Look up dolce in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Dolce means "sweet" in Italian and may refer to:

Places[link]

• Dolcè, an Italian municipality located in the Province of Verona
• Dolce (Plzeň-South District), a village in the Czech Republic

People[link]

• Christine Dolce
• Lodovico Dolce, Italian humanist of the Renaissance
• Joe Dolce, singer/songwriter
• Dolce dell'Anguillara, an Italian condottiero

Music[link]

• Dolce, sweet, gentle
• Dolce (album), album by J-Pop artist Ami Suzuki

Other[link]

• Dolce (satellite television), Romanian satellite television provider
• Dolce, a Pomeranian owned by tennis star Maria Sharapova, featured in a 2007-2008 Canon ad campaign.^[1]
• Dolce & Gabbana, Italian Fashion house
• DOLCE: Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering
• La Dolce Vita, the sweet life
• La Dolce Vita (TV series)
• Dolce Stil Novo, sweet new style

References[link]

Dolce Social Ballroom (Toronto, Canada)

See also[link]

• Dulce (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Chael Sonnen
Chael Sonnen at UFC 115 in Vancouver, Canada, on June 11, 2010.
Born	Chael Patrick Sonnen (1977-04-03) April 3, 1977 (age 35) West Linn, Oregon, United States
Other names	The Foreman American Gangster[1] The People's Champ[2]
Nationality	American
Height	6 ft 1 in (1.85 m)
Weight	185.5 lb (84 kg; 13 st 4 lb)
Division	Middleweight (185 lb) Light Heavyweight (205 lb)
Reach	74 in (188 cm)
Stance	Southpaw
Fighting out of	Portland, Oregon, United States
Team	Team Quest
Wrestling	NCAA Division I Wrestling Olympic Alternate Greco-Roman wrestling
Years active	1997, 2002–present (MMA)[3][4]
Mixed martial arts record
Total	39
Wins	27
By knockout	7
By submission	4
By decision	16
Losses	11
By knockout	2
By submission	8
By decision	1
Draws	1
Amateur career
Total	2
Wins	2
By knockout	2
Other information
Occupation	Mixed martial artist, promoter and entrepreneur
University	University of Oregon
Mixed martial arts record from Sherdog
last updated on: October 11, 2011

Chael Patrick Sonnen^[5] (pronounced /ˈtʃeɪl ˈsʌnən/; born April 3, 1977) is an American mixed martial artist who competes as a middleweight in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He was an NCAA Division I All-American wrestler at the University of Oregon, a silver medalist at the 2000 Greco-Roman World University Championships,^[6] as well as a two-time Dave Schultz Memorial International Greco-Roman winner.

As of October 2011^[update], Sonnen is ranked as the No. 2 middleweight in the world by Sherdog.^[7]

Early life[link]

Sonnen was born Chael Patrick Sonnen on April 3, 1977 in West Linn, Oregon.

Mixed martial arts career[link]

Sonnen started his MMA career at the age of 19 in 1997 by defeating Ben Hailey in Vancouver, Washington. His second fight was against future ICON Sport Middleweight Champion and Strikeforce Middleweight contender Jason "Mayhem" Miller. Sonnen went 6–0 in his first six fights, until his loss to Trevor Prangley, which he later avenged in 2006 at UFC Ultimate Fight Night 4. He also fought The Ultimate Fighter winner and former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Forrest Griffin.

UFC[link]

Sonnen made his UFC debut against former IFC and Strikeforce Light Heavyweight Champion Renato Sobral at UFC 55, where Sonnen fought for his first time at Light Heavyweight. He lost via triangle choke in the second round. Afterwards, he avenged his first ever MMA defeat by defeating Trevor Prangley at UFC Ultimate Fight Night 4 by unanimous decision. Then, for a third time, he fought Jeremy Horn at UFC 60 and lost via armbar. Having gone 1–2 in the Octagon, Sonnen was released from the UFC.

Bodog Fight[link]

After leaving the UFC, Sonnen was signed by Bodog Fight. He earned his first victory in Bodog Fight by defeating Tim Credeur via TKO. After that he fought Alexey Oleinik to a unanimous decision victory, and defeated Tim McKenzie via brabo choke within the first 15 seconds of the opening round. After quickly dismantling McKenzie, Sonnen fought UFC and Pride veteran Amar Suloev and won via TKO. After Bodog, Sonnen defeated future Ultimate Fighter member Kyacey Uscola at SuperFight 20: Homecoming.

World Extreme Cagefighting[link]

In December 2007, Sonnen fought Paulo Filho for the WEC middleweight championship. Sonnen lost via submission at 4:55 of the second round. There was controversy stemming from the fight stoppage, however. Sonnen did not tap out but yelled out, and the referee took that as a verbal submission and stopped the fight. In his post-fight interview Sonnen said that he told the referee not to stop the fight, and continually said "No" when the referee asked if he wanted to submit.^[8]

A rematch between the two was scheduled for March 26, 2008, but was cancelled due to Paulo Filho checking himself into a rehabilitation clinic for an unknown substance abuse problem.^[9] Sonnen instead faced undefeated WEC middleweight contender Bryan Baker and dominated him for three rounds, winning a unanimous decision.^[10] Sonnen and Filho eventually met again on November 5, 2008, where Sonnen soundly defeated Filho by unanimous decision. Prior to the fight, Filho did not make weight, weighing in at close to seven pounds over 185, thus making the bout a non-title match and taking away the chance for Sonnen to rematch for the WEC title. After Filho lost, he announced he would ship Sonnen the championship belt.^[11]

Return to UFC[link]

Following the dissolution of the WEC's middleweight division Sonnen was moved back over to the UFC, in his first fight in the promotion since UFC 60, he lost via triangle choke to Demian Maia at UFC 95.

Sonnen defeated Dan Miller at UFC 98 on May 23 via unanimous decision. Sonnen showed his willingness and toughness as a fighter and came in as a late replacement for Yushin Okami when Okami sustained a torn ligament in training.^[12] Sonnen took the fight on 22 days notice and lost 36 pounds to compete.^[13] Incidentally in his next fight, Sonnen out-wrestled Okami at UFC 104 to a unanimous decision victory.^[14] The weeks proceeding the fight, Okami trained with Chael Sonnen and his camp for a number of weeks. Chael Sonnen commented on Okami's size, strength and skill set as well as his relationship with Okami as something close to a brother.

Sonnen was expected to face Nate Marquardt on February 21, 2010 at UFC 110, but the fight was moved up and the two fought at UFC 109 on February 6, with Sonnen winning via unanimous decision after out-wrestling the heavily favored Marquardt for three rounds. Marquardt caught Sonnen in two very deep guillotine chokes in the first and third rounds; however, Sonnen managed to get free. With the victory, Sonnen solidified his position as the next fighter in line to challenge Anderson Silva for the UFC Middleweight Championship.

