Claudia Cardinale, the iconic leading lady of Italian cinema in the 1960s, celebrated for her radiant beauty and often hailed as Italy’s “dream girl,” has passed away in Nemours, France, at the age of 87. Her remarkable talent captivated legendary directors such as Luchino Visconti, Sergio Leone, and Federico Fellini.
Her agent, Laurent Savry, confirmed her passing to Agence France-Presse on Tuesday, though the cause of death was not disclosed. Ms. Cardinale had resided in Nemours, a town south of Paris, during her later years.
Throughout her impressive six-decade career in Europe, Ms. Cardinale starred in over 150 films. Her versatility also led her to Hollywood, where she graced several productions, notably Blake Edwards’s beloved comedy classic, “The Pink Panther.”
Cardinale embodied Marcello Mastroianni’s feminine ideal in Fellini’s “8½,” portrayed a determined bordello owner funding a fantastical Amazonian opera house in Werner Herzog’s “Fitzcarraldo,” and took on the role of a resilient widow gunslinger in Sergio Leone’s epic “Once Upon a Time in the West.”
A striking image of Ms. Cardinale alongside Federico Fellini in 1963, captured on the set of his acclaimed film “8½.” This was just one of many significant productions she undertook in rapid succession during her flourishing career.
Ms. Cardinale with legendary director Sergio Leone during the production of his 1968 spaghetti western masterpiece, “Once Upon a Time in the West.”
Often associated with fellow Italian screen sirens Sophia Loren and Gina Lollobrigida as a leading sex symbol of the 1960s and ’70s, Ms. Cardinale cultivated a distinctive, more approachable persona. Italian film critic Massimo Benvegnù observed that while other “maggiorate” stars were overtly curvaceous, Cardinale offered a more grounded, “girl-next-door” appeal.
Remarkably, acting was not her initial ambition as a teenager. Adding to her unique story, she initially struggled with Italian in some early roles, having grown up speaking French.
Born Claude Joséphine Rose Cardinale on April 15, 1938, she hailed from the French protectorate of Tunisia. Her parents, Francesco Cardinale and Yolanda Greco, were Sicilian immigrants.
The eldest of four, she grew up in Tunis, the capital, within a close-knit Sicilian community. Her father served as a technical engineer for the Tunisian railway, while her mother managed their household.
At 18, Claude entered a beauty pageant at the Italian Embassy in Tunisia, an event her mother had partly arranged. Crowned “the most beautiful Italian girl in Tunisia,” her prize was a trip to the Venice Film Festival, where she garnered significant media attention, largely due to her bikini, as she later recalled. Despite having already made a few film appearances, she publicly stated at the time that acting was not her aspiration.
Ms. Cardinale in Italy during the 1950s. An Italian critic once remarked, “In many films, she becomes an icon, something between reality and unreality,” a testament to her enigmatic screen presence.
“Following the festival, she graced the covers of numerous Italian magazines, often under headlines proclaiming her as ‘the girl who doesn’t want to make movies,’” Mr. Benvegnù recounted.
Upon returning to Tunisia, Claude initially shunned acting opportunities. A deeply personal tragedy unfolded during her teenage years when she endured a sexual assault, leading to an abusive relationship and pregnancy. In 1957, she gave birth to her son, Patrick, in London. To shield him from the societal norms of the time, her parents raised Patrick as her younger brother, revealing the truth only when he was eight years old, as shared by her daughter, Claudia Squitieri.
That same year, Italian producer Franco Cristaldi signed her to his studio, Vides Cinematografica (now Cristaldifilm), marking the official start of her career as Claudia Cardinale.
Her breakthrough came with the 1958 comedic crime film “Big Deal on Madonna Street,” directed by Mario Monicelli. This led to a rapid succession of starring roles, including two seminal works of 1963: Federico Fellini’s Oscar-winning “8½” and Luchino Visconti’s “The Leopard.”
