Alberto Sordi: film series at Film Forum
Roman actor and director born in Trastevere on 15 June 1920. He abandoned his studies at a commercial institute (later completing his diploma privately) to move to Milan where he applied to do an acting course at the Accademia dei Filodrammatici. But owing to his strong Roman accent he was advised to forget about a career as an actor. He therefore decided to turn this disadvantage into an opportunity and tried his luck at light comedy. However when this attempt also ended in failure, he returned to Rome and began working as an extra in Cinecittà. In the meantime he had won a place as a dubbing artist for M.G.M. and became the Italian voice of Oliver Hardy, (for his ‘Ollio' character in Italy). While carrying on his work as a dubber he ventured into cabaret, under the name of Albert Odisor, and joined Aldo Fabbrizi's company. Going from theatre to dubbing, dubbing to cinema, cinema to radio (his 1948 radio show "Vi parla Alberto Sordi" was very popular, introducing such well-loved characters as Mario Pio and Conte Claro), he founded a production company with his friend Vittorio di Sica in 1950 and met with his first film successes. Federico Fellini cast him in the lead roles of The White Sheik (1952) and I vitelloni (1953) and in the theatre he was a hit alongside Wanda Osiris. At this juncture he would go on to create a gallery of tragi-comic characters, many of whom would be the incarnation of the average Italian - a sort of craven conformist mummy's boy – who chase dreams they will never realise. In 1965 he made his directing debut with Smoke Over London. He received many awards in Italy and abroad: in 1955 President Harry Truman invited him to Kansas City to receive the keys of the city (and the office of honorary governor) as thanks for the pro-American propaganda of his character Nando Morioni. In 1958 Italian president Giovanni Gronchi invested him with the prestigious award of Knight of the Italian Republic. On the occasion of his eightieth birthday in 2000, the Mayor of Rome made him Mayor for a day. His artistic awards include four Nastri d'Argento, a Silver Bear at Berlin in 1972, a Golden Lion for career achievement in 1995 and a David di Donatello for his career in 1999. He was appointed Italian cultural ambassador to the world. His private life was always strictly guarded - no official relationships and no scandals – and he lived always with his sisters Savina and Aurelia. He died after a short illness, in his villa at Piazza Numa Pompilio. He was eighty two. He was survived by his sister Aurelia, the last of the four siblings.