Middleweight Championship Fight[link]

Sonnen fought Anderson Silva for the UFC Middleweight Championship on August 7, 2010 at UFC 117.^[15] Sonnen trash talked during the build up to the fight, which caused some controversy, as he stated that he was going to retire Silva.^[16][17][18] Sonnen won each of the first four rounds on all of the judges' scorecards, with the score heading into the fifth round being 40–34, 40–35, and 40–36.^[19][20] However in the final round Sonnen found himself caught in a triangle/armbar combination by the champion. Sonnen tapped and lost the fight by triangle at 3:10 in the fifth round. Sonnen later stated in an interview it was the choke, not the armbar, that had caused him to submit.

CSAC Suspensions and Appeals[link]

Drug tests conducted at the time of his match with Anderson Silva showed that Sonnen had an elevated testosterone/epitestosterone (or T/E) ratio which fell outside the allowable range. Specifically, Sonnen’s urinalysis showed that his T/E ratio was 16.9:1. By comparison, an average man has a T/E ratio of 1:1, and testing bodies such as CSAC may allow for a variance as high as 4:1 for athletes—meaning Sonnen's T/E ratio was nearly 17 times that of a normal man and more than four times higher than the allowed maximum for an athlete.^[21] Sonnen was fined $2,500 and suspended for one year (until September 2, 2011) by CSAC.^[22] Sonnen's scheduled rematch with Silva was cancelled in light of the suspension.^[23][24]

Initial Appeal[link]

Sonnen filed an appeal from CSAC's decision,^[25] and that hearing was held on December 2, 2010. The principal grounds of Sonnen's appeal were that: (i) he had a medical justification for taking testosterone; and (ii) he believed that he had already taken the necessary steps to disclose the condition and treatment to CSAC. Specifically, Sonnen testified that in 2008 he had been diagnosed with hypogonadism and was undergoing Testosterone replacement therapy (or TRT) in the form of synthetic testosterone which he self-injected twice weekly.^[26] Sonnen was joined at the hearing by his family physician, Dr. Mark Czarnecki, who confirmed that he had diagnosed Sonnen with hypogonadism and had prescribed the twice weekly testosterone injections in 2008.

In his further sworn testimony, Sonnen claimed to have been previously approved for TRT by the Nevada State Athletic Commission (NSAC), and to have spoken directly to NSAC's Executive Director, Keith Kizer, who allegedly informed Sonnen that he was approved for TRT and should not again disclose the treatment on the pre-bout medical disclosure statements required by NSAC.^[27] Sonnen testified that he believed Keith Kizer's alleged advice about omitting his TRT on Nevada disclosure forms applied equally to the forms of other state Athletic Commissions.^[27] Additionally, Sonnen testified that he had previously disclosed his condition to CSAC, specifically citing his UFC 104 bout against Yushin Okami, which took place in Los Angeles on October 24, 2009.^[28] Based on the above sworn testimony, CSAC voted to re-characterize Sonnen's transgression as a failure to properly disclose a medical treatment, and correspondingly reduced his suspension from 12 to six months, ending March 2, 2011.

Keith Kizer has since publicly responded to Sonnen's testimony, stating that NSAC had never approved Sonnen for TRT, that Sonnen had never applied for the approval process, and that he "[had] never talked to Chael Sonnen in [his] life."^[23][29][30] At a subsequent meeting between the UFC, Sonnen, and NSAC, Kizer confronted Sonnen about the false testimony he had given at the December 2, 2010 CSAC hearing. According to Kizer, Sonnen initially deflected Kizer's questions, but when pressed further, admitted that no such conversation had occurred, explaining that "My manager and you talked about therapeutic exemptions, and therefore, I just used the wrong word. I should have said 'my' instead of 'I.' As in 'my manager' instead of 'I'" which Kizer said was a "strange story" and a "ridiculous explanation"^[31] Incidentally, Kizer has acknowledged speaking with Sonnen's manager, Matt Lindland, about TRT, but stated that the conversation concerned only the procedure itself, not the application of any particular fighter.^[32]

CSAC Executive Director, George Dodd has also contradicted Sonnen's testimony, stating that CSAC has no documentation evidencing that Sonnen was approved for TRT, either for October 24, 2009 fight with Okami, or at all.^[33]

As of January 2012^[update], there is no documented approval by CSAC, NSAC or any other state Athletic Commission to corroborate Sonnen's testimony that he has ever been approved for TRT.

Subsequent Suspension by CSAC[link]

Sonnen's abbreviated CSAC suspension expired on March 2, 2011. However, in the third week of April 2011, after working out the details with Kizer, the CSAC announced they had reversed their decision to lower his sentence, placing him on indefinite administrative suspension, due to his conviction for money laundering (see below), and his possibly false testimony during the hearing of December 2, 2010.^[32] Sonnen appeared before the Commission on May 18, 2011 to request that the suspension be lifted. After hearing testimony from Keith Kizer via streaming video, as well as Sonnen and his supporters, CSAC voted 4–1 to uphold Sonnen's indefinite suspension. Two days later, CSAC clarified that the applicable regulations only allowed for Sonnen to be suspended until his existing license expired (i.e., June 29, 2011).^[34] CSAC has stated that should Sonnen apply for a new license after June 29, 2011, he would have to re-appear before CSAC and it remained within the Commission's discretion to deny Sonnen's application.^[35]

Return to UFC[link]

After the expiration of his suspension related to his elevated testosterone/epitestosterone ratio, Sonnen returned to the UFC, defeating Brian Stann in the second round via arm triangle choke on October 8, 2011 at UFC 136.