Ms. Cardinale alongside Renato Salvatori in “Big Deal on Madonna Street” (1958), the comedic crime story directed by Mario Monicelli that proved to be her breakout role.
A scene featuring Ms. Cardinale and Alain Delon in “The Leopard” (1963). She famously credited the film’s director, Luchino Visconti, with teaching her “how to be beautiful,” emphasizing his lessons on cultivating mystery.
“From that point, she became affectionately known as ‘Italy’s girlfriend’—the quintessential dream girl,” Mr. Benvegnù recalled.
In 1964, Ms. Cardinale delivered a commercially and critically acclaimed performance in Luigi Comencini’s “La Ragazza di Bube” (“Bebo’s Girl”), which earned her Italy’s prestigious Nastro d’Argento award for best actress. In the film, she portrayed Mara, a Tuscan peasant navigating post-World War II Italy, falling for a young partisan who is forced into hiding after being implicated in a double homicide.
She married Mr. Cristaldi in Las Vegas in 1966, a union her daughter, Ms. Squitieri, noted that Ms. Cardinale never truly considered “official,” despite Cristaldi giving his surname to her son.
In Fellini’s “8½,” set against the backdrop of a lavish spa, Ms. Cardinale portrayed Claudia, an actress and muse to the film’s protagonist, Guido Anselmi (played by Marcello Mastroianni). Her character materialized as Guido’s ideal woman, an ingénue for the science fiction film he envisioned.
Ms. Cardinale in “8½,” portraying the ethereal muse figure who embodied the protagonist’s ideal woman, played by Marcello Mastroianni.
Guido’s sentiments towards her character were poetic: “You are one of the girls who passes out the healing water. She is beautiful, both young and ancient, a child and yet already a woman, authentic and radiant. There’s no doubt that she’s his salvation.”
This portrayal resonated deeply with audiences, defining their perception of Ms. Cardinale, explained Vito Zigarrio, a film critic, historian at the University of Rome, and Venice Film Festival organizer. He noted, “In many films she becomes an icon, something between reality and unreality, and this ambiguity between fantasy and reality makes the character very intense.”
In Luchino Visconti’s epic period drama “The Leopard,” she captivated audiences as a young Sicilian debutante who effortlessly charmed both a soldier (Alain Delon) and his uncle (Burt Lancaster). In her 2005 autobiography, “Mes étoiles” (“My Stars”), co-written with Danièle Georget, Cardinale reflected on Visconti’s influence: “You can learn beauty. Visconti taught me how to be beautiful. He taught me to cultivate mystery, without which, he said, there cannot be real beauty.”
Her first venture with an American director, Blake Edwards, saw her take a comedic turn in 1964’s “The Pink Panther.” She played a princess whose lost jewel sets off a hilarious caper, starring alongside comedy legends Peter Sellers, David Niven, and Robert Wagner.
Ms. Cardinale sharing a scene with David Niven in Blake Edwards’s “The Pink Panther” (1964), a star-studded comedy that marked her debut with an American director, featuring Peter Sellers and Robert Wagner.
A pivotal, career-defining role arrived in Sergio Leone’s 1968 spaghetti western, “Once Upon a Time in the West.” Here, she portrayed a New Orleans prostitute who travels to the American Southwest to marry, only to discover her intended husband has been brutally murdered by bandits upon her arrival.
In a cast dominated by male antiheroes like Charles Bronson and Henry Fonda, Ms. Cardinale stood as the sole female lead. Jay Weissberg, an American film critic in Rome, remarked that she “was able to hold her own with these extremely strong, major actors, and conveying a sense of interiority that is quite palpable.”
Her fierce independence, evident in that film, became a hallmark of her career, according to Antonio Monda, artistic director of the Rome Film Festival. He observed, “There was something free about her, a strong personality that would never be tamed. She was strongly independent.”
Ms. Cardinale pictured in 1969 with Italian screenwriter and producer Franco Cristaldi, her husband. Their marriage concluded around 1975.
