Frank Wolff, San Francisco-born actor who achieved stardom in Italian westerns and gangster films after a series of minor parts in Hollywood, was found dead yesterday in his hotel room in Rome.
Italian authorities said he committed suicide.
Mr. Wolff, 43, son of distinguished San Francisco physician, Dr. Ernest Wolff and the late Dr. Leona Bayer, had an appointment in Rome today with the producer of a film to be titled “When Women Lost Their Tales.”
In Good Humor
Employees at the luxury hotel where his body was found said the actor had seemed in good humor Saturday.
The body of the actor, who received threatening notes 11 years ago for his realistic portrayal of an informer in “Giuliano,” a film about Sicilian outlaw chief was found by the maid.
Mr. Wolff was separated from his American-born wife, Alice, whom he met and married in Rome.
He was a graduate of Lowell High School and Stanford University and held a master’s degree in theater arts from the University of California in Los Angeles.
Other films
One of his first big parts in Italy was that of Mussolini’s son-in-law, Count Ciano, in the 1963 film film, “The Verona Trial.” He had important roles in the resistance film, “The Four Days of Naples,” in “There Was Once the West” and with Catherina Spaak in “The Matriarch.”
In addition to his parents, Mr. Wolff is survived by a brother, Dr. Tom Wollf of the University of Arizona in Tucson, and two sisters, Dr. Carla Perez of San Francisco and Mrs. Ursula Jacobs of Mill Valley.
Funeral arrangement will be announced.
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