Fellini’s face who mostly refused Hollywood
Marcello Mastroianni (1924–1996) logged 147 films from 1939 to 1996 yet stayed stubbornly Italian—first actor nominated for an Oscar for a non-English performance, twice a Cannes Best Actor, and Federico Fellini’s on-screen alter ego in La Dolce Vita and 8½.
Born 26 September 1924 in Fontana Liri and raised in Turin and Rome, son of a carpenter, he escaped a loosely guarded German prison camp during the war and hid in Venice. An uncredited extra in Marionette at fourteen, he broke through with Big Deal on Madonna Street in 1959, then became an international emblem as Fellini’s jaded tabloid writer in La Dolce Vita in 1960 and blocked director in 8½ three years later. Across eleven films from 1954 to 1994 he paired with Sophia Loren in both comedy and drama.
Best Actor Oscar nominations followed for Divorce Italian Style (1961), A Special Day (1977), and Dark Eyes (1987)—breaking ground as the earliest nominee for a performance not in English. Cannes gave him its Best Actor prize on two separate occasions, matching a short list shared only with Jack Lemmon and Dean Stockwell: once for The Pizza Triangle, again for Dark Eyes nearly two decades later. Hollywood offers rarely tempted him; Italy instead stacked state decorations, among them the republic’s top-ranking knighthood for cultural merit.
Brother Ruggero edited several of his later Fellini films. Married to Flora Carabella from 1950, he never divorced despite affairs; a long relationship with Faye Dunaway ended when he would not remarry. He died 19 December 1996; Voyage to the Beginning of the World appeared posthumously. After Dunaway he lived for four years with Catherine Deneuve, making four films with her; their daughter Chiara was born in 1972 and later acted beside him in Three Lives and Only One Death. From 1976 his partner was the filmmaker Anna Maria Tatò. Pancreatic cancer killed him at seventy-two, and Rome switched off the Trevi Fountain, the setting of his most famous La Dolce Vita scene, and draped it in black.
Source: Marcello Mastroianni
