Claudia Cardinale

Claudia Giuseppina Rose Cardinale (La Goleta, Tunis, April 15, 1938), better known as Claudia Cardinale, is an Italian actress born in the capital of Tunisia when that country was still a French protectorate. Her parents were from the island of Sicily (Italy). Muse of Italian directors such as Sergio Leone, Luchino Visconti and Federico Fellini, she has participated in legendary titles such as 8½, Il Gattopardo, Rocco y sus hermanos and C'era una volta il West, and has also gained renown in Hollywood and international cinema with such popular films as The Pink Panther, by Blake Edwards, and Fitzcarraldo, by Werner Herzog. She is one of the last living legends of Italian cinema.

Biography

Claudia Cardinale, photo taken in 1957.

Claudia Cardinale entered the world of cinema after winning a Tunisian beauty contest in 1957. She made her film debut in Goha (1958), alongside Omar Sharif, and that same year she had a role in an internationally successful film, Rufufú (I soliti ignoti), starring Vittorio Gassman. Her early career was led by producer Franco Cristaldi, whom she married in 1966; He brought her to stardom by exploiting her privileged Latin beauty in roles as a sensual woman with character, for which she would become famous and recognized at the level of Sofía Loren, Gina Lollobrigida and Virna Lisi. However, the actress had a peculiar voice hoarse that didn't seem to fit her sex symbol image, which is why she was dubbed in all her films, until Fellini decided otherwise.

Beginnings: 1960s

Cardinale in Eight and a half (1963)

In the 1960s Claudia Cardinale appeared in many Italian or Italian co-financed films, including two Luchino Visconti masterpieces, Rocco and His Brothers (1960) and Il Gattopardo (The Leopard, 1963). In both productions she had Alain Delon as a partner. He also participated in 8½, by Federico Fellini, and in Sergio Leone's successful western Hasta que lleg su hora (C'era una volta il West, 1968), where he worked with Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson and Jason Robards.

Career in Hollywood

Cardinale never made a real attempt to break into the US market, as she was not interested in leaving Europe for an extended period of time; In addition, her poor command of the English language was an obstacle for her. In any case, she shot several Hollywood movies, such as Circus World ( The fabulous world of the circus , 1964), with John Wayne and Rita Hayworth; the popular The Pink Panther (The Pink Panther, 1964,) with David Niven; Blindfold (1965), with Rock Hudson; The Professionals (1966), by Richard Brooks, with Burt Lancaster, Lee Marvin and Jack Palance; Don't Make Waves, with Tony Curtis, and The Hell With Heroes (The Heroes Are Dead, 1968), with Rod Taylor.

Bob Dylan Cover

A photograph of the actress appeared on the cover art of Bob Dylan's Blonde On Blonde (1966) album; since the photo was used without Cardinale's permission, in subsequent editions the photo was removed from the sleeve.

Other films

Claudia Cardinale has appeared in more European films of recognized quality than most of her contemporaries, more focused on commercial cinema. Her performance in Visconti's Sandra is considered mesmerizing, playing a Holocaust survivor in an incestuous relationship with her brother. In Luigi Comencini's film La Storia (based on the novel by Elsa Morante) Cardinale plays a widow raising a son during World War II, which was another well-received performance by Cardinale.

Other performances by Cardinale that are considered significant include the films The Girl with the Suitcase by Valerio Zurlini, Liberty, My Love by Mauro Bolognini and Nell&# 39;anno del Signore by Luigi Magni.

1970-2000

Cardinale has been active in European cinema for decades. Her films from the 1970s include Las oileras (1971), a comedy set in the West and shot in Spain with Brigitte Bardot and José Luis López Vázquez; Beautiful, honest, emigrated to Australia wants to marry an untouched girl (1971), together with Alberto Sordi, a film with which Cardinale won the David de Donatello award; and Qui comincia l'avventura (1975). In 1977 she had a role in the blockbuster television production Jesus of Nazareth, directed by Franco Zeffirelli and featuring stars such as Anthony Quinn, Laurence Olivier, James Mason, Anne Bancroft, Fernando Rey, Olivia Hussey...

