Monday Reads

Obituary:  Italian actress and later successful photographer Gina Lollobrigida, 95, died earlier today.  She had been ill for quite some time.

During the 1950s and early 1960s, her name became synonymous with earthy beauty.  When the roles got fewer, she embarked on other interests, becoming quite successful as a photographer.

She also tried her hand at politics, but she didn't succeed in being elected.

Snip:

Lugina Lollobrigida was born on July 4, 1927, in the Italian village of Subiaco, about 50 miles east of Rome. Her carpenter father, Giovanni Lollobrigida, and her mother, Giuseppina Mercuri, had three other daughters, according to Canales’s book.

Lollobrigida entered beauty contests to put food on the table and pay for art lessons and, in 1947, she came third in the Miss Italy contest behind Lucia Bose and Gianna Maria Canale, both of whom later had successful film careers in Italy.

The exposure of the beauty contest led to movie offers for the young Lollobrigida and she appeared in a number of Italian films, such as “Bread Love and Dreams” (1953), before making her first American movie: John Huston’s “Beat the Devil” (1953) with Bogart. Other US hits followed, including “Trapeze” (1956) with Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster and “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” with Quinn the same year.

____________________________________________

LOL at the hysteria displayed in this article.

___________________________________________