ROME, Italy (AFP) – Monica Vitti, an Italian actress best known for her roles in Michelangelo Antonioni films, died at the age of 90, the culture ministry announced Wednesday.
“Goodbye, Monica Vitti, and farewell, queen of Italian cinema. Today is a terribly sad day since we have lost a brilliant artist as well as a wonderful Italian “Dario Franceschini, Minister of Culture, stated in a statement.
Vitti rose to worldwide prominence in the 1960 drama “L Avventura” (“The Adventure”), in which she portrays a tortured lady who falls in love with her the lover of her missing friend.
Vitti, actual name Maria Luisa Ceciarelli, was born in Rome on November 3, 1931, and found her love of the theatre during World War II, when she amused her family with puppets to relieve boredom.
“As the bombs dropped, and we had to take cover in the bunkers,” she later said, “my younger brother and I would compose short plays to entertain people around us.”
She began her career in the stage after graduating from Rome’s National Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1953, exhibiting a natural humorous flair.
Vitti, who distinguished out from her Italian contemporaries such as Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida due to her freckles and blond mane, was finally recognised by Antonioni, with whom she rapidly began an artistic and personal bond.
“I was fortunate to begin my career with a guy of immense brilliance,” but also “spiritual, full of life and excitement,” Vitti stated in an interview on Italian television in 1982.