With Silva expected to be sidelined until mid 2012 recovering from various injuries, Sonnen was expected to face Mark Muñoz on January 28, 2012 at UFC on Fox 2.^[36] However, Muñoz was forced out of the bout with an injury and replaced by Michael Bisping.^[37] He won the fight via unanimous decision.^[38]

A rematch with Anderson Silva was expected to take place on June 23, 2012 at UFC 147.^[39] However, on April 20, according to a published report from Sherdog.com, the bout is now expected to take place on July 7, 2012 at UFC 148, while the expected co-feature of the Brazilian event, a rematch between Vitor Belfort and Wanderlei Silva would headline that event. The changes are due to a scheduling conflict with the UN Conference, Rio+20, which will be occurring during the same time frame as the UFC event.^[40]

Money laundering conviction[link]

Sonnen pled guilty to charges of money laundering in connection with mortgage fraud on January 3, 2011. The maximum sentence is 20 years in prison and a $500,000 fine,^[41] but as a result of his plea and agreeing to cooperate with the investigation into a ring of mortgage fraud (cooperating as a witness against others involved^[42]), Sonnen is expected to receive two years probation, a $10,000 fine, and the revocation of his realtor license.^[43] Sonnen, a licensed realtor in the State of Oregon, admitted that a financial transaction he conducted was designed to conceal or disguise the ownership and control of the proceeds of wire fraud.^[44]

As the agent for a home sale, Sonnen told the title company to pay a plumbing company owned by Sonnen's mother^[45] for repairs, even though he knew that they would not be carried out.^[46] After the mortgage company agreed to the loan, the plumbing company was paid $69,000, and then the plumbing company, at Sonnen's direction, paid the home buyer $65,000.^[47]

Sonnen was fined $10,000 and sentenced to two years of probation.^[48]

Championships and accomplishments[link]

Amateur wrestling[link]

• National Collegiate Athletic Association
  • NCAA Division I All-American out of University of Oregon (1998)^[49][50]
  • NCAA Division I 190 lb – 8th place out of University of Oregon (1998)^[51]
  • Pac-10 Conference 190 lb – 5th place out of University of Oregon (1997)^[52]
• Oregon Wrestling Classic
  • Oregon Wrestling Classic 190 1b – 5th place (1997)^[52]
• University National Greco-Roman Championships
  • University National Greco-Roman Championships 190 1b – 3rd place out of University of Oregon (1997)^[52]
• World University Championships
  • World University Championships Greco-Roman Seniors 85 kg – second place (2000)^[53]
• Dave Schultz Memorial International
  • Dave Schultz Memorial International Greco-Roman Seniors 85 kg – winner (2000)^[54]
  • Dave Schultz Memorial International Greco-Roman Seniors 97 kg – winner (2001)^[55][56]
  • Dave Schultz Memorial International Greco-Roman Seniors 84 kg – third place (2002)^[57]

Mixed martial arts[link]

• Ultimate Fighting Championship
  • Fight of the Night (Two times)
• Gladiator Challenge
  • Gladiator Challenge Light Heavyweight Championship (One time)^[50]
• Hitman Fighting Productions
  • Hitman Light Heavyweight Championship (One time)^[50]
• Danger Zone
  • Danger Zone Light Heavyweight Championship (One time)^[50]
  • Danger Zone Light Heavyweight Tournament Winner
• Rumble at the River
  • Rumble at the River Tournament Winner^[50]
• World MMA Awards
  • Fight of the Year (2010) – Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen
• Wrestling Observer Newsletter awards
  • Best on Interviews (2010)^[58]

Mixed martial arts record[link]

See also[link]

• List of male mixed martial artists
• List of sportspeople sanctioned for doping offences

References[link]

External links[link]

• Professional MMA record for Chael Sonnen from Sherdog
• Chael Sonnen profile at the National Wrestling Hall of Fame
• Official UFC Profile
• Mixing Martial Arts Profile

Andriy Danylko
Background information
Birth name	Andriy Mykhailovych Danylko
Also known as	Verka Serduchka
Born	(1973-10-02) 2 October 1973 (age 38)
Origin	Poltava, Ukrainian SSR, USSR
Genres	Comedy, Parody, Pop
Occupations	Comedian, Singer
Instruments	Singing
Years active	1998 – present
Labels	CD Land, MamaMusic
Website	http://www.serduchka.com

Andriy Mykhailovych Danylko (Ukrainian: Андрі́й Миха́йлович Дани́лко) (born 2 October 1973 in Poltava, Ukrainian SSR), better known as his drag character Verka Serduchka (Ukrainian: Вєрка Сердючка), is a Ukrainian comedian and pop and dance singer. In the role of Serduchka, he represented Ukraine in the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 and finished in second place. In his career Serduchka has sold over 600,000 records in Ukraine.

Biography[link]

Early career[link]

In 1990, Andriy Danylko started to create the character Verka Serduchka, a flamboyant middle-aged female railroad car steward from a rural family. At a humor contest in Poltava on 4 January 1991, he presented Verka Serduchka publicly for the first time. He invented the character's name by combining the randomly picked first name Verka and the last name of a former school classmate, Anya Serduk.^[1][2] Apart from pop and dance numbers, Danylko has also performed ambient musical compositions under his real name. His popularity, however, is firmly established on the stage personality of Verka Serduchka, and most of his performances are done under this stage name.

Following Verka Serduchka, Danylko created other characters, such as a militsioner, a soldier and a female ballet dancer. In such a fashion, the Danylko Theater was established, touring cities of Russia and Ukraine. In 2002, Danylko, along with his group, toured in the CIS and Baltic countries, showing the program "I am a Revolution" for the whole year. The next year, soon after the Danylko Theater's concert tour, "I Was Born for Love", Andriy Danylko received the title of Honored Artist of Ukraine.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s (decade) he hosted a talk show called "SV-show" ("SV" is an abbreviation for Russian: Спальный Вагон, "Spalniy Vagon", which means sleeping car) on various Ukrainian television channels.^[3]

Eurovision Song Contest 2007[link]

Verka Serduchka with his ensemble in the Eurovision Song Contest 2007.

Verka Serduchka was chosen to represent Ukraine at the Eurovision Song Contest 2007 in Helsinki, Finland, with the song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai",^[4] and the performance finished in second place. Ukraine had been guaranteed an appearance in the final because of the top-ten finish of the previous year's Ukrainian representative, Tina Karol, with her song "Show Me Your Love".

The participation of Andriy Danylko in Eurovision was not without controversy in Ukraine. One of the nationwide FM radio stations organized a protest action in February 2007 to express their disapproval with the selection of Serduchka to represent the country.^[5] Some Ukrainians and even members of the Ukrainian Parliament expressed their disapproval with Serduchka's participation in the contest, because they saw it as "grotesque and vulgar".^[6][7]

Serduchka's song "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" was sung in 4 languages: German, English, Ukrainian, and Russian. The invented words "lasha tumbai" caused some controversy after the performance, because many people noted the phrase's similarity to "Russia Goodbye". In early publicity appearances, Serduchka claimed that "lasha tumbai" was an expression in the Mongolian language for "whipped cream". However, several Mongols on a talk show by Channel One (Russia), which was shown just before the Eurovision Song Contest 2007, stated that there is no phrase "lasha tumbai" in their language, and one of them pronounced the correct Mongolian phrase for "whipped cream".^[8] The Mongolian embassy in Moscow also said that "lasha tumbai" was total gibberish.^[9]

During the performance, Verka Serduchka wore clothes made by the famous company Dolce & Gabanna.^{[citation needed]}

The single for "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" reached #6 in the French charts and went on to be #28 on The Official UK Singles Chart on 20 May 2007. This was the first time a non-UK non-winning Eurovision entry had made UK charts since 1974.

