Sandra Milo, the 'girl of the century' who played Italy, has died
Maggiorata in the 1950s, actress and lover of Fellini in the 1960s, TV presenter and lover of Craxi in the 1980s, she was a meme before memes were invented
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Key points
3' min read
Great art and petty gossip, palaces of power and Catholicism of miracles, socialism and bed sheets: 20th century Italy, whether we like it or not, was all these things at once. This is why we can say that with Sandra Milo - who died at the age of 90 in her home in Rome - the 'girl of the century' goes, someone who lived a lot, loved too much, acted often, on the big and small screen. And accompanied such decisive figures in the history of the country as Federico Fellini and Bettino Craxi.
"Cyrus", first meme in television history
.Film actress, TV presenter, gossip character, meme even before memes were invented thanks to that 'Who? Ciro? Dove?" shouted on live TV in the 1990s to those who warned her of a fictitious admission to hospital of her son after an accident. A fake news before the invention of fake news around which the country debated for months. Because what happened to Sandra Milo happened to Italy.
From Tunisia to Cinecittà
.An overseas Italian, with the name Salvatrice Elena Greco, she was born in Tunis (curiously, the same city as Claudia Cardinale, another woman who would make Federico the Great's head turn) of a Sicilian father and a Tuscan mother. She moved to Viareggio when little more than a child and at the age of 15 went to her first wedding that lasted just 21 days. She made her film debut at the age of 22 alongside Alberto Sordi in Lo scapolo (1955). From there one film after another and Roberto Rossellini wanted her with Vittorio De Sica in Generale della Rovere (1959). Everything suggested that great cinema would be her destiny, but Sandra Milo must have had more than one destiny.
Fellini's 'Sandrocchia'
.And so a less than memorable interpretation of Vanina Vanini (1961), still for Rossellini, led some critics to attribute her the nickname 'Canina Canini'. There are those who say she is not an actress of important works and her career then veers towards box-office films, but the greatest of them all, Federico Fellini, will take care of bringing her back to the perimeter of great cinema. Milo, whom the Maestro addressed with the affectionate nickname "Sandrocchia", embodied the Fellini woman par excellence, as prosperous as she was uninhibited, and found herself playing the part of herself in masterpieces such as 8½ (1963) and Giulietta degli Spiriti (1965). But Fellini is above all 'the great love' of Sandra Milo's life, as she will recount on several occasions.
The Second TV Life
.Sandra's second public life is that of the 1980s, the decade of Milano da bere and the Rai-Finvest television duopoly. The actress, who has always been close to the PSI, had an affair with Bettino Craxi and hung out with the parochial Rai 2 to such an extent that she became the presenter of cult programmes such as Piccoli Fans (1987-1989). Someone, referring to the socialist circle of the beautiful world, coined the expression 'dwarves and dancers'. All this before the Tangentopoli blizzard arrived.