In the following decade, the following stand out: La piel (La Pelle, 1982) by Liliana Cavani, where she worked with Burt Lancaster and Marcello Mastroianni; Fitzcarraldo (1982; Werner Herzog), with Klaus Kinski; Henry IV (1984) by Marco Bellocchio, again alongside Mastroianni; La Storia (1985) by Luigi Comencini, where he rubbed shoulders with Francisco Rabal, and Un homme amoureux (A man in love, 1987), Starring Peter Coyote and Greta Scacchi. In 1989 Claudia Cardinale participated in the ambitious feature film History of a Revolution, by Robert Enrico and Richard T. Heffron about the French Revolution, with an extensive cast: Klaus Maria Brandauer, Jane Seymour, Peter Ustinov, Christopher Lee, Georges Corraface...

In 1991 he co-starred with Omar Sharif in the film Mayrig by Henri Verneuil, in 1993 he participated with Roberto Benigni in the comedy The Son of the Pink Panther by Blake Edwards, and in 1999 in the documentary about Kinski entitled My Intimate Enemy.

Latest works

In 2002, she participated in the film And now... Ladies and Gentlemen, directed by Claude Lelouch and starring Jeremy Irons. On stage, in 2005 she starred in Sweet Bird of Youth, by Tennessee Williams, in Paris, and in 2009 she shot the gay-themed film Le fil, where she played a Tunisian mother reluctant to accept her son's homosexuality. In 2012 she has shot, together with Jean Rochefort, the film The artist and the model , by the Spanish Fernando Trueba.

Private life

She was married only once, to Franco Cristaldi in 1966; the couple divorced in 1975 and the actress has been living since that same year with film director Pasquale Squitieri. She has two children. Her eldest child, Patrizio, was born as a result of a rape suffered by Cardinale when she was only seventeen years old and still living in Tunisia; Cristaldi later adopted it. She has a daughter, also named Claudia, with Squitieri, born on April 26, 1979 when the actress was forty years old. Squitieri already had three children from her previous marriage: Vittoria, Paola and Mario.

Claudia Cardinale is a progressive woman with strong political convictions. She is involved in issues in favor of women and the gay community. She is also involved in many humanitarian causes. Since the seventies Paris has been her home.

Claudia Cardinale wrote an autobiography, Moi Claudia, Toi Claudia. In 2005, she also published a book in French, Mes Étoiles , about her personal and professional relationships with many of her directors and castmates during her nearly fifty years in the world of film. show. In her confessions, Cardinale declares that she laughingly refused the requests of Marlon Brando, who tried to seduce her in a Rome hotel in 1967, and that he later regretted her.

The actress at the World Women's Awards in 2009

Filmography

• All roads lead to Rome (2016)
• The artist and the model (2012)
• My intimate enemy (1999)
• Li chiamarono... briganti! (1999)
• The wilderness of fire (1997)
• A summer in La Goulette (1996)
• The Son of the Pink Panther (1993)
• History of a Revolution (1989)
• A man in love (Un homme amoureux1987)
• The gift (1982)
• Fitzcarraldo (1982)
• The red salamander (1980)
• Evasion in Athena (1979)
• The gun (1978)
• Corleone (1978)
• Jesus of Nazareth (1977)
• The Placer Round (1974)
• Popsy Pop (1971)
• The hearing (1971)
• The red shop (1971)
• Beautiful, honest, emigrated to Australia wants to marry an untouched girl (1971)
• Oils (1971)
• Freedom, love (1970)
• Nell'anno del Signore (1969)
• Cool, hot and dangerous (Ruba to prossimo tuo...(1968)
• Until your time came (1968)
• The day of lettuce (1968)
• The heroes are dead (1968)
• Don't wave (1967)
• Professionals (1966)
• The four witches (1966)
• Lost Command (Curions) (1966)
• Secret mission (1965)
• Sandraor Unpredictable atavism (1965)
• The pink panther (1963)
• Celos to the Italian (1964)
• The fabulous circus world (1964)
• The ragazza di Bube (1964)
• The indifferent (1964)
• The catpardo (1963)
• Eight and a half (1963)
• Senilità (in North America) Careless in France Quand la chair succombe(1962)
• The beautiful Antonio (1961)
• Cartouche (1961)
• The girl in the suitcase (1961)
• The viaccia (1961)
• Rocco and his brothers (1960)
• Rufufufufu gives the blow (1959)
• A fucking trick. (1959)
• Unknown forever (1958)

Awards and distinctions

Venice International Film Festival