Director Nini Grassia, who won the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Film Festival in 2008, has died at the age of 66. His heart stopped beating Sunday night in the clinic where he was hospitalized for liver cirrhosis.
In his career he has directed 41 films, 43 commercials and 67 documentaries. Grassia was in the entertainment world for having launched many famous names in Italian comedy and music, such as Gigi D’Alessio, the protagonist in Annaré and Cient’anne, and Nino D’Angelo, who made his debut in Grassia’s Celebrità. Grassia shot five films with Nino D’Angelo, who said:
“I remember when he came to see me in the theater and was convinced he could make a movie with me protagonist. It was the time of the earthquake in Irpinia and Nini was surprised by my ability, because I was filling the theaters, the only artist doing performances in Naples at a time when people were afraid to be in crowded rooms, for fear of further tremors. I told him that I was an ‘anti-earthquake artist’, a definition that made him laugh! I always had great respect for him, he was a person from another time, with old fashioned values, even artistic. “With him I made 5 films (including, ‘Lo Studente’, ndr.). Although we did see each other for long periods, because of my commitments, in 30 years we never lost sight of each other, and every time we met it was a great pleasure.”
Grassia also directed a number of obscure, interesting action films and erotic thrillers during the 80s and 90s, including his debut, La pagella, a revenge movie starring Marc Porel, La puritana (89), Provocazione fatale (90) and the late crime movie Il burattinaio (aka The First Action Hero, 94).
