Isa Miranda

Isa Miranda (born Ines Isabella Sampietro; 5 July 1905 – 8 July 1982) was an Italian actress with an international film career.
Biography
Miranda was born Ines Isabella Sampietro in Milan, the daughter of a street car conductor. When she was 10 years old, she began working as an errand girl for a dressmaker. She later had jobs in a box factory and a handbag factory. When she was 15, she became a model, a job that provided enough income for her to learn bookkeeping and typing in night school. She worked as a typist while attending the Accademia dei Filodrammatici in Milan and trained as a stage actress. She went on to play bit parts in Italian films in Rome. She changed her name to Isa Miranda and success came with Max Ophüls' film La Signora di tutti (Everybody's Woman; 1934) in which she played Gaby Doriot, a famous film star and adventuress with whom men cannot help falling in love. This performance brought in its wake several film offers and a Hollywood contract with Paramount Pictures. There, billed as the "Italian Marlene Dietrich", she played femme fatale roles in films such as Hotel Imperial (1939) and Adventure in Diamonds (1940).
She returned to Italy soon after the outbreak of World War II and continued to act on stage and to make films. In 1949, she starred in René Clément's The Walls of Malapaga, which won an Academy Award for the most outstanding foreign language film of 1950, and for Miranda, the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Another success of that period was La Ronde (1950), also directed by Ophüls.
Her career took her to France, Germany and Britain, where she frequently appeared in TV films, including The Avengers. Other notable film appearances included Siamo donne (1953), a portmanteau film, in which Miranda shared the screen with Anna Magnani, Alida Valli and Ingrid Bergman; Summertime (1955), starring Katharine Hepburn; Gli Sbandati (1955); The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1964); The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968); and Liliana Cavani's
The Night Porter (1974).
Miranda was married to the Italian director and producer Alfredo Guarini until his death in 1981. She died in Rome on 8 July 1982.
Selected filmography
The Haller Case (1933) - Badwoman
Cardinal Lambertini (1934) - Anna
Everybody's Woman (1934) - Gabriella Murge, alias Gaby Doriot
Tenebre (1934) - Vera
Creatures of the Night (1934) - Una gigolette
Red Passport (1935) - Maria Brunetti
Like the Leaves (1935) - Irene "Nennele" Rosani
The Love of the Maharaja (1936) - Mira Salviati
A Woman Between Two Worlds (1936) - Mina Salviati
Thou Art My Joy (1936) - Mary Hofer & Bianca Monti
The Man from Nowhere (1937) - Louise Paléari
The Former Mattia Pascal (1937) - Luisa Paleari
Scipio Africanus: The Defeat of Hannibal (1937) - Velia, a Roman woman
The Lie of Nina Petrovna (1937) - Nina Petrovna
Like the Leaves (1938) - Nennele
Hotel Imperial (1939) - Anna Warschawska
Adventure in Diamonds (1940) - Felice Falcon
Senza cielo (1940) - Regina
A Woman Has Fallen (1941) - Dina
Document Z-3 (1942) - Sandra Morini
Malombra (1942) - Marina di Malombra
Zazà (1944) - Zazà
La carne e l'anima (1945) - Katrin detta "Stella"
My Widow and I (1945) - Maria, sua moglie
L'aventure commence demain (1948) - Clarence Holbane
The Walls of Malapaga (1949) - Marta Manfredini
I'm in the Revue (1950) - Isa
Pact with the Devil (1950) - Marta Larocca
La Ronde (1950) - Charlotte, the Actress
Cameriera bella presenza offresi... (1951) - Angela Leonardi
The Seven Deadly Sins (1952) - Mme Alvaro (segment "Avarice et la colère, L' / Avarice and Anger")
Gli uomini non guardano il cielo (1952) - The countess
We, the Women (1953) - Isa (segment "Isa Miranda")
Before the Deluge (1954) - Madame Françoise Boussard
The Secret of Helene Marimon (1954) - Hélène Marimon
Rasputin (1954) - La tsarine Alexandra
Summertime (1955) - Signora Fiorini
The Abandoned (1955) - Contessa Luisa
Rommel's Treasure (1955) - Mrs. Fischer
I pinguini ci guardano (1956)
I colpevoli (1957) - Lucia Rossello
Arrivano i dollari! (1957) - Caterina Marchetti
A Kiss for a Killer (1957) - Betty Farnwell
Le secret du Chevalier d'Éon (1959) - La tzarine Elisabeth Petrovna
Corruption (1963) - Signora Mattoli
The Empty Canvas (1963) - Cecilia's Mother
Hardi Pardaillan! (1964) - Catherine de Medicis
Dog Eat Dog (1964) - Madame Benoit
Do You Know This Voice? (1964) - Mrs. Marotta
The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1964) - Duchesse d'Angouleme
Una storia di notte (1964) - Peppino's wife
Un monde nouveau (1966) - Une sage-femme
Hell Is Empty (1967) - Isa Grant
Darling Caroline (1968) - La duchesse de Bussez
The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968) - The Marchesa
L'assoluto naturale (1969) - Mother
La donna a una dimensione (1969) - Elena
The Syndicate: A Death in the Family (1970) - Tenutaria bordello
Dorian Gray (1970) - Mrs. Ruxton
Roy Colt and Winchester Jack (1970) - Mammola / Violet
Un estate con sentimento (1970) - Sue's Mother
Marta (1971) - Elena
A Bay of Blood (1971) - Countess Federica Donati
Lo chiameremo Andrea (1972) - Teacher
The Night Porter (1974) - Countess Stein
Le farò da padre (1974) - Lorè
La lunga strada senza polvere (1977) - The wife
Apocalisse di un terremoto (1982) - Madre di Ciro (final film role)
References
External links
Photographs and literature
1905 births
1982 deaths
20th-century Italian actresses
Actors from Bergamo
Italian film actresses
Italian stage actresses
Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress winners
Burials at the Cimitero Flaminio