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Lydia Quaranta

Italian postcard. Ed. A. Traldi, Milano, no. 450.

Lidia Quaranta aka Lydia Quaranta (1891-1928) was an actress of the Italian silent cinema.

Lydia Quaranta was born 6 March 1891 in Turin, Italy. She started her career as stage actress at the company of Dante Testa. In 1910 she debuted in film, together with her sister Letizia, when the company Itala Film enrolled both. Her true film debut though was in a short called L'ignota/The Unknown Woman (1910), produced by Aquila Films and directed by Edoardo Bencivenga. After a few more Aquila productions, Quaranta played steadily at Itala, as in the airplane drama Come una sorella (Vincenzo Denizot 1912), the sensational drama Padre (Dante Testa, Gino Zaccaria 1912), starring Ermete Zacconi, Lo scomparso (Testa 1913) with again Zacconi, and the crime story Tigris (Denizot 1913). Together with her sister Letizia, Quaranta played in Addio giovinezza! (1913), directed by Nino Oxilia. In 1914 Lydia Quaranta’s cinema career reached its apex when she had the title role in the mega-production Cabiria. This was a historical film made on epic scale by Giovanni Pastrone who had used the pseudonym Piero Fosco and who for much money had the author Gabriele D’Annunzio attach his name to the film. D’Annunzio in reality only invented some of the names of the characters and helped with the elaborate intertitles of the film. In 1914-1915 Cabiria was an international success. It would eventually cause Pastrone also to create a whole series around one of the popular characters of the film, the strong man Maciste (played by Bartolomeo Pagano). Quaranta did not get this special exposure by Pastrone, but Cabiria did guarantee her many film offers in the years 1915-1920, from various Turinese film companies, such as Gloria and Savoia, while Itala hired her again in 1919, for the then enormous sum of 10.000 lire per month. Among these memorable titles were Jvna, perla del Gange (Giuseppe Pinto 1914), Beffa di Satana (Telemaco Ruggeri 1915) with Dante Cappelli, Il romanzo di un atleta (Vittorio Rossi Pianelli 1915) with strong man Mario Ausonia, Nel vortice del peccato (Ruggeri 1916) with Sandro Ruffini, Fiamma! (Ettore Piergiovanni1920) with Piergiovanni in the male lead as well, and I tre sentimentali (Augusto Genina 1921) - the film the film historian Vittorio Martinelli considered her best.

After this film, Quaranta moved to the Fert company, for which she did a few films such as the comedy Treno di piacere (Luciano Doria 1924). In 1925 she played her last part, a small part in Mario Camerini’s Voglio tradire il mio marito, starring Linda Pini. All in all, Lydia Quaranta played in some 70 films. In 1928, at the age of only 36 years, Quaranta was struck with pulmonitis and died in her hometown Turin on 5 March 1928. Her sister Letizia (1893-1977) had a less intense but longer career. In 1921 she would marry film director Carlo Campogalliani and did various films with him, such as a few starring Maciste. Letizia had a twin sister Isabella (1892-1975) who also knew a career in Italian silent cinema between 1912 and 1917 but didn’t have the status her sisters had.

Sources: Italian Wikipedia, IMDB, www.cinemainpiemonte.it/schedapersonaggio.php?personaggio....

Taken on: October 22, 2011

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Sets appears in: • Ed. A. Traldi, Italy • Italian Silent Film Women

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