Agostino ‘Dino’ De Laurentiis was born on August 8, 1919
in Torre Annunziata, Campania, Italy. He left home at age 17 to enroll in film
school, supporting himself as an actor, extra, prop man, or any other job he
could get in the film industry. His persistence paid off, and by the time he
reached his 20th birthday he already had one produced film under his belt.
After serving in the Italian army during World War II, De Laurentiis went back
into film production, and in 1946 scored a critical and commercial
international hit with “Bitter Rice” (1949). He later married its star, Silvana
Mangano [1930-1989] (1949-1988). De Laurentiis eventually formed a partnership
with producer Carlo Ponti [1912-2007], and the team had a string of hits,
including several by director Federico Fellini. After the partnership
dissolved, De Laurentiis embarked on a plan to build his own studio facilities,
which would enable him to make the kind of massive spectacles he wanted to
make. The studio complex, called Dinocitta', eventually was forced to close
down due to a combination of hard times in the Italian film industry and a
string of flops by De Laurentiis himself. De Laurentiis eventually sold the
property to the Italian government and moved his base of production to the
United States. He again opened up a film production complex in Wilmington,
North Carolina, called DEG Studios, but was eventually forced by economic
conditions to sell that, too. De Laurentiis had some critical successes since
his move to the U.S. “Ragtime” (1981), but most of his U.S. productions have
been critically lambasted, although several have been commercial successes.
DeLaurentis died in Beverly Hills, California on November 10, 2010. ~ Serg Pageen
DeLaurentis produced three Euro-westerns: “A Man Called
Sledge” (1970), “The Deserter” (1971) and “Chino” 1973.
Today we remember Dino DeLaurentis on what would have
been his 95th birthday.
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