Danylko later made a brief phone-in appearance on the BBC's The Graham Norton Show, in which his comments made no sense whatsoever. Another call was made, but with a translator in the audience. In this instance, Danylko told guest Andrew Lloyd Webber he was "rubbish". However, in an interview with Andrew Williams in the 60 Seconds column of metro.co.uk (30 July 2007), Danylko clarified his meaning:

AW: Why did you call Andrew Lloyd Webber ‘rubbish’ on The Graham Norton Show? AD: Someone interpreted Serduchka wrongly. I meant I watched "Cats: the Musical" on TV. It was boring. You should watch a musical on the stage. Don't watch "Cats" on TV.^[10]

In the same interview, he stated that "lasha tumbai" was a somewhat made-up phrase that sounds like the Mongolian phrase for "milkshake" and that many Russians nevertheless managed to interpret it as saying "Russia goodbye!".^{[citation needed]}

In 2011, a writer from British newspaper The Guardian described "Dancing Lasha Tumbai" as the "best song never to win Eurovision" before going on to describe Serduchka as "an oven-ready Christopher Biggins".^[11]

Personal life[link]

Danylko is reluctant about discussing his private life, but he has stated that he lived with a woman for 8 years, that it was a hard experience for him, and that after the breakup he became more creative again.^[12]

Eurovision 2011[link]

Serduchka had planned to participate in the Ukrainian national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2011. He automatically qualified for the final,^[13] but withdrew his nomination in October 2010.^[14]

Political life[link]

Danylko announced in 2007 that he would front a new political party, "For Ours!", to compete in that year's Ukrainian parliamentary election, but he later abandoned the idea. A public opinion poll in July 2007 placed 'For Ours! Verka Serduchka' at 2% overall support.^[15][16]

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

• Я рождена для любви (Ya rozhdena dlya lyubvi, I was born for love) (1998)
• Гоп-гоп (Hop-hop) (2002)
• Чита дрита (Chita drita) (2003)
• Ха-ра-шо (Kha-ra-sho - Good) (2003)
• Жениха хотела (Zhenikha khotela - I wanted a husband) (2004)
• После тебя (Posle tebya - After you) (2005) (released under the name Danylko: instrumental music)
• Новые песни Верки Сердючки (Novye pesni Verki Serdyuchki - The new songs of Verka Serduchka) (2006)
• Tralli-Valli (2006)
• Dancing Europe (2007)
• DoReMi DoReDo (2008)
• Alles Gut Mamba (2011)

Singles[link]

• Я не поняла (Ya ne ponyala, I didn't understand) (2003)
• Всё будет хорошо (Vsyo budet khorosho, Everything will be fine) (2003)
• Гоп гоп (Hop hop,^[17] Jump jump) (2003)
• Пирожок (Pyrozhok, Pie) (2003)
• Горилка (Horilka) (2003)
• Контролер (Kontroler, Ticket collector) (2003)
• Чита Дрита (Chyta-dryta) (2004)
• Попала На Любовь (Ya popala na lyubov, I Fell in Love) (2004)
• Тук тук тук (Tuk tuk tuk, Knock Knock Knock) (2004)
• Хорошо красавицам ('Tis swell to be a belle) (2006)
• Tralli-valli (2006)
• А я смеюсь (And I'm laughin') (2006)
• Dancing Lasha Tumbai (2007)
• Kiss please (2007)
• I am Eurovision Queen (2008)
• До-ре-ми (Do Re Mi) (2008)
• Essen (2008)
• Dolce & Gabbana (2010)

Dancing Lasha Tumbai Chart position[link]

Other songs[link]

• Переполох (Perepolokh) with Philip Kirkorov (2007)
• Горбачев (Gorbachev) (2008)

• Kafeshka (Café) with Philip Kirkorov
• Kerubino (As Andriy Danylko)
• Новогодняя (Novogodnyaya, (happy) new year). As Andriy Danylko, with Alla Pugacheva and various artists
• Danylko Tango (As Verka Serduchka & Andriy Danylko)
• Dolce & Gabbana (2009)
• I Love You (2010)

DVD[link]

• The Best. Clips of various years (2009)

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Verka Serduchka

• "Andriy Danylko's official website" (in English/Russian, it is coming soon as the site says). http://www.serduchka.com/. 
• "Biography" (in Ukrainian). KM Studio. http://www.kmstudio.com.ua/cheremshyna/serdiuchka.htm. 
• "Unofficial Verka Serducka's blog" (in Russian). http://serduchka.org/. 
• "The two faces of Verka Serduchka". Public Radio International. April 7, 2010. http://www.theworld.org/2010/04/the-two-faces-of-verka-serduchka/. 

Federico Fellini
Born	(1920-01-20)January 20, 1920 Rimini, Italy
Died	October 31, 1993(1993-10-31) (aged 73) Rome, Italy
Occupation	Film director and scriptwriter
Years active	1945–1992
Influenced by	Charlie Chaplin, John Ford, Luis Buñuel, Sergei Parajanov, Akira Kurosawa, Ingmar Bergman
Influenced	Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, David Lynch, Terry Gilliam, Pedro Almodóvar, Dariush Mehrjui, John Waters, Alejandro Jodorowsky
Spouse	Giulietta Masina (m. 1943–1993, his death)

Federico Fellini (Italian pronunciation: [fedeˈriːko felˈliːni]; January 20, 1920 – October 31, 1993) was an Italian film director and scriptwriter. Known for a distinct style that blends fantasy and baroque images, he is considered one of the most influential filmmakers of the 20th century, and is widely revered.^[1] He won five Academy Awards and was nominated for 12 in a career that spanned over forty years.

Early life and education[link]

Rimini (1920–1938)[link]

Fellini was born on January 20, 1920 to middle-class parents in Rimini, then a small town on the Adriatic Sea. His father, Urbano Fellini (1894–1956), born to a family of Romagnol peasants and small landholders from Gambettola, moved to Rome in 1915 as a baker apprenticed to the Pantanella pasta factory. His mother, Ida Barbiani (1896–1984), came from a bourgeois Catholic family of Roman merchants. Despite her family’s vehement disapproval, she eloped with Urbano in 1917 to live at his parents' home in Gambettola.^[2] A civil marriage followed in 1918 with the religious ceremony held at Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome a year later. The couple settled in Rimini where Urbano became a traveling salesman and wholesale vendor. Fellini had two siblings: Riccardo (1921–1991), a documentary director for RAI Television, and Maria Maddalena (m. Fabbri; 1929–2002).

