Ettore Scola, the great Italian writer-directors, best known for “Il Sorpasso” (1962), “We All Loved Each Other Very Much” (1974), “A Special Day” (1977), “The Family” (1987) and “The Dinner” (1998), died Tuesday at a Rome hospital. He was 84 and had fallen ill on Sunday.
Scola was perhaps best known for “We All Loved Each Other So Much,” a 1974 portrait of postwar Italy that starred Nino Manfredi, Vittorio Gassman and Stefania Sandrelli.
A Special Day
He directed and co-scripted with Maccari the 1977 Sophia Loren-Marcello Mastroianni film “A Special Day,” which picked up Oscar nominations for best foreign film and best actor for Mastroianni. He and Loren played neighbors who meet in 1938 during Hitler’s visit to Italy.
Scola won the best director award at Cannes Film Fest for the 1976 film, Ugly, Dirty and Bad, and he shared the festival’s best screenplay award for La terrazza (1980).
Another film much applauded on the festival circuit was the director’s 1983 film “Le bal.”
Scola started as a screenwriter, co-scripting 1962’sa “Il Sorpasso” with director Dino Risi and Ruggero Maccari. Starring Gassman and Jean-Louis Trintignant, the film was a road movie that is a classic of the genre.
Scola directed and co-scripted 1987’s “The Family,” starring Gassman, Stefania Sandrelli and Fanny Ardant, which was sort of an “Italian ‘Upstairs, Downstairs.”
In 1988, he directed and co-scripted the comedy, The Dinner, starring Ardant, Gassman and Giancarlo Giannini.