Around 1975, Ms. Cardinale sought a new path, divorcing Mr. Cristaldi and beginning a relationship with independent director Pasquale Squitieri, known for his provocative, right-leaning films. “In a sense she wanted to emancipate herself,” Mr. Monda explained. “She didn’t want to be thought of as only the product of a great producer.”
In subsequent interviews, Ms. Cardinale candidly described her life with Mr. Cristaldi as being under his absolute control. She stated that he dictated almost every facet of her existence and retained the majority of her earnings from American film productions. “I was just an employee, like an office worker,” she revealed to Variety.
The deepening strain in her marriage and her affair with Mr. Squitieri reportedly led to what Ms. Cardinale described as their “blackballing” from the Italian film industry. This prompted her move to France, where she rebuilt her career by taking on supporting roles.
She starred in nearly a dozen of Mr. Squitieri’s films. The couple welcomed a daughter in 1979 and remained together for four decades until his passing in 2017.
Ms. Squitieri characterized her parents’ bond as “an unconventional relationship”; they lived together until 1989 and maintained an exceptionally close connection thereafter.
Ms. Cardinale with Italian director Pasquale Squitieri in 1978. Their relationship spanned 40 years until his death in 2017, and they welcomed a daughter in 1979. Cardinale frequently collaborated with Squitieri, starring in nearly a dozen of his films.
Her diverse roles included an appearance in the 1977 all-star television mini-series “Jesus of Nazareth,” where she played an adulteress facing the threat of stoning.
Interestingly, early in her career, Ms. Cardinale had admired and modeled herself after French actress Brigitte Bardot. The two later co-starred in the 1971 French western comedy “Les Pétroleuses” (“The Legend of Frenchie King”), directed by Christian-Jaque. The film parodied Hollywood conventions, featuring memorable all-female shootouts and a lively fistfight between the two leading ladies.
“Bardot was her idol,” Ms. Squitieri shared. “Despite expectations of a fierce rivalry, they actually became very good friends.”
In Werner Herzog’s “Fitzcarraldo” (1982), Ms. Cardinale, in a supporting role opposite Klaus Kinski, was nonetheless central to the narrative. She portrayed a brothel madame whose unwavering faith in her lover’s dream to construct an opera house in the Amazon fuels his eccentric plan to drag a steamship over a mountain.
Klaus Kinski and Ms. Cardinale on location in Peru during the filming of “Fitzcarraldo” (1981), with director Werner Herzog visible in the foreground.
Reviewing the film, Vincent Canby of The Times wrote, “Miss Cardinale is not onscreen as long as one might wish, but she not only lights up her role, she also lights up Mr. Kinski,” adding that she “helps to transform Mr. Kinski into a genuinely charming screen presence.”
“Fitzcarraldo” earned the top award at the Cannes Film Festival, bringing Ms. Cardinale renewed acclaim and ensuring her continued presence on the radar of film producers and casting directors for years to follow.
During her later years, Ms. Cardinale resided with her son and daughter in Nemours. There, she founded an organization dedicated to supporting arts focused on women and environmental issues. In 2000, UNESCO appointed her a goodwill ambassador, acknowledging her unwavering dedication to advancing the status and rights of women and girls through education.
Ms. Cardinale with her daughter, Claudia Squitieri, at the 2004 Marrakech Film Festival’s opening ceremony, where Ms. Cardinale was celebrated for her distinguished career.
Further details regarding her survivors were not immediately released.
In 2023, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, in collaboration with Cinecittà, Italy’s national film company, honored Ms. Cardinale’s extensive career with a 23-film retrospective.
Even as she aged, Ms. Cardinale maintained a consistent presence in film, often in supporting roles, working across various countries, especially in her adopted France.
Her daughter, Ms. Squitieri, fondly described her mother as “very adaptive,” noting, “She is not a precious woman who has great needs, who is capricious because she is a star. She was always very humble in her requests. She always, always, always stopped to sign autographs. She detested the idea of body guards; she always wanted to be as close as she could to people. She felt very blessed by her luck.”