Cinema historian Peter Bondanella described Masina's work as "masterful" and "unforgettable",[1] and Charlie Chaplin, with whose work Masina's is often compared,[2][3][4] called her "the actress who moved him most".
Giulia Anna Masina, the eldest of four children, was born in San Giorgio di Piano, north of Bologna. Her father was a violinist and her mother was a schoolteacher. When Masina was four, her uncle took her to meet the Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello, who was later to win the Nobel Prize in literature. A few years later, when this uncle died, his widow, Masina's aunt, asked Masina's parents if they would allow her to come to Rome to stay with her. Masina's parents agreed, in part because they believed that in Rome Masina would have more success in the arts for which she was already demonstrating a unique talent.[6]
Masina attended an Ursuline convent school and took lessons in voice, piano, and dance. Her first experiences acting took place during World War II as part of the theater section of Rome's Gruppi Universitari Fascisti, a state-sponsored but university-student-led arts organization. She graduated with a degree in Literature from Sapienza University of Rome. She found work as a voice actress in radio during the war, which earned her more money and attention than stage acting. It was as a radio artist that Masina met Federico Fellini, a radio scriptwriter. They married in 1943, and a few months later, Masina suffered a miscarriage after falling down a flight of stairs. In 1944, she became pregnant again; Pierfederico (nicknamed Federichino) was born on 22 March 1945 but died from encephalitis 11 days later. Masina and Fellini had no other children.[7]
Working together with her husband, Masina made the transition to on-screen acting.[8] Half of her Italian films, the more successful projects, were either written or directed by her husband. Masina made her film debut in an uncredited role in Roberto Rossellini's Paisà (1946), which was co-written by Fellini. She received her first screen credit in Alberto Lattuada's Without Pity (Senza pietà, 1948), which was an adaptation co-written by Fellini, and played opposite John Kitzmiller.[citation needed]
She starred with Anthony Quinn in Fellini's La Strada (1954), playing the abused stooge of Quinn's travelling circus strongman. She won the Best Actress Award at the Cannes Film Festival for her portrayal of the title role in Fellini's Nights of Cabiria (1957). She played a prostitute who endures life's tragedies and disappointments with both innocence and resilience of biblical proportions. Both films received the Academy Award for Best Foreign-Language Film. In a 1998 New York Times review, Janet Maslin wrote that there is more "grace and courage" in Masina's performance than "all the fire-breathing blockbusters Hollywood has to offer."[9]
Masina in 1966
Masina's career was damaged by the critical and box office failure of The High Life (1960) directed by Julien Duvivier. Subsequently, she became dedicated almost entirely to her personal life and marriage. Nonetheless, she again worked with Fellini in Juliet of the Spirits (1965), which earned both the New York Film Critics award (1965)[10] and the Golden Globe award (1966) for Best Foreign Language Film.[11] Roger Ebert stated that "Fellini lore has it that the master made 'Juliet Of The Spirits' as a gift to his wife".[12]
Masina performed in The Madwoman of Chaillot (1969), her first film in English, which also starred Katharine Hepburn. After almost two decades, during which she worked sporadically only in television, Masina appeared in Fellini's Ginger and Fred (1986) with Marcello Mastroianni in which the leads play Italian impersonators of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers reuniting for a television special. She then rejected outside offers to attend to her husband's precarious health. Her last film was Jean-Louis Bertuccelli's A Day to Remember (1991). In the late 1960s, Masina hosted a popular radio show, Lettere aperte, in which she addressed correspondence from her listeners. The letters were eventually published in a book. From the 1970s on, she appeared on television. Two performances, in Eleonora (1973) and Camilla (1976), respectively, were particularly acclaimed.[citation needed]
Sign at a street in Rimini which was renamed after Masina
Masina died from lung cancer on 23 March 1994 at age 73, five months after her husband's death on 31 October 1993.[13] For her funeral, she requested that trumpeter Mauro Maur play "La Strada" by Nino Rota,[14] a poignant leitmotif from the film. Masina is buried with Fellini and their son, Pierfederico, in a bronze sepulchre sculpted by Arnaldo Pomodoro in the Monumental Cemetery of Rimini.[15][16]
^Fellini, Federico (1978). "My Experiences as a Director". In Bondanella, Peter (ed.). Federico Fellini: Essays in Criticism. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 7.
^Kezich, Tullio (1991). Giulietta Masina. Bologna: Cappelli. p. 22.
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