Silvana Mangano

Silvana Mangano(Italian pronunciation:[silˈvaːnaˈmaŋɡano]; 21 April 1930– 16 December 1989) was an Italian film actress. She was one of a generation of thespians who arose from theneorealistmovement, and went on to become a major female star, regarded as asex symbolfor the 1950s and '60s.She won theDavid di Donatello for Best Actressthree times – forThe Verona Trial(1963),The Witches(1967), andThe Scientific Cardplayer(1972) – and theNastro d'Argento for Best Actresstwice.
Raised in poverty duringWorld War II, Mangano trained as a dancer and worked as a model before winning a Miss Rome beauty pageant in 1946. This led to work in films; she achieved success inBitter Rice(1949) and went on to forge a successful career in films, working with many notable directors likePier Paolo Pasolini,Luchino Visconti,Alberto Lattuada, andVittorio De Sica. Her career continued well into her 50s, with supporting roles inDavid Lynch'sDune(1984) andNikita MikhalkovDark Eyes(1987).
Mangano was the wife of international film producerDino De Laurentiisand had four children with him, includingVeronica De LaurentiisandRaffaella De Laurentiis.
Born in Rome to an Italian father and an English mother (Ivy Webb fromCroydon), Mangano lived in poverty during World War II. Trained for seven years as a dancer, she supported herself as a model. In 1946, at age 16, Mangano won the Miss Rome beauty pageant, and through this, she obtained a role in a Mario Costa film.One year later, she became a contestant in the Miss Italia contest. The contest that year became a springboard for a pool of potential actresses, including the winnerLucia Bosé, Mangano, and several other future stars of Italian cinema such asGina Lollobrigida,Eleonora Rossi DragoandGianna Maria Canale.
Mangano's earliest connection with filmmaking occurred through her romantic relationship with actorMarcello Mastroianni. This led her to a film contract, though it took some time for Mangano to ascend to international stardom with her performance inBitter Rice(Riso Amaro,Giuseppe De Santis, 1949). She signed a contract withLux Filmin 1949, and later married producerDino De Laurentiis.
Although she never had an international career to match her contemporariesSophia LorenandGina Lollobrigida, Mangano remained a favorite star between the 1950s and 1970s, appearing inAnna(Alberto Lattuada, 1951),L'oro di Napoli(Vittorio De Sica, 1954),Mambo(Robert Rossen, 1955),Teorema(Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1968),Death in Venice(Luchino Visconti, 1971),The Scientific Cardplayer(Luigi Comencini, 1972), andLudwig(Luchino Visconti, 1973). She played the lead role in the 1967 anthology filmThe Witches,which featured segments directed byPasolini,Visconti,De Sica, andMauro Bolognini. She collaborated four times with Pasolini and Visconti.
Over the course of her career, Mangano won theDavid di Donatello for Best Actressthree times and theNastro d'Argento for Best Actresstwice. Her final film role was inNikita MikhalkovforDark Eyes, for which received a Nastro d'Argento nomination forBest Supporting Actress. Although it was sung byFlo Sandon's, Silvana Mangano was credited on the record label of "El Negro Zumbón", which is from the soundtrack of the filmAnna(1951) and was a hit song in 1953. A clip of the opening of this performance is featured in the filmCinema Paradiso(1988).
It is claimed that she had an affair withMohammad Reza Shahof Iran during the late 1940s.Married to film producerDino De Laurentiisfrom 1949, the couple had four children:Veronica,Raffaella, Francesca, andFederico.Veronica's daughterGiada De Laurentiisis the host ofEveryday ItalianandGiada at Homeon theFood Network. Raffaella co-produced with her father on Mangano's penultimate film,Dune(David Lynch, 1984). Federico died in an airplane crash in 1981 in Alaska.De Laurentiis and Mangano separated in 1983, and Mangano began divorce proceedings in 1988.
Following surgery on 4 December 1989 that left her in a coma, Mangano died of lung cancer in Madrid, Spain on 16 December 1989.
In 2000, the city ofRomenamed a street in theValleranodistrict after Mangano.