Sophia Loren: Moulding the Star

137 Pages·2009·1.95 MB·English

by  Pauline Small

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Pauline Small l
SOPHIA LOREN
Moulding the Star
European stardom is very different from that of Hollywood, where the industry S
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concentrates intensively on establishing and promoting major stars. This unique book P
sets out to highlight the career of Sophia Loren as a prime example of a highly original H
I
rise to fame in a European context. Pauline Small emphasises that although primarily an A
Italian star, Loren’s career crossed the boundaries of a shifting network of film-making L
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ventures that spanned Italy, Hollywood and Europe.
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Loren was one of the leading figures in the 1950s whose professional achievements, Small n
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argues, were undervalued and to a degree remain so. Using written and visual materials M
ranging from government archives to academic journals, from the popular press to her o
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major films, Sophia Loren: Moulding the Star gives a fuller understanding of the forces, l
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commercial, industrial and cultural, that combined to forge her enduring stardom. i
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AboUT THE AUTHor h
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Pauline Small lectures in film at the School of Languages, S
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Linguistics and Film at Queen Mary, University of London. a
r Pauline Small
SOPHIA LOREN
‘A very unusual and highly original study... an accessible and fascinating
account of the early career of one of the most famous icons of world cinema.’
– Professor Manuel Alvarado, City University, London.
Moulding the Star
‘This book will be immensely valuable for students and teachers of Italian cinema, giving fasci-
nating insights into Italian society and the Italian and Hollywood film industries, and how the
star functioned within them. Pauline Small has uncovered a wealth of information, changing
our perceptions of Italian popular cinema.’ – Professor Mary Wood, University of London.
ISBN 978-1-84150-234-2
0 0
9 781841 502342
intellect | www.intellectbooks.com
Sophia Loren
Moulding the Star

Sophia Loren
Moulding the Star
Pauline Small
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First published in the UK in 2009 by
Intellect Books, The Mill, Parnall Road, Fishponds, Bristol, BS16 3JG, UK
First published in the USA in 2009 by
Intellect Books, The University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th Street, Chicago,
IL 60637, USA
Copyright © 2009 Intellect Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without
written permission.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Cover designer: Holly Rose
Copy-editor: Rebecca Vaughn-Williams
Typesetting: Mac Style, Beverley, E. Yorkshire
ISBN 978-1-84150-234-2
EISBN 978-1-84150-328-8
Printed and bound by Gutenberg Press, Malta.
C
ontents
Acknowledgements 7
Chapter 1 Why Sophia? 9
Chapter 2 Loren and Ponti 15
Chapter 3 Loren and Hollywood 39
Chapter 4 Loren and De Sica 63
Chapter 5 Loren and Mastroianni 89
References 115
Appendices 127

A
Cknowledgements
I have been assisted in writing this book in a number of ways. I acknowledge the financial
support of the British Academy, the University of London Central Research Fund, the School of
Languages, Linguistics and Film and the Film Department of Queen Mary University of London.
My research was greatly facilitated by the expertise of Sean Delaney and all the staff of the
British Film Institute Library in London, Elisabetta Chiarotti of the Cineteca Nazionale in Rome,
and the staff of the Archivio Centrale dello Stato in Rome. I am most grateful to Mary Wood,
Brian Richardson, Chris Wagstaff, Adalgisa Giorgio and Judith Bryce for their support and
advice on my work, and my colleagues at Queen Mary, with whom it is such a pleasure to
work. I wish to thank specifically Peter Evans, for reading and suggesting amendments to
preliminary drafts of the manuscript; Mina Fabbri, for giving me access to her superb private
collection of Sophia Loren materials, and for the warm hospitality she and her family gave me
in their home; Pier Luigi Raffaelli, who patiently initiated me into the labyrinth of Italian
government film archives; and to my family, for living with me (and Sophia) through the long
period of preparing and writing the book. Without them, it would never have been completed
successfully. Thanks are also due to Intellect Books who took on the publishing of this project
and brought it to fruition. Naturally, any errors the book contains are mine alone.
NOTE: ‘Sophia’ or ‘Sofia’? As explained in Chapter Two, Sofia Scicolone at first took the
professional name Sofia Lazzaro, then changed it again, still at an early stage in her career, to
Sophia Loren. In general Italian contributors, including De Sica, Giuseppe Marotta and Gian
Luigi Rondi, repeatedly persist in using the form ‘Sofia’. When quoting from their writings, I
have retained the version they used of the actress’s name. This confusion is also not helped by
the fact that Loren plays key roles in two of her major films (The Gold of Naples and Scandal
in Sorrento) as characters with the name of ‘Donna Sofia’. Thus the shifting between ‘Sophia’
and ‘Sofia’, found throughout the book, is attributable to the variations present in the range of
sources consulted on Sophia Loren’s career. All translations from Italian are by the author.
Sophia as Nives, the ‘Woman of the River’.
Stills Department, Cineteca Nazionale, Rome.
Sophia as Cesira, the antithesis of the pin-up. Stills Department, Cineteca Nazionale, Rome.
1
w s ?
hy ophiA
Why Sophia? A study of the career of Sophia Loren has intrinsic interest – she is after all the
nearest the nation has to ‘an Italian icon’ (Gundle 1995: 367) – but it is also important for the
insights it affords into the era in which her image was forged. Hers is a career full of
contradictions. She came from the poorest and most humble origins, yet came to be associated
with glamour and great elegance. In much of her early career she made comedies, yet in her
international career few of her films fit that category. Although considered an international star,
a retrospective film season of the films of Sophia Loren is virtually unheard of. While the
international reputation of postwar Italian cinema is largely based on arthouse productions,
Loren’s Italian output is wholly defined by the popular genres of comedy and melodrama.
Although now seen as highly popular, there were periods of her career when she was vilified,
particularly in the Italian press, for her marriage to Carlo Ponti and for the difficulties they later
encountered with the Italian tax authorities. And finally, although she is rightly judged to be the
one Italian actor of the postwar generation who made a success of her Hollywood career, few
of the films that she made in Hollywood had box-office success either in Italy or in the
international market. Like any artist, there are two dimensions to her story, the personal and the
professional. Loren is generally thought of as a star well known to her public. The bibliography
of this book lists numerous biographies of her, as well as books she has authored on beauty,
cooking and fashion. From earliest years Loren has fed information about her life to the press,
regularly offering individual and syndicated interviews to tell her story. At the same time there
has always been huge media coverage of her public image highlighting her many appearances
at film festivals in Cannes and Berlin, on-set reports on her films in Hollywood and on location
in London, the Oscar successes, and major events in what was supposedly her private life –
marriage to the producer Carlo Ponti, and the birth of her two children. It is a type of coverage
that has largely neglected to focus on the very considerable importance of her professional
career, to the extent that it seems as if she has not merited serious consideration as an artist.
This book sets to redress the balance, to fill a major gap in our understanding of Italy’s most
prominent and enduring star by uncovering and analysing a wealth of information about how