GINA LOLLOBRIGIDA
(4 July 1927 - 16 January 2023)
Most famous as an actress, Gina Lollobrigida, who has died aged 95 after a long illness, also became both a photojournalist and a politician. Exceedingly beautiful from her youngest days, she became a model and won many beauty contests which led to her becoming an actress at eighteen. After her initial success in early French and Italian movies, she appeared in many American films, too, making her a global star. Gina Lollobrigida’s film and television career then took off and lasted for some fifty years.
Born Luigia Lollobrigida in Subiaco, Italy, to a furniture-maker, Giovanni Lollobrigida, and his wife Giuseppina, Gina began acting in 1945 in small film parts until 1952, when she was cast in her first proper film roles in France: Fanfan la Tulipe and Les Belles de Nuit (1952) and Le Grand Jeu (1954). The first of her films in Italy were Bread, Love and Dreams, The Wayward Wife (both 1953) and Woman of Rome (1954). Her initial US film was Beat the Devil, with Humphrey Bogart. Then came Trapeze (1956) with Burt Lancaster, and The Hunchback of Notre Dame with Anthony Quinn, in which she played Esmeralda. ‘La Lollo’, as she was called, had made it internationally. Lollo, a type of curly lettuce, was named after Gina’s wild hairstyle.
Cast not only for her acting but also for her stunning beauty, Gina made many Hollywood films with the stars of the day – Crossed Swords with Errol Flynn, Never So Few with Frank Sinatra, Solomon and Sheba with Yul Brynner, Come September with Rock Hudson (for which she won a Golden Globe), and Woman of Straw with Sean Connery. She also returned to Europe to work with directors Vittorio De Sica, Jules Dassin, Jean Delannoy and Alessandro Blasetti. One of her best comedy roles was in Melvin Frank’s Buona Sera. Mrs Campbell, playing the title character who cannot recall the father of her daughter. For this she was nominated for a Golden Globe and won one of her three David di Donatello best actress awards.
Earlier she had appeared in Michelangelo Antonioni’s The Lady Without Camelias, Five Branded Women with Silvana Mangano, Jeanne Moreau, Vera Miles and Barbara Bel Geddes, and Hotel Paradiso with Alec Guinness. She regretted having to turn down Federico Fellini for La Dolce Vita as his screenplay got lost on the way to her. On CBS TV she played Francesca Gioberti in the soap opera Falcon Crest and was nominated for another Golden Globe.
While she was still acting, Gina had taken up photography and journalism. She began shooting not only actors such as Paul Newman and Audrey Hepburn and the singers Ella Fitzgerald and David Cassidy, but also photographed the painter Salvador Dali, politicians including Henry Kissinger and Fidel Castro with whom she arranged an interview, and the German football team. She published several books of photographs of Italy, the Philippines, sculptures and a collection called Wonder of Innocence.
Her political career began when she tried to run as a Democrat for the European Parliament but failed. Even as late as 2022, aged 95, she stood in the Italian election for a seat in the Senate but was again unsuccessful. However, she kept her interest in politics by endorsing Pope Francis on LGBT rights and following the work of Indira Gandhi. She retired from films in 1997 to lead a quiet life in her house in Rome and her villa in Monte Carlo. She sold her jewellery and donated the proceeds to stem-cell therapy.
Back in 1949 Gina had married the Yugoslavian doctor Milko Skofic and they had a son, Andrea. In 1960 they moved to Canada but divorced in 1971. In 2006 she married the Spanish businessman Javier Rigau y Rafols. However, through a court case accusing Rigau of fraud, the marriage foundered. Often called “the most beautiful woman in the world”, Gina Lollobrigida had a successful acting career merely by chance as she had actually studied painting and sculpture at school. Sadly, her last years were dominated by men who tried to con her out of her fortune. She admitted that she had had too many admirers for her own good.
MICHAEL DARVELL