This is not a sick fetish of mine naming cemeteries for the great dead. It’s just history. Apologies for doing the third article of this.
Established in the early 19th century, Campo Verano was constructed outside the old city walls with considerable architecture and sculptures in mind to be done. It was continuously expanded all the way until the 1960s, covering 83 hectares of land. Control of the cemetery was once squarely in the hands of the Vatican as the Basilica of San Lorenzo is nearby, containing the graves of multiple popes. However, the cemetery was later divided into a Catholic zone, a Jewish zone, and those who died in World War I. Today, people can tour the cemetery due to its historical relevance in the art sphere with surviving sculptures.
Now for the notables that are here, I know that you are all interested in (or not). Paolo Sorrentino’s film Il Divo covers the scandalous years of Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, who is interned in Verano. So is Alberto Moravia, a novelist whose books would be adapted into the films The Conformist and Two Women. Singer and tragic heartthrob Rino Gaetano and Mussolini’s mistress executed with him, Clara Petacci, also were laid to rest here in Campo Verano with some of these Italian film legends.
Vittorio De Sica (1901-1974)
One of the leading figures of Italian neorealism, De Sica was a paradox; being a Roman Catholic and politically communist when the church denounced communism. It is indeed a mix in which he made films about the poor, and working-class with a moral tale to it. Two of those films, Shoeshine and Bicycle Thieves, would win Honorary Oscars for Best International Film when it was not an active competitive category. However, he did win twice when it became a formal category, for Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, and The Garden of the Finzi-Continis. A part-time actor, he also got another Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actor for his role in A Farewell To Arms. It was an astounding career on both sides of the camera which makes him a pound-for-pound all-time great in cinema.
Vittorio Gassman (1922-2000)
Gassman started out as Italy’s own great stage actor with performances in A Streetcar Named Desire and Othello, where he co-founded the Teatro d’Arte Italiano. Adorned with the nickname ll Mattatore (The Matador), Gassman’s film career elevated his stardom with roles in numerous acclaimed comedies Big Deal On Madonna Street, Il Sorpasso, The Incredible Army of Brancaleone, and Scent Of A Woman, the original version rather than the slop that was made starring Al Pacino. Gassman was also known to American audiences, partly because of his marriage to actress Shelley Winters and starring in the musical Rhapsody alongside Elizabeth Taylor.
Marcello Mastroianni (1924-1996)
One of De Sica’s leading stars in Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, Mastroianni was an Italian acting legend and a cultural icon in the country. Famous around the world for his dashing charisma, he collaborated with every great director in Italy, most famously as Guido in Federico Fellini’s 8 ½, plus starring in Pietro Germi’s Divorce Italian Style, Michelangelo Antonioni’s La Notte, and Ettore Scola’s A Special Day, where he earned one of his three Oscar nominations. In eight films, he co-starred with Sophia Loren in a friendship that lasted until his death, and Mastroianni preferred staying in Europe rather than moving over to Hollywood. He dated Catherine Deneuve, Claudia Cardinale, and Faye Dunaway; his brother, Ruggero, was a highly regarded editor who died months before Marcello, and both are buried in Verano.
Alberto Sordi (1920-2003)
Sordi stands as one of Italy’s great acting comedians (a whole lot better than Roberto Benigni, I say) whose stature is about equal to Mastroianni. He first started dubbing non-Italian films in roles performed by Anthony Quinn, Oliver Hardy, and Robert Mitchum, as well as performing on Italian radio. Then, in the 1950s, Sordi became a major star thanks to roles in I Vitelloni, The Great War, and An American In Rome among many comedies that flourished in Italy’s post-war boom. He even won a Golden Globe for his performance in To Bed Or Not To Bed. Upon Sordi’s passing, more than a quarter of a million people paid their last respects and his tomb is among the most visited in the cemetery.
Alida Valli (1921-2006)
Valli was one of the first Italian actresses to have success in Hollywood. First, she was a star in Fascist Italy with Mussolini declaring her, “the most beautiful woman in the world,” then being signed by David O. Selznick to star in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Paradine Case. Returning home in the 1950s, she regained footing in Luchino Visconti’s Senso, followed by Georges Franju’s horror masterpiece, Eyes Without A Face. Other major roles were on the stage including Italian adaptations of A View From The Bridge and Romeo And Juliet; Valli’s other film roles include The Third Man (1949) and the original Suspiria (1977). Her star power in Europe was so much that Valli was compared to Marlene Dietrich and Greta Garbo.
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