Italian postcard by Bromofoto, Milano, no. 1731. Photo: Cineriz. Mara Berni in Il vigile/The Traffic Policeman (Luigi Zampa, 1960).
Italian postcard by Bromostampa, Milano, no. 170.
A fresh and sensual beauty
Mara Berni was born in 1932 in Brunate, Lombardy, Italy as Mara Rita Antonia Bernasconi. Following her parents' wishes, Mara Berni made her debut as a child in Wanda Petrini's 'Compagnia dei piccoli', while at the same time taking lessons from the elderly actress Teresa Franchini.
After finishing school, she studied dance and piano and made her debut as a television presenter and announcer. Berni debuted in Italian cinema as one of the marathon dancers in Luigi Comencini's La tratta delle bianche/The White Slave Trade (1952) starring Eleonora Rossi Drago, Ettore Manni and Silvana Pampanini.
Blonde, shapely, with fresh and sensual beauty, Mara Berni took part in about forty films made between the 1950s and 1960s, mostly in the comical genre, opposite such big names as Alberto Sordi and Totò. Occasionally, she also worked in Spain and France.
After many minor parts, her breakout came with the anthology film Amore in città/Love in the City (1953), in which she played the segment directed by Alberto Lattuada. Her first main credit was Buonanotte... avvocato!/Good night ... lawyer! (Giorgio Bianchi, 1955) opposite Alberto Sordi. With Sordi, she also co-starred in Accadde al penitenziario/It happened in the penitentiary (Giorgio Bianchi, 1955), Il moralista/The Moralist (Giorgio Bianchi, 1959), and Il vigile/The Traffic Policeman (Luigi Zampa, 1960).
She played opposite Totò and Peppino De Filippo in Totò, Peppino e... la dolce vita/Totò, Peppino and... the Sweet Life (Sergio Corbucci, 1961), which spoofs Federico Fellini's La dolce vita (1960) and it was filmed in the same sets.
Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 399.
Italian postcard by Bromofoto, Milano, no. 1448. Photo: Agenzia Liliana Biancini Sabatello.
Femme fatale
In the early 1960s, Mara Berni acted in various Peplum films like I baccanali di Tiberio/The bacchanalia of Tiberius (Giorgio Simonelli, 1960) starring Walter Chiari and Ugo Tognazzi, and Maciste contro lo sceicco/Maciste Against the Sheik (Domenico Paolella, 1962) opposite Ed Fury and Erno Crisa.
Gifted with grace and ease, Berni was often relegated to the role of 'femme fatale', even in a comic vein, and it can be said that she was not exploited to the best of her ability.
From the mid-1960s onward she abandoned the screen but worked occasionally for television. She acted in TV adaptations of novels, such as the brief but intense role of Cecilia's mother in I promessi sposi/The Betrothed (Sandro Bolchi, 1967) from the novel by Alessandro Manzoni.
Until the end of the 1980s, she also participated in variety shows. A fitting tribute to her beauty was paid when she was chosen to play the part of the goddess Venus in Antonello Falqui's brilliant musical show 'Biblioteca di Studio Uno', with the Cetra Quartet, in the episode dedicated to 'the Odyssey'.
In October 1989, she married a rich Pakistani industrialist Tarik Mamoud Rana. The couple had a daughter in 1990 when Mara was 58. She currently lives between Los Angeles and Italy.
Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 364.
West-German postcard by Ufa/Film-Foto, no. FK 2255. Photo: Dial / Unitalia Film, Roma.
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1631. Mara Berni in Il vigile/The Traffic Policeman (Luigi Zampa, 1960).
Sources: Wikipedia (Italian and English) and IMDb.
No comments:
Post a Comment