La Cuccagna (1917)

The Italian diva Hesperia was the star of the silent drama La Cuccagna/The Bonanza (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917). The film was an adaptation of Emile Zola's La curée. Hesperia is Renata/Renée, second wife of the cunning and wealthy Saccard, who married young Renata for her money. She has an affair with Saccard's son Max, played by Alberto Collo. In the end money triumphs over love, just as in Zola's novel.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5070. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Renata and Massimo love each other." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Alberto Collo.


Italian postcard by IPA CT V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5071. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Saccard surprises Renata and Max Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917). On this postcard the father (Claudio Nicola at left) looks not much older than the son (Alberto Collo at right).


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5072. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Massimo and Luisa are betrothed. The jealousy of Renata." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5073. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Renata and Massimo at the ball of Bianca Muller." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Alberto Collo.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5074. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Saccard cannot pay the bills of his wife anymore." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Claudio Nicola.

Money triumphs over Love

Hesperia (1885-1959), was one of the divas of the Italian silent screen. She often worked with director Baldassarre Negroni, who later became her husband.

La Cuccagna was a liberal adaptation of Emile Zola's La curée, cutting Zola's socialist critique on bourgeois building speculation and nouveau riche under the Second Empire, and keeping the Phaedra-like, private intrigue of a triangular affair.

Hesperia is Renata/Renée, second wife of the cunning and wealthy Saccard (Claudio Nicola), originally Aristide Rougon, who married young Renata for her money, with Saccard's sister Sidonie as intermediate.

Years after, his son from his first marriage, Max/Massimo (Alberto Collo), develops an affair with his stepmother Renata - an affair which Saccard initially tolerates in exchange for Renata's inheritance. They claim to have an open marriage.

In the end money triumphs instead of love, just as in Zola's novel. Massimo is married to young Luisa (Diana d'Amore), the daughter of rich banker Mareuil (Ignazio Lupi), when Saccard claims he cannot pay Renata's bills anymore.

Renata is so shocked Massimo leaves her for wealth and youth she first maddens, then develops meningitis and dies.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5076. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Massimo had been raised in a provincial college." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia, Alberto Collo and Claudio Nicola.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5077. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Renata had turned Massimo in un 'viveur'." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Claudio Nicola, Hesperia and Alberto Colla.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5078. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Sidonia hosted meetings between her female and her male customers." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Ida Carloni Talli as Sidonia.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5079. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Renata and Massimo agree to elope." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Alberto Collo.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5080. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "The nocturnal meetings of Massimo and Renata." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Alberto Collo.

How true are her heartbeats

In the Italian film journal La vita cinematografica (22/28.2.1917), Pier da Castello regretted the loss of the social critique but praised Hesperia's performance:

"How naively she smiles, how heartily she laughs, how she knows to be tender, languid and mischievous!

How true are her heartbeats and her worries, how pathetic are her despairs, how sad and bitter her tears.

How true and human is her desperate rage! Hesperia does not act. She lives her part, defies every confrontation and surpasses any expectation.

Whoever sees her in La cuccagna must connect her with the female sovereigns of the gesture, among the silent actresses who unsurpassable know to express any emotion."


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5081. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "Renata has heard about the wedding between Massimo and Luisa." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia and Alberto Colla.


Italian postcard by IPA CT. V. Uff. Rev. St. Terni, no. 5082. Photo: Tiber Film. Caption: "At the Half Lent ball. All is lost for Renata." Postcard for La Cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917), starring Hesperia.

Source: Vittorio Martinelli (Il Cinema Muto Italiano - Italian) and IMDb.

Ida Carloni Talli

Ida Carloni Talli (1860-1940) was an important Italian stage actress, who also acted in 92 Italian silent films between 1912 and 1924.


Italian postcard. Photo: Ida Carloni Talli (Agnese) and Emilia Vidali (Lucia) in I promessi sposi/The Betrothed (Mario Bonnard, 1922).

In arte

Ida Carloni Talli was born in Rome, Italy, in 1860.

She started as an amateur actress and became highly regarded among the companies of this kind. In 1887, she entered the legitimate theatre - or ‘in arte’ as they used to say - with the company of Giuseppe Pietriboni.

Subsequently, she became first actress at the Fava company, where she made her mark with La trilogia di Dorina by Gerolamo Rovetta.

She became company leader with Virgilio Talli – whose wife she became, assuming his name - and with Ettore Paladini for a couple of years, obtaining great success with audiences and critics with La parigina (La Parisienne) by Henry Becque (Milan, 1890) and in The Father by August Strindberg (Teatro Valle, Rome, 1893).

Her name is mentioned in the joint company Tovagliari-Carloni Talli-Pezzinga at which she collaborated with Baghetti Aristide and in 1899 she was at the company of Luigi Ferrati.

