VANZINA, STEFANO

(1917-1988)

Screenwriter and director. Although probably best remembered for a string of delightful comedies that he directed during the early 1950s, Vanzina, better known as Steno, was a professional and versatile director who could work comfortably in a variety of genres.

While studying law at the University of Rome, Vanzina became one of the animators of the satirical magazineMarc'Aurelio. In the late 1930s, together with a number of other writers from the magazine, he began to work as a screenwriter, helping to pen a series of films directed byMario Mattoliand featuring popular comic actorErminio Macario.In the immediate postwar period he continued to work as a screenwriter before making his own directorial debut in 1949 withAl diavolo la celebrita(A Night of Fame, 1949), the first of nine films that he would direct in partnership withMario Monicelli. In the same year, together with Monicelli, he directedToto cerca casa(Toto Looks for an Apartment, 1949), the first of thirteen films he would make with master comic actorToto, which would include the much-acclaimedGuardie e ladri(Cops and Robbers, 1951), nominated for the Grand Prize at Cannes, as well asToto a colori(Toto in Color, 1952), the first Italian film to be made in color. AfterL'uomo, la bestia e la virtu(Man, Beast and Virtue, 1953), an adaptation of a play by Luigi Pirandello that featured Orson Welles in one of the major roles, Vanzina directed the now-legendaryUn americano a Roma(An American in Rome, 1954), the film that first showcased the comic talents ofAlberto Sordi.

While he continued to show a marked propensity for the comic genre throughout his career, in the early 1970s Vanzina also made a foray into the gangster genre withCose di Cosa Nostra(Gang War, 1971) and directed several tense police thrillers, the best known beingLa polizia ringrazia(Execution Squad, 1972). He scored one of his biggest successes of the 1970s withFebbre da cavallo(Horse Fever, 1976), a film set in the world of horse racing. In the late 1980s he returned to the police thriller with six films made for television, featuring the maverick police commissioner Jack Clementi, also known as the Professor.