as a teenager, then trained as an actress at Rome's National Academy of Dramatic Arts and at Pittman's College, where she played a teen in a charity performance of Dario Niccodemi's La nemica. She toured Germany with an Italian acting troupe and her first stage appearance in Rome was for a production of Niccolò Machiavelli's La Mandragola.Film career
Early Roles
Vitti's first film role was an uncredited bit part in Edoardo Anton's Ridere Ridere Ridere. She was in Adriana Lecouvreur, the TV series L'alfiere and the TV movies Questi ragazzi and Il tunnel. She did an episode of Mont-Oriol and dubbed Rosaana Rory's voice in Big Deal on Madonna Street.Vitti's first widely noted performance was at the age of 26, in Mario Amendola's Le dritte with Franco Fabrizi. She was in the TV movie Il borghese gentiluomo.
Antonioni
In 1957 she joined Michelangelo Antonioni's Teatro Nuovo di Milano and dubbed the voice of Dorian Gray in the director's Il Grido. She played a leading role in Antonioni's internationally praised film L'avventura, as a detached and cool protagonist drifting into a relationship with the lover of her missing girlfriend. Giving a screen presence which has been described as "stunning", she is also credited with helping Antonioni raise money for the production and sticking with him through daunting location shooting. L'avventura made Vitti an international star. Her image later appeared on an Italian postage stamp commemorating the film. According to The New York Times, Vitti's "air of disenchantment perfectly conveys the unreal aura of her heroines."Vitti received critical praise for starring roles in the Antonioni film La Notte, with Jeanne Moreau and Marcello Mastroianni. Vitti starred in a TV movie Le notti bianche then did a third with Antonioni, L'Eclisse with Alain Delon.
Vitti was one of many stars in an anthology movie, Three Fables of Love. She had a cameo in Sweet and Sour and played the lead in a comedy for Roger Vadim, Nutty, Naughty Chateau. Vitti was then in another anthology film High Infidelity and made a fourth with Antonioni, Il Deserto Rosso, with Richard Harris. The director said Vitti "certainly inspires me, because I like to watch and direct her, but the parts I give her are a long way from her own character."
After Vitti's relationship with Antonioni ended, the two did not work together again until Il mistero di Oberwald.
Vitti starred in a comedy for Tinto Brass, The Flying Saucer, and appeared in the anthology, The Dolls.
International Films
Vitti's first English language film was Modesty Blaise, a mod James Bond spy spoof in which she performed in July 1965. Co starring Terence Stamp and Dirk Bogarde, directed by Joseph Losey, it had only mixed success and received harsh critical reviews.She performed in the anthology movie The Queens, a television series Les fables de La Fontaine, Kill Me Quick, I'm Cold with Jean Sorel, and I Married You for Fun.
Vitti appeared in On My Way to the Crusades, I Met a Girl Who... with Tony Curtis, The Girl with a Pistol with Stanley Baker, The Bitch Wants Blood with Maurice Ronet, and Help Me, My Love with Alberto Sordi.
1970s
Vitti starred with Marcello Mastroianni in Ettore Scola's highly successful romantic comedy Dramma della gelosia. She followed it with Ninì Tirabusciò, la donna che inventò la mossa, Le coppie with Sordi, The Pacifist, La supertestimone, That's How We Women Are, and Orders Are Orders.Vitti was in a version of La Tosca and a comedy Teresa the Thief. She made Polvere di stelle, directed by Alberto Sordi, for which she won the 1974 David di Donatello award for Best Actress.
Vitti played a key part in one of the episodic vignettes in Luis Buñuel's The Phantom of Liberty. She did two films with Claudia Cardinale, The Immortal Bachelor and Blonde in Black Leather.
She was in Duck in Orange Sauce,, Mimì Bluette... fiore del mio giardino, Basta che non si sappia in giro!.., L'altra metà del cielo, State Reasons, Il cilindro, Per vivere meglio, divertitevi con noi, Amori miei and Tigers in Lipstick .
Vitti's second English film was An Almost Perfect Affair, directed by Michael Ritchie and co-starring Keith Carradine, which was set during the Cannes Film Festival.
Later career
Vitti reunited with Antonioni in The Mystery of Oberwald which is not as well known as L'Avventura. She followed it in I Don't Understand You Anymore, Camera d'albergo, Tango of Jealousy, I Know That You Know That I Know with Sordi, Scusa se è poco, Flirt, and Francesca è mia. She co wrote the last two films. In 1984 she was awarded the Order of Arts and Letters by French Culture Minister Jack Lang, who praised her for helping spur a renewal of Italian films. "We need Italian cinema to find its health again so that French cinema will not remain an island in the middle of other European countries," Lang said. By 1986, Vitti had returned to the theatre as an actress and teacher.In 1989, Vitti tried writing and directing, and created Scandalo Segreto, which she also starred in alongside Elliott Gould. The film was not a success and she then retired from cinema.
