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Name: Rossano Brazzi
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Date of Birth:
September 18, 1916
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Place of Birth:
Bologna, Italy
Mini-bio:
Bologna-born Rosanno Brazzi abandoned his law studies at San Marco University when his parents were killed by fascists. Becoming an actor, Brazzi rapidly rose to matinee-idol status after his film deb... read moreut in 1939; but while making faces before the Mussolini-controlled cameras by day, he was tirelessly active in the Resistance by night. He made his first Hollywood film, Little Women, in 1949, but it was his multi-hued portrayal of the impotent Count Vincenzo Toriato-Faurini in The Barefoot Contessa (1954) that won him international stardom. He went on to play such suave Europeans as Renato di Rossi in Summertime (1955) and Emile DeBecque in South Pacific (1958), after which his film roles tended to become routine and repetitive. An occasional visitor to television after his first small-screen appearance on a 1960 episode of The June Allyson Show, Brazzi was a regular on the Harold Robbins-created series The Survivors (1969), playing Onassis clone Antaeus Riakos. Turning to directing in the mid-1960s (sometimes under the nom de film of Edward Ross), Brazzi's best-known effort in this capacity was the modest family-oriented film The Christmas That Almost Wasn't (1966). From 1940 to 1981, Rosanno Brazzi was the husband of actress Lidia Bartalini; after her death, he married another actress, Ilse Fischer. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
Rossano Brazzi mini-bio: Rossano Brazzi was an Italian singer, stage and film actor. He was married to Lydia Brazzi until her death, and to Isle Fischer, his second wife, until his death.
His first break into films came in 1942, when Zarah Leander's film studio was casting for a leading man to play opposite Ms. Leander in the film Damals (1943) ("At That Time", "Le Foyer Perdu") (1943).
His most famous role was as Emile de Becque in South Pacific (1958), playing opposite Mitzi Gaynor.
He died in Rome of complications following a neural virus, on 24 December 1994.
