The Italian actor Nino Castelnuovo died on Monday in Rome "from a long illness", his relatives announced to the transalpine press.
He was 84 years old.
In France, the actor was best known for his role in
Les Parapluie de Cherbourg
by Jacques Demy.
In this musical film, awarded a Palme d'Or in 1964, he played Guy, Geneviève's boyfriend, played by Catherine Deneuve.
"But I could never live without you," she sang to him, distraught, in the most emblematic song of this melodrama.
"With what is happening in Algeria at the moment, I will not be back for a long time," he told her earlier.
For singing, the two actors were dubbed, respectively by Danielle Licari and José Bartel, but that did not prevent them from remaining one of the most memorable couples of French cinema in the cinephile imagination.
Visconti before Demy
Born in Lecco, Lombardy, in October 1936, Nino Castelnuovo took his first steps in the world of entertainment when he moved to Milan at the end of the 1950s. After a mime experience on television, he took over the management film sets chaining the roles under the direction of Pietro Germi (
Murder à l'italienne
, in 1959), Carlo Lizzani (
The Hunchback of Rome
, in 1960) and Luchino Visconti (
Rocco and his brothers
, in 1960).
Ironically,
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
, which allowed it to develop its international notoriety, went unnoticed at the time when it was released in Italian theaters.
Nino Castelnuovo subsequently continued to shoot for the cinema, but by the end of the 1970s he found the majority of his roles on television.
A memorable jump
In 1996, more than fifteen years after his last appearance on the big screen, the comedian made a brief return to cinema in the costume of D'Agostino, an archaeologist character in
Tony Minghella's
The English Patient
.
Se ne va un altro bravo attore del nostro cinema e televisione.A 84 anni è morto Nino Castelnuovo.
Era gravely malato.
Indimenticabile Renzo de'I Promessi Sposi ', Rai per la regia di Sandro Bolchi.Gran successo con uno spot degli anni 90.Quell'invidiabile salto alla staccionata pic.twitter.com/Oq37ob5PrH
- Franco Scarsella (@ FrancoScarsell2) September 7, 2021
For a large number of Italians, the most striking image of the actor is to be found in… an advertising spot for an olive oil brand.
He, who practiced gymnastics in his youth, proved that he had beautiful acrobatic remains by illustrating himself in the jump of a wooden barrier.
An a priori anecdotal performance which registered him in popular culture.
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