Alfonso Cassini

Biography

Alfonso Cassini stepped onto the stage in 1876 and never truly left. For four decades he drifted through Italy’s theatre circuit, lending his face and voice to the companies of Francesco Benincasa Gervasi, Ermete Novelli and Virgilio Talli, slipping from one repertoire to the next like a well-worn coat. In 1912 the camera beckoned; he answered, trading footlights for arc-lights and greasepaint for nitrate. Until the day he died he moved easily between Cines, Etna Film, Film d’Arte Italiana, Itala Film, Tiber Film and Fert, a familiar silhouette in the flicker of early Italian cinema. Off-screen he shared his life with actress-director Julia Rizzotto, their partnership as much a production as any play or picture.