In 1924, Fellini started primary school in an institute run by the nuns of San Vincenzo in Rimini, attending the Carlo Tonni public school two years later. An attentive student, he spent his leisure time drawing, staging puppet shows, and reading Il corriere dei piccoli, the popular children’s magazine that reproduced traditional American cartoons by Winsor McCay, George McManus and Frederick Burr Opper. (Opper’s Happy Hooligan would provide the visual inspiration for Gelsomina in Fellini's 1954 film La strada; McCay’s Little Nemo would directly influence his 1980 film City of Women.)^[3] In 1926, he discovered the world of Grand Guignol, the circus with Pierino the Clown, and the movies. Guido Brignone’s Maciste all’Inferno (1926), the first film he saw, would mark him in ways linked to Dante and the cinema throughout his entire career.^[4]

Enrolled at the Ginnasio Giulio Cesare in 1929, he made friends with Luigi ‘Titta’ Benzi, later a prominent Rimini lawyer (and the model for young Titta in Amarcord (1973)). In Mussolini’s Italy, Fellini and Riccardo became members of the Avanguardista, the compulsory Fascist youth group for males. He visited Rome with his parents for the first time in 1933, the year of the maiden voyage of the transatlantic ocean liner SS Rex (which makes an appearance in Amarcord). The sea creature found on the beach at the end of La Dolce Vita (1960) has its basis in a giant fish marooned on a Rimini beach during a storm in 1934. Although Fellini adapted key events from his childhood and adolescence in films such as I Vitelloni (1953), 8½ (1963), and Amarcord (1973), he insisted that such autobiographical memories were inventions: "It is not memory that dominates my films. To say that my films are autobiographical is an overly facile liquidation, a hasty classification. It seems to me that I have invented almost everything: childhood, character, nostalgias, dreams, memories, for the pleasure of being able to recount them."^[5]

In 1937, Fellini opened Febo, a portrait shop in Rimini with the painter Demos Bonini. His first humorous article appeared in the "Postcards to Our Readers" section of Rimini’s Domenica del Corriere. Deciding on a career as a caricaturist and gag writer, Fellini travelled to Florence in 1938 where he published his first cartoon in the weekly 420. Failing his military culture exam, he graduated from high school in July 1938 after doubling the exam.

Rome (1939)[link]

In September 1939, he enrolled in law school at the University of Rome to please his parents although biographer Hollis Alpert reports that "there is no record of his ever having attended a class".^[6] Installed in a family pensione, he met another lifelong friend, the painter Rinaldo Geleng. Desperately poor, they unsuccessfully joined forces to draw sketches of restaurant and café patrons. Fellini eventually found work as a cub reporter on the dailies Il Piccolo and Il Popolo di Roma but quit after a short stint, bored by the local court news assignments.

Four months after publishing his first article in Marc’Aurelio, the highly influential biweekly humour magazine, he joined the editorial board, achieving success with a regular column titled Will You Listen to What I Have to Say?^[7] Described as “the determining moment in Fellini’s life”,^[8] he enjoyed steady employment between 1939 and 1942, interacting with writers, gagmen, and scriptwriters that eventually led to opportunities in show business and cinema. Among his collaborators on the magazine’s editorial board were the future director Ettore Scola, Marxist theorist and scriptwriter Cesare Zavattini, and Bernardino Zapponi, a future Fellini screenwriter. Conducting interviews for CineMagazzino also proved congenial: when asked to interview Aldo Fabrizi, Italy’s most popular variety performer, their immediate personal rapport led to professional collaboration. Specializing in humorous monologues, Fabrizi commissioned material from his young protégé.^[9]

Career and later life[link]

Early screenplays (1940-43)[link]

Retained on business in Rimini, Urbano sent wife and family to Rome in 1940 to share an apartment with his son. Fellini and Ruggero Maccari, also on the staff of Marc’Aurelio, began writing radio sketches and gags for films. Not yet twenty and with Fabrizi’s help, Fellini obtained his first screen credit as a comedy writer on Mario Mattoli’s Il pirata sono io (The Pirate's Dream). Progressing rapidly to numerous collaborations on films at Cinecittà, his circle of professional acquaintances widened to include novelist Vitaliano Brancati and scriptwriter Piero Tellini. In the wake of Mussolini’s declaration of war against France and England on June 10, 1940, he discovered Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, Gogol, John Steinbeck and William Faulkner along with French films by Marcel Carné, René Clair, and Julien Duvivier.^[10] In 1941 he published Il mio amico Pasqualino, a 74-page booklet in ten chapters describing the absurd adventures of Pasqualino, an alter ego.^[11]

Writing for radio while attempting to avoid the draft, Fellini met his future wife Giulietta Masina in a studio office at the Italian public radio broadcaster EIAR in autumn 1942. Well-paid as the voice of Pallina in Fellini's radio serial, Cico and Pallina, Masina was also known for her musical-comedy broadcasts which cheered an audience depressed by the war.^[12] In November 1942, Fellini was sent to Libya, occupied by Fascist Italy, to work on the screenplay of I cavalieri del deserto (Knights of the Desert, 1942), directed by Osvaldo Valenti and Gino Talamo. Fellini welcomed the assignment as it allowed him "to secure another extension on his draft order".^[13] Responsible for emergency re-writing, he also directed the film's first scenes. When Tripoli fell under siege by British forces, he and his colleagues made a narrow escape by boarding a German military plane flying to Sicily. His African adventure, later published in Marc’Aurelio as "The First Flight", marked “the emergence of a new Fellini, no longer just a screenwriter, working and sketching at his desk, but a filmmaker out in the field”.^[14]

The apolitical Fellini was finally freed of the draft when an Allied air raid over Bologna destroyed his medical records. Fellini and Giulietta hid in her aunt’s apartment until Mussolini's fall on July 25, 1943. After dating for nine months, the couple were married on October 30, 1943. Several months later, Masina fell down the stairs and suffered a miscarriage. She gave birth to a son, Pierfederico, on March 22, 1944 but the child died of encephalitis three weeks later. The tragedy had enduring emotional and artistic repercussions.^[15]

Neorealist apprenticeship (1944–1949)[link]

After the Allied liberation of Rome on June 4, 1944, Fellini and Enrico De Seta opened the Funny Face Shop where they survived the postwar recession drawing caricatures of American soldiers. He became involved with Italian Neorealism when Roberto Rossellini, at work on Stories of Yesteryear (later Rome, Open City), met Fellini in his shop proposing he contribute gags and dialogue for the script . Aware of Fellini’s reputation as Aldo Fabrizi’s “creative muse”,^[16] Rossellini also requested he try to convince the actor to play the role of Father Giuseppe Morosini, the parish priest executed by the SS on April 4, 1944.

In 1947, Fellini and Sergio Amidei received an Oscar nomination for the screenplay of Rome, Open City.