During the 1990s she did television work, acting and directing, including Ma tu mi vuoi bene?.
In 1993 Vitti was awarded the Festival Tribute at the Créteil International Women's Film Festival, in France.
Personal life
and Vitti met in the late 1950s, and their relationship grew stronger after L'Avventura was made, because it had shaped both their careers. However, by the late 1960s, they did not make any movies together, making the relationship strained until it officially ended. In a later interview, Vitti stated that Antonioni ended their relationship. They made the film Il mistero di Oberwald together in 1981.In 1995 Vitti married Roberto Russo, with whom she had lived since 1975. In 2011, it was learned that Alzheimer's disease had "removed her from the public gaze for the last 15 years." In 2018, her husband confirmed she is still living in Rome and with a caretaker.
Awards
- Nastro d'Argento : 3 occasions
- David di Donatello : 5 occasions
- Golden Grail : 4 occasions
- Silver Bear for an outstanding single achievement at the 34th Berlin International Film Festival.
Filmography
| Year | Title | Notes |
| 1954 | Laugh! Laugh! Laugh! | |
| 1954 | Una pelliccia di visone | |
| 1955 | Adriana Lecouvreur | |
| 1958 | Le dritte | |
| 1960 | L'Avventura | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Revelation Golden Grail for Best Actress Nominated—BAFTA for Best Foreign Actress Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1961 | La Notte | Nastro d'Argento for Best Supporting Actress |
| 1962 | L'Eclisse | Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1962 | Three Fables of Love | Golden Plate |
| 1963 | Nutty, Naughty Chateau | |
| 1963 | Follie d'estate | |
| 1963 | Sweet and Sour | |
| 1964 | High Infidelity | Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Supporting Actress |
| 1964 | Red Desert | Golden Grail for Best Actress |
| 1964 | Il disco volante | |
| 1965 | Le bambole | |
| 1966 | Sex Quartet | Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Supporting Actress |
| 1966 | Modesty Blaise | |
| 1967 | I Married You for Fun | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Nominated—Golden Grail for Best Actress Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1967 | Kill Me Quick, I'm Cold | |
| 1968 | The Girl with the Pistol | David di Donatello for Best Actress Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Golden Grail for Best Actress |
| 1968 | The Scarlet Lady | |
| 1969 | On My Way to the Crusades, I Met a Girl Who... | |
| 1969 | Help Me, My Love | Golden Grail for Best Actress |
| 1970 | David di Donatello for Best Actress Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress | |
| 1970 | The Pizza Triangle | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress |
| 1970 | Le coppie | |
| 1970 | The Pacifist | |
| 1971 | La Supertestimone | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress |
| 1971 | That's How We Women Are | |
| 1972 | Teresa the Thief | Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1972 | Gli ordini sono ordini | |
| 1973 | La Tosca | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress |
| 1973 | Polvere di stelle | David di Donatello for Best Actress |
| 1974 | The Phantom of Liberty | |
| 1975 | Duck in Orange Sauce | David di Donatello for Best Actress Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1975 | The Immortal Bachelor | |
| 1975 | Qui comincia l'avventura | |
| 1976 | Basta che non si sappia in giro | |
| 1977 | Mimì Bluette... fiore del mio giardino | |
| 1977 | L'altra metà del cielo | Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1978 | Per vivere meglio, divertitevi con noi | |
| 1978 | State Reasons | |
| 1979 | Tigers in Lipstick | |
| 1979 | Amori miei | David di Donatello for Best Actress |
| 1979 | An Almost Perfect Affair | |
| 1980 | I Don't Understand You Anymore | |
| 1981 | Il tango della gelosia | |
| 1981 | Camera d'albergo | Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress |
| 1981 | The Mystery of Oberwald | |
| 1982 | I Know That You Know That I Know | |
| 1982 | Scusa se è poco | |
| 1983 | Flirt | Silver Bear for an outstanding single achievement Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Nominated—David di Donatello for Best Actress Nominated—Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress |
| 1986 | Francesca è mia | |
| 1989 | Secret Scandal | Italian Golden Globe for the Best First Feature Italian Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Nominated—David di Donatello for Best New Director |
Television
- Ma tu mi vuoi bene?