She was an admired interpreter both in drama and comedy, working with major companies, such as Andò-Leigheb, Emanuel, Garavaglia, and Ruggeri-Borelli.

Subsequently she withdrew from the theatre and taught for years at the School of Eleonora Duse at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome. Among her many pupils were Anna Magnani and many other famous actresses.


Italian postcard. Photo: Ida Carloni Talli (Agnese), Domenico Serra (Renzo), Emilia Vidali (Lucia) and Umberto Scalpellini (Don Abbondio) in I promesso sposi (Mario Bonnard, 1922), one of many adaptations of Alessandro Manzoni's classic novel. Caption: "If you want me to marry you, I'm here. The scene depicts the final scene of the story."


Italian postcard by IPA CT Duplex, no. 5078. Photo: Tiber Film, Roma. Publicity still for La cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917). Caption: "Sidonia hosted meetings between her female and her male customers." La cuccagna was an adaptation of Emile Zola's La curée. Renata/Renée (Hesperia) is the second wife of the cunning and wealthy Saccard, who married young Renata for her money. She though develops an affair with Saccard's son Max/Massimo (Alberto Collo). Saccard's sister Sidonia/Sidonie Rougon (Carloni Talli) is a professional matchmaker between men and women with financial or amorous interests. She covers this secret profession with a trade in lace. It is she who arranges the marriage of her brother and Renée.

Noble and austere mothers

Ida Carloni Talli was also highly active in the Italian silent cinema. From 1912, she acted in subordinate and character parts, in 92 silent films, specializing mainly in the roles of noble and austere mothers.

In the early 1910s she acted in Cines in shorts like Anna Maria (1912), epic films like Quo vadis? (Enrico Guazzoni, 1913) and Marcantonio e Cleopatra/Antony and Cleopatra (Enrico Guazzoni, 1913), and the drama I due macchinisti (Enrique Santos, 1913).

Between 1912 and 1915, Carloni Talli was one of the regular supporting but also leading actresses in Cines shorts and features, together with other regulars like Leda Gys, Alberto Collo, Ignazio Lupi, Augusto Mastripietri and Amleto Novelli.

From 1913 she also acted at the Celio company, affiliated with Cines. She acted in films with Francesca Bertini such as Niní Verbena (1913), L’onestà che uccide (1914) and Rose e spine (1914).

In 1915 Carloni Talli moved to Tiber Film for many films with Hesperia and Maria Jacobini but also some with Lina Cavalieri, Lina Millefleurs, Diomira Jacobini and Diana Karenne.

She occasionally acted at the competing company of Caesar Film for films like Il capestro degli Asburgo (Gustavo Serena, 1915) starring Francesca Bertini

In the mid-1910s Carloni Talli acted in many diva films, e.g. La signora dalle camelie/The Lady of the Camellias (Baldassarre Negroni, 1915), L’aigrette (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917) and La cuccagna (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917) starring Hesperia, and Come le foglie (Gennaro Righelli, 1916), starring Maria Jacobini.

She also played in the war propaganda films Cicueracchio (Emilio Ghione, 1915) and Guglielmo Oberdan, martire di Trieste (Emilio Ghione, 1916), and also had a part in Ghione’s crime serial I topi grigi (1918).

In the early 1920s, Carloni Talli acted at Fert Film in films with Maria Jacobini in Amore rosso (1921), La preda (1921), and Cainà (1922).

She also acted as Agnese in I promessi sposi/The Betrothed (Mario Bonnard, 1923) starring Domenico Serra and Emilia Vidali, and as the Mother Superior in the American production The White Sister (Henry King, 1923) starring Lilian Gish and shot on location in Italy.

Her last film was Consuelita (Roberto Roberti, 1925), starring Francesca Bertini.

Ida Carloni Talli died in Milan, Italy, in 1940.


Italian postcard by IPA CT Duplex, no. 5105. Photo: Tiber Film, Roma. This is probably a publicity still of Tullio Carminati and Ida Carloni-Talli in L'aigrette (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917) (misspelled by IMDb as L'aiglette). This silent Italian film is an adaptation of a stage play by Dario Niccodemi. Ida Carolini Talli plays the countess of Saint-Servant, who has raised her son Enrico (Tullio Carminati) to be proud of his name and title, and to cherish honour and virtue, symbolised by the feather of her aigrette. In reality the countess is hunted by creditors, the castle is falling apart. Enrico falls in love with Susanne Leblanc (Hesperia), wife of banker, and in return she loads him with money in order to restore the castle. Her husband Claudio (André Habay) is not so happy with this kind of charity...


Italian postcard by IPA CT Duplex, no. 5105. Photo: Tiber Film, Roma. Hesperia and Ida Carloni Talli in L'aigrette (Baldassarre Negroni, 1917).

Sources: Wikipedia (Italian, English and Spanish) and IMDb.