Working as both screenwriter and assistant director on Rossellini’s Paisà (Paisan) in 1946, Fellini was entrusted to film the Sicilian scenes in Maiori. In February 1948, he was introduced to Marcello Mastroianni, then a young theatre actor appearing in a play with Giulietta Masina.^[17] Establishing a close working relationship with Alberto Lattuada, Fellini co-wrote the director’s Senza pietà (Without Pity) and Il mulino del Po (The Mill on the Po). Fellini also worked with Rossellini on the anthology film L'Amore (1948), co-writing the screenplay and in one segment titled, "The Miracle", acting opposite Anna Magnani. To play the role of a vagabond rogue mistaken by Magnani for a saint, Fellini had to bleach his black hair blond.

Early films (1950-53)[link]

In 1950 Fellini co-produced and co-directed with Alberto Lattuada Variety Lights (Luci del varietà), his first feature film. A backstage comedy set among the world of small-time travelling performers, it featured Giulietta Masina and Lattuada’s wife, Carla del Poggio. Its release to poor reviews and limited distribution proved disastrous for all concerned. The production company went bankrupt, leaving both Fellini and Lattuada with debts to pay for over a decade.^[18] In February 1950, Paisà received an Oscar nomination for the screenplay by Rossellini, Sergio Amidei, and Fellini.

After travelling to Paris for a script conference with Rossellini on Europa '51, Fellini began production on The White Sheik in September 1951, his first solo-directed feature. Starring Alberto Sordi in the title role, the film is a revised version of a treatment first written by Michelangelo Antonioni in 1949 and based on the fotoromanzi, the photographed cartoon strip romances popular in Italy at the time. Producer Carlo Ponti commissioned Fellini and Tullio Pinelli to write the script but Antonioni rejected the story they developed. With Ennio Flaiano, they re-worked the material into a light-hearted satire about newlywed couple Ivan and Wanda Cavalli (Leopoldo Trieste, Brunello Bovo) in Rome to visit the Pope. Ivan’s prissy mask of respectability is soon demolished by his wife’s obsession with the White Sheik. Highlighting the music of Nino Rota, the film was selected at Cannes (among the films in competition was Orson Welles’s Othello) and then retracted. Screened at the 13th Venice Film Festival, it was razzed by critics in “the atmosphere of a soccer match”.^[19] One reviewer declared that Fellini had “not the slightest aptitude for cinema direction”.

In 1953, I Vitelloni found favour with the critics and public. Winning the Silver Lion Award in Venice, it secured Fellini’s first international distributor.

Beyond neorealism (1954-60)[link]

Fellini directed La strada based on a script completed in 1952 with Pinelli and Flaiano. During the last three weeks of shooting, Fellini experienced the first signs of severe clinical depression.^[20] Aided by his wife, he undertook a brief period of therapy with Freudian psychoanalyst Emilio Servadio.^[20]

Fellini cast American actor Broderick Crawford to interpret the role of an aging swindler in Il Bidone. Based partly on stories told to him by a petty thief during production of La strada, Fellini developed the script into a con man’s slow descent towards a solitary death. To incarnate the role’s “intense, tragic face”, Fellini’s first choice had been Humphrey Bogart^[21] but after learning of the actor’s lung cancer, chose Crawford after seeing his face on the theatrical poster of All the King’s Men (1949). The film shoot was wrought with difficulties stemming from Crawford’s alcoholism.^[22] Savaged by critics at the 16th Venice Film Festival, the film did miserable box office and did not receive international distribution until 1964.

During the autumn, Fellini researched and developed a treatment based on a film adaptation of Mario Tobino’s novel, The Free Women of Magliano. Located in a mental institution for women, financial backers considered the subject had no potential and the project was abandoned.

While preparing Nights of Cabiria in spring 1956, Fellini learned of his father’s death by cardiac arrest at the age of 62. Produced by Dino De Laurentiis and starring Giulietta Masina, the film took its inspiration from news reports of a woman’s decapitated head retrieved in a lake and stories by Wanda, a shantytown prostitute Fellini met on the set of Il Bidone.^[23] Pier Paolo Pasolini was hired to translate Flaiano and Pinelli’s dialogue into Roman dialect and to supervise researches in the vice-afflicted suburbs of Rome. The movie won an Academy Award as Best Foreign Film and brought Masina the Best Actress Award at Cannes for her performance.

With Pinelli, he developed Journey with Anita for Sophia Loren and Gregory Peck. An “invention born out of intimate truth”, the script was based on Fellini's return to Rimini with a mistress to attend his father's funeral.^[24] Due to Loren’s unavailability, the project was shelved and resurrected twenty-five years later as Lovers and Liars (1981), a comedy directed by Mario Monicelli with Goldie Hawn and Giancarlo Giannini. For Eduardo De Filippo, he co-wrote the script of Fortunella, tailoring the lead role to accommodate Masina’s particular sensibility.

The Hollywood on the Tiber phenomenon of 1958 in which American studios profited from the cheap studio labour available in Rome provided the backdrop for photojournalists to steal shots of celebrities on the via Veneto.^[25] The scandal provoked by Turkish dancer Haish Nana’s improvised striptease at a nightclub captured Fellini’s imagination: he decided to end his latest script-in-progress, Moraldo in the City, with an all-night “orgy” at a seaside villa. Pierluigi Praturlon’s photos of Anita Ekberg wading fully dressed in the Trevi Fountain provided further inspiration for Fellini and his scriptwriters. Changing the title of the screenplay to La Dolce Vita, Fellini soon clashed with his producer on casting: the director insisted on the relatively unknown Mastroianni while De Laurentiis wanted Paul Newman as a hedge on his investment. Reaching an impasse, De Laurentiis sold the rights to publishing mogul Angelo Rizzoli. Shooting began on March 16, 1959 with Anita Ekberg climbing the stairs to the cupola of Saint Peter’s in a mammoth décor constructed at Cinecittà. The statue of Christ flown by helicopter over Rome to Saint Peter's Square was inspired by an actual media event on May 1, 1956, which Fellini had witnessed. The film wrapped August 15 on a deserted beach at Passo Oscuro with a bloated mutant fish designed by Piero Gherardi.

