Sofia Villani Scicolone was born on September 20, 1934 in a slum called Pozzuoli, outside of Naples. She was the illegitimate daughter of Romilda Villani and Riccardo Scicolone. She has a sister who married Benito Mussolini’s son, Romano. As a child she bore the nickname of “stuzzicadente” which translates into “toothpick,” an unlikely moniker for a woman who would come to be known as “the Italian Marilyn Monroe.” Her mother won a Greta Garbo lookalike contest run by MGM in 1932, but she was only 17 at the time and her mother would not allow her to pursue her dream of becoming a star. She became pregnant with Sofia soon afterwards.
After landing a few small parts in “Quo Vadis” (1951) and “Variety Lights” (1950), Sophia met movie director Carlo Ponti who was more than twenty years her senior and probably the father figure who was so lacking in her formative years. She married him twice; the marriage annulled the first time in order to save Ponti from Italian charges of bigamy. In 1958, Ponti got a Mexican divorce from his first wife and married Sophia via proxy while she was in Hollywood filming “Houseboat” and dating co-star Cary Grant. They have been together for more than 45 years and have two sons.
Despite her talent as an actress, she suffered from stage fright and because of this, has never appeared in a theatrical production in front of a live audience. In 1960, she received an Academy Award for her performance in “Two Women (La Ciociara). It was the first “Best Actress” Oscar ever given for a role in a “foreign- language” film. Many of her movies were produced w by her husband and she played opposite Marcello Mastroanni many times.
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