La Dolce Vita broke all box office records. Despite scalpers selling tickets at 1000 lire,^[26] crowds queued in line for hours to see an “immoral movie” before the censors banned it. At an exclusive Milan screening on February 5, 1960, one outraged patron spat on Fellini while others hurled insults. Denounced in parliament by right-wing conservatives, undersecretary Domenico Magrì of the Christian Democrats demanded tolerance for the film’s controversial themes.^[27] The Vatican's official press organ, l'Osservatore Romano, lobbied for censorship while the Board of Roman Parish Priests and the Genealogical Board of Italian Nobility attacked the film. In one documented instance involving favourable reviews written by the Jesuits of San Fedele, defending La Dolce Vita had severe consequences.^[28] In competition at Cannes alongside Antonioni’s L’Avventura, the film won the Palme d'Or awarded by presiding juror Georges Simenon. The Belgian writer was promptly “hissed at” by the disapproving festival crowd.^[29]

Art films and dreams (1961–1969)[link]

A major discovery for Fellini after his Italian neorealism period (1950–1959) was the work of Carl Jung. After meeting Jungian psychoanalyst Dr. Ernst Bernhard in early 1960, he read Jung's autobiography, Memories, Dreams, Reflections (1963). Bernhard also recommended that Fellini consult the I Ching and keep a record of his dreams. What Fellini formerly accepted as "his extrasensory perceptions"^[30] were now interpreted as psychic manifestations of the unconscious. Bernhard’s focus on Jungian depth psychology proved to be the single greatest influence on Fellini’s mature style and marked the turning point in his work from neorealism to filmmaking that was “primarily oneiric”.^[31] As a consequence, Jung's seminal ideas on the anima and the animus, the role of archetypes and the collective unconscious directly influenced such films as 8½ (1963), Juliet of the Spirits (1965), Satyricon (1969), Casanova (1976), and City of Women (1980).^[32]

Exploiting La Dolce Vita’s success, financier Angelo Rizzoli set up Federiz in 1960, an independent film company, for Fellini and production manager Clemente Fracassi to discover and produce new talent. Despite the best intentions, their guarded editorial and business skills forced the company to close down soon after cancelling Pasolini’s project, Accattone (1961).

Condemned as a “public sinner”^[33] for La Dolce Vita, Fellini responded with The Temptations of Doctor Antonio, a segment in the omnibus Boccaccio '70. His first colour film, it was the sole project green-lighted at Federiz. Infused with the surrealistic satire that characterized the young Fellini’s work at Marc’Aurelio, the film ridiculed a crusader against vice who goes insane trying to censor a billboard of Anita Ekberg espousing the virtues of milk.

In an October 1960 letter to his colleague Brunello Rondi, Fellini first outlined his film ideas about a man suffering creative block: "Well then - a guy (a writer? any kind of professional man? a theatrical producer?) has to interrupt the usual rhythm of his life for two weeks because of a not-too-serious disease. It’s a warning bell: something is blocking up his system."^[34] Unclear about the script, its title, and his protagonist’s profession, he scouted locations throughout Italy “looking for the film”^[35] in the hope of resolving his confusion. Flaiano suggested La bella confusione (literally A Fine Confusion) as the movie’s title. Under pressure from his producers, Fellini finally settled on 8½, a self-referential title referring principally (but not exclusively)^[36] to the number of films he had directed up to that time.

Giving the order to start production in spring 1962, Fellini signed deals with his producer Rizzoli, fixed dates, had sets constructed, cast Mastroianni, Anouk Aimée, and Sandra Milo in lead roles, and did screen tests at the Scalera Studios in Rome. He hired cinematographer Gianni Di Venanzo, among key personnel. But apart from naming his hero Guido Anselmi, he still couldn't decide what his character did for a living.^[37] The crisis came to a head in April when, sitting in his Cinecittà office, he began a letter to Rizzoli confessing he had "lost his film" and had to abandon the project. Interrupted by the chief machinist requesting he celebrate the launch of 8½, Fellini put aside the letter and went on the set. Raising a toast to the crew, he "felt overwhelmed by shame… I was in a no exit situation. I was a director who wanted to make a film he no longer remembers. And lo and behold, at that very moment everything fell into place. I got straight to the heart of the film. I would narrate everything that had been happening to me. I would make a film telling the story of a director who no longer knows what film he wanted to make".^[38]

Shooting began on May 9, 1962. Perplexed by the seemingly chaotic, incessant improvisation on the set, Deena Boyer, the director’s American press officer at the time, asked for a rationale. Fellini told her that he hoped to convey the three levels “on which our minds live: the past, the present, and the conditional - the realm of fantasy”.^[39] After shooting wrapped on October 14, Nino Rota composed various circus marches and fanfares that would later become signature tunes of the maestro’s cinema.^[40] Nominated for four Oscars, 8½ won awards for best foreign language film and best costume design in black-and-white. In Hollywood for the ceremony, Fellini toured Disneyland with Walt Disney the day after.

Increasingly attracted to parapsychology, Fellini met the Turin magician Gustavo Rol in 1963. Rol, a former banker, introduced him to the world of Spiritism and séances. In 1964, Fellini experimented with LSD 25^[41] under the supervision of Emilio Servadio, his psychoanalyst during production of La strada.^[42] For years reserved about what actually occurred that Sunday afternoon, he admitted in 1992 that

"objects and their functions no longer had any significance. All I perceived was perception itself, the hell of forms and figures devoid of human emotion and detached from the reality of my unreal environment. I was an instrument in a virtual world that constantly renewed its own meaningless image in a living world that was itself perceived outside of nature. And since the appearance of things was no longer definitive but limitless, this paradisiacal awareness freed me from the reality external to my self. The fire and the rose, as it were, became one."^[43]

Fellini's hallucinatory insights were given full flower in his first colour feature Juliet of the Spirits (1965), depicting Giulietta Masina as a housewife, Juliet, who rightly suspects her husband's infidelity and succumbs to hearing voices of spirits summoned at a séance at her home. Her sexually voracious next door neighbor Suzy (Sandra Milo) introduces Juliet to a world of uninhibited sensuality but Juliet is haunted by childhood memories of her Catholic guilt and a teenaged friend who committed suicide. Complex and filled with psychological symbolism, the film is set to a jaunty score by Nino Rota.

Honours (1970–1980)[link]

Fellini received a lifetime achievement at the 27th Cannes Film Festival in 1974.

Amarcord, a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age comedy, won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 1975.^[44]

The following year Fellini's Casanova won the Oscar for Best Costumes (Danilo Donati).

Late films and projects (1981–1990)[link]

Organized by his publisher Diogenes Verlag in 1982, the first major exhibition of 63 drawings by Fellini was held in Paris, Brussels, and the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York.^[45] A gifted caricaturist, much of the inspiration for his sketches was derived from his own dreams while the films-in-progress both originated from and stimulated drawings for characters, decor, costumes and set designs. Under the title, I disegni di Fellini (Fellini’s Designs), he published 350 drawings executed in pencil, watercolours, and felt pens.^[46]

On September 6, 1985 Fellini was awarded the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement at the 42nd Venice Film Festival. That same year, he became the first non-American to receive the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s annual award for cinematic achievement.

Long fascinated by Carlos Castaneda’s The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, Fellini accompanied the Peruvian author on a journey to the Yucatán to assess the feasibility of a film. After first meeting Castaneda in Rome in October 1984, Fellini drafted a treatment with Pinelli titled Viaggio a Tulun. Producer Alberto Grimaldi, prepared to buy film rights to all of Castaneda’s work, then paid for pre-production research taking Fellini and his entourage from Rome to Los Angeles and the jungles of Mexico in October 1985.^[47] When Castaneda inexplicably disappeared and the project fell through, Fellini’s mystico-shamanic adventures were scripted with Pinelli and serialized in Corriere della Sera in May 1986. A barely veiled satirical interpretation of Castaneda's work,^[48] Viaggio a Tulun was published in 1989 as a graphic novel with artwork by Milo Manara and as Trip to Tulum in America in 1990.

For Intervista, produced by Ibrahim Moussa and RAI Television, Fellini intercut memories of the first time he visited Cinecittà in 1939 with present-day footage of himself at work on a screen adaptation of Franz Kafka’s Amerika. A meditation on the nature of memory and film production, it won the special 40th Anniversary Prize at Cannes and the 15th Moscow Film Festival Grand Prize. In Brussels later that year, a panel of thirty professionals from eighteen European countries named Fellini the world’s best director and 8½ the best European film of all time.^[49]

In early 1989 Fellini began production on The Voice of the Moon, based on Ermanno Cavazzoni’s novel, Il poema dei lunatici (The Lunatics’ Poem). A small town was built at Empire Studios on the via Pontina outside Rome. Starring Roberto Benigni as Ivo Salvini, a madcap poetic figure newly released from a mental institution, the character is a combination of La strada's Gelsomina, Pinocchio, and Italian poet Giacomo Leopardi.^[50] Fellini improvised as he filmed, using as a guide a rough treatment written with Pinelli.^[51] Despite its modest critical and commercial success in Italy, and its warm reception by French critics, it failed to interest North American distributors.

Fellini won the Praemium Imperiale, the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in the visual arts, awarded by the Japan Art Association in 1990.^[52]

Final years (1991–1993)[link]

In July 1991 and April 1992, Fellini worked in close collaboration with Canadian filmmaker Damian Pettigrew to establish "the longest and most detailed conversations ever recorded on film".^[53] Described as the "Maestro's spiritual testament” by his biographer Tullio Kezich,^[54] excerpts culled from the conversations later served as the basis of their feature documentary, Fellini: I'm a Born Liar (2002) and the book, I'm a Born Liar: A Fellini Lexicon. Finding it increasingly difficult to secure financing for feature films, he developed a suite of television projects whose titles reflect their subjects: Attore, Napoli, L’Inferno, L’opera lirica, and L’America.

In April 1993, Fellini received his fifth Oscar for lifetime achievement "in recognition of his cinematic accomplishments that have thrilled and entertained audiences worldwide". On June 16, he entered the Cantonal Hospital in Zurich for an "angioplasty on his femoral artery"^[55] but suffered a stroke at the Grand Hotel in Rimini two months later. Partially paralyzed, he was first transferred to Ferrara for rehabilitation and then to the Policlinico Umberto I in Rome to be near his wife, also hospitalized. He suffered a second stroke and fell into an irreversible coma. Fellini died in Rome on October 31 at the age of 73, a day after his fiftieth wedding anniversary. The memorial service was held in Studio 5 at Cinecittà attended by an estimated “70,000 people”.^[56] At the request of Giulietta Masina, trumpeter Mauro Maur played the "Improvviso dell'Angelo" by Nino Rota during the funeral ceremony.^[57] Five months later on March 23, 1994, Giulietta Masina died of lung cancer.

Fellini, Masina and their son Pierfederico are buried in a bronze sepulchre sculpted by Arnaldo Pomodoro. Designed as a ship's prow, the tomb is located at the main entrance to the Cemetery of Rimini. The Federico Fellini Airport in Rimini is named in his honour.

Influence and legacy[link]

Dedicatory plaque to Fellini on Via Veneto, Rome:
To Federico Fellini, who made Via Veneto the stage for the "Sweet Life" - SPQR - January 20, 1995

Personal and highly idiosyncratic visions of society, Fellini's films are a unique combination of memory, dreams, fantasy and desire. The adjectives "Fellinian" and "Felliniesque" are "synonymous with any kind of extravagant, fanciful, even baroque image in the cinema and in art in general".^[3] La Dolce Vita contributed the term paparazzi to the English language, derived from Paparazzo, the photographer friend of journalist Marcello Rubini (Marcello Mastroianni).^[58]

Contemporary filmmakers such as Woody Allen, Pedro Almodovar, Tim Burton,^[59] Terry Gilliam,^[60] Emir Kusturica,^[61] David Lynch,^[62] Girish Kasaravalli, David Cronenberg, Martin Scorsese, and Juraj Jakubisko have cited Fellini's influence on their work.

Polish director, Wojciech Has, whose two major films, The Saragossa Manuscript (1965) and The Hour-Glass Sanatorium (1973) are examples of modernist fantasies, has been compared to Fellini for the sheer "luxuriance of his images".^[63]

I Vitelloni inspired European directors Juan Antonio Bardem, Marco Ferreri, and Lina Wertmuller and had an influence on Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets (1973), George Lucas's American Graffiti (1974), Joel Schumacher's St. Elmo's Fire (1985), and Barry Levinson's Diner (1987), among many others.^[64] When the American magazine Cinema asked Stanley Kubrick in 1963 to name his favorite films, the film director listed I Vitelloni as number one in his Top 10 list.^[65]

Nights of Cabiria was adapted as the Broadway musical Sweet Charity and the movie Sweet Charity (1969) by Bob Fosse starring Shirley MacLaine.

8½ inspired among others: Mickey One (Arthur Penn, 1965), Alex in Wonderland (Paul Mazursky, 1970), Beware of a Holy Whore (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1971), Day for Night (François Truffaut, 1973), All That Jazz (Bob Fosse, 1979), Stardust Memories (Woody Allen, 1980), Sogni d'oro (Nanni Moretti, 1981), Parad Planet (Vadim Abdrashitov, 1984), La Pelicula del rey (Carlos Sorin, 1986), Living in Oblivion (Tom DiCillo, 1995), 8½ Women (Peter Greenaway, 1999), Falling Down (Joel Schumacher, 1993), along with the successful Broadway musical, Nine (Maury Yeston and Arthur Kopit, 1982).^[66] Yo-Yo Boing! (1998), a Spanish novel by Puerto Rican writer Giannina Braschi, features a dream sequence with Fellini that was inspired by 8½.^{[